was laughing and he knew it was at him. He’d take care of her right fucking now. Slipping open the car door, he didn’t even close it before he doubled his fist up and hit her right in the face. She fell back against the window with a nice pop and he tried to concentrate on his stepbrother.
“…when I get back. I’m not going to make a decision until then.” There was a slight pause and Thomas wondered what he’d missed. “Are you listening to me? I want you to stay away from my house and my servants. In fact, I want you to stay the hell away from anything that belongs to me. You got it?”
“Yeah, I got it. But the girl…what’s her name? Wadders…Waite, she’s not around either. Where is she? With you, I suppose?” Thomas was going to get the girl, Grace, if it was the last thing he’d do. “You give me her phone number and I’ll pretend none of this ever—”
“You stay the hell away from my future wife, do you hear me, Thomas?” Michael said with a tone that he’d only ever heard once before, and he’d been afraid then too. “If you so much as go near her, I will hunt you down and kill you slowly. The same for my son. You don’t want to test me—”
“I didn’t touch the little shit. I don’t care what he said happened. I was following him out of the building and he disappeared. I thought he went in that building on Ninth, the one you’ve been whining about, but I couldn’t get in to get him.” The silence at the other end made him think Michael had hung up on him. When Michael started speaking this time, Thomas knew he’d pushed him too far.
“You aren’t to come near anything I own ever again. And if I hear of you doing anything, including breathing the same airspace as my family, there won’t be a hole you can hide deep enough in, nor will there be a place that I won’t find you. You will pray for death before I’m through with you. Do I make myself perfectly clear?”
Thomas was terrified. He knew what his stepbrother had been in the Special Forces. He knew what he’d been doing the entire time he’d been in. He’d heard the stories or the half stories that Michael and his father talked about. And he’d even cared enough to look it up. Michael was a hired killer. And not only that, but he was fucking good at it.
“I hear you.” His voice was not nearly a brave as he’d wanted and it squeaked a bit and that pissed him off. “But if I catch them out, all bets are off.” He closed the phone and leaned his head back against the seat. The small mewling sound made him remember the girl next to him. He looked over at her without lifting his head. Just what he fucking needed.
The window was covered in blood. And her face was fat and also bloodied. He knew he’d hit her, but he also knew he’d not hit her that hard. He hated whiny people, especially whiny whores. Shifting in the seat to get a better look at her, he realized he didn’t have a clue who she was and he honestly didn’t care. She turned to look at him with her one good eye and started to speak.
“Shut up,” he snarled at her. “You just shut the fuck up. And if you think you’re going to get to a hospital anytime soon, then you’re fucking out of luck. I just gotta figure out what to do with you.” He tried to think, but her crying and whining again had him reach over and wrap his hands around her throat. He let her go when she shut up.
She was dead. As soon as he realized he’d killed her, he laughed. “Now, brother dearest, you’re so fucked. What will your little family think when they find a dead hooker on your doorstep?”
Thomas got out of his car and walked to the other side. He was pulling her out of the passenger’s side door when he thought of something really funny. If whatshername… Grace found out about her future husband’s former life and this hooker on the lawn she would come running to him in no time. Yes, Thomas thought as he kicked the hooker again, things were about to get really good for him.
Thomas went back to