Queen of Quarantine (Brutal Boys of Everlake Prep #4) - Caroline Peckham Page 0,274

sixty percent of the people who got infected with it. But I didn’t much care for wearing face masks and in my line of work I didn’t come into contact with many people, so I was content to go without and take my chances. I’d gone up against death and won plenty of times before now anyway, I doubted fate was kind enough to let me die in sick my bed.

"What difference does that make? You should be wearing the mask I provided you with regardless."

"Of course I am,” I replied – assuming by ‘wearing it’ he meant he hoped I’d left it in my car. “But it seemed like letting him suffer through the virus might have saved me a job. Anyway, he got the all clear, so I'm doing it now."

Liam tutted and I could imagine him stubbing out a cigarette while he thought up ways to punish me. "Home. Nine." He hung up and I considered tossing my phone all the way away. There was a man walking along the street and if my aim was true I'd likely kill him with the damn thing from this height. He had the look of an asshole about him so in all likelihood he deserved it.

Perhaps it wasn't the brightest idea to consider using a phone that could be linked back to me as a murder weapon though. Pity that.

I shifted on my perch, my gaze sweeping out to take in the rising sun again as the pigeons stopped dancing around the subject and got down to fucking. I gave them a moment to have at it. No need to ruin their day after all.

With the coos of pigeon pleasure calling out to me, I looked at the sun and thought of the time me and Ava had trekked up that fucking mountain in Ireland and watched it set. She said it was the most beautiful thing she'd ever seen and I’d promised to take her up that mountain every year so she could see it again. Not that we ever went back. And she didn't get much of a forever. That was the curse of loving me.

Of course, thinking of my wife made me think about the state her corpse had been in when I finally got her back. Too late. Too fucking late. Time hadn't meant a whole lot to me since that day.

The pigeons finished up their fun and I offered them a round of applause. That noise right there was Burnley's chance to wake up, spot me, scream, run, beg - but he must have been a deep sleeper because he just slept on.

I sighed, shrugged one shoulder and slid the little wire I'd been holding beneath the bottom of the sash window. Honest to donkey dicks, I didn't know why people were dumb enough to have these old piece of shit windows still in place on their properties. It was like they assumed being eight floors up and overlooking a busy street was enough of a deterrent to psychopaths who might wanna crawl in their window and take a shit all over their lives.

Not so, my friend. Not so.

With a twist of my fingers, the curled end of the wire hooked around the catch at the bottom of the window and I gave it a sharp tug to unlock it. The thing gave way easier than I'd expected and I came damn close to falling all the fucking way down to the street below.

No such luck of course. The devil didn't want any competition so he'd refused my admittance to hell more times than I could count by now. He'd done me the courtesy of making sure I lived within my own personal hell at all times though, so I guessed he was winning.

The window slid up with a bit of muscle and a grinding noise that really should have woken Burnley. But no. Maybe I was about to find him dead and my work completed for me. Unlikely, but I supposed it was possible.

I dropped down into his fancy pants room with its bachelor pad grey on grey on grey on - oh shit is that a bit of red? Kinky fucker. Right above his bed too.

I tilted my head to one side as I tried to make sense of the splashy splotchy piece of art, but I’d be damned if it looked like anything other than a cat’s arsehole to me.

I took the hammer from my belt and gave it a few