Stepping into one room, a balcony visible through the double doors, I immediately spotted an ash tray on a dresser and walked over to inspect it.
I picked up one of Damon’s black cigarette butts in a sea of white ones and brought it to my nose. The earthy and spicy scent had the same overpowering sweetness I remembered.
I dropped it back in the ashtray, noticing all the white Davidoffs, too. Both of his brands.
Gazing around the bedroom, I took in the mussed sheets with the pillows at the foot of the bed, the bottles of Corona in the trash, and the floor littered with the foil wrappings from inside his cigarette boxes that Damon had a serial killer obsession with folding into tiny parcels until they couldn’t be folded anymore.
“He may not be here now, but he was,” I said, turning around to face her.
She held my gaze, remaining silent.
“Where is he now?” I asked, walking toward her.
“I don’t know.”
I cocked my head, repeating my question. “Where is he?”
“I don’t know.”
Another step toward her. “Where is he?”
“I don’t know.”
I backed her into the wall, heat filling my glare “He’s very possessive of you, isn’t he?”
She folded her full lips between her teeth, and there were so many things I didn’t yet understand—why Damon was so attached to her, why she was so loyal to him, and I didn’t have the slightest idea who the fuck she really was, but one thing I knew for sure. I could mess with Gabriel, I could dangle Rika like a worm on a hook, but this girl, right here, was the one person to drive Damon insane.
She was his weakness.
“Perhaps I don’t need to look for him, after all,” I told her. “I have you, and he’ll come to me, won’t he? With the right motivation.”
Her eyes snapped up to mine, and I caught a flinch of worry before she hid it.
But that one flinch was everything. It was a crack—one of the only ones I’d seen—in her hard, cold exterior.
And for a moment I forgot all about Damon Torrance.
“Ask me not to hurt him,” I said, my voice cracking unexpectedly.
But she just stared at me, her gaze faltering only slightly.
I inched closer, feeling her body’s heat. “Did it ever occur to you that all you would have to do is ask?”
I needed Damon, so I could get the location of the goddamn body out of him before he decided to use it against me, but I didn’t have to hurt him. That was up to him. And maybe her.
She searched my eyes, the endless abyss of her green ones starting to glisten. Her chin trembled, and she shook her head slowly, at war with herself.
“You can’t, can you? You won’t ask me for anything.”
She dropped her eyes, her chest caving.
“Do you love him?” I asked.
“Yes.”
Her head was still down as she whispered, but I heard the quick reply well enough.
“Yes,” she repeated, nodding. “I love him so much. More than I’ll ever love anyone.” Her teary eyes rose and met mine again. “I can control him. If I can find him. Just give me a chance.”