"Oh, Juliet," Vicky said tenderly. "Are you on Gwendola Lane? Are you alone?"
I wasn’t alone. I was never alone. I had the fly in my stomach and the wall of Malice’s men at my back.
"She would have taken this route home. It's the direct way to Grams’s house. But what if she was going to stop somewhere? What if she had laundry in that backpack, Vicky? There is a twenty-four-hour laundromat on Hannah Street. She could have walked there—"
"We already checked the security footage for Hannah Street, and no one at the laundromat saw her, Juliet," Vicky replied quietly. I knew this. I really did. No rock unturned. It was a theory, a lead, a dead end. A nothing. Flies everywhere.
"Okay. So what if she was abducted—"
Vicky cut me off. "Juliet. Can you sit down? Let's do our breathing exercises. The ones we practiced last time," she whispered.
Her tone angered me. Didn't she get it? "I don't want to breathe. I want to find my fucking mother."
She sighed into the receiver. "Okay. Give me just a second. I'm going to text someone."
I counted my steps between stores. I looked at the sun rising in the east. I found a piece of old gum on the concrete. Evidence. Get all the evidence.
"Okay, Juliet? Are you still there?"
"What if she took a cab home? What if she didn't feel—"
"She didn't take a cab, sweetie."
Right, right. "Do you hear that?"
"Hear what?"
"That fly. It won't stop buzzing." This would be so much easier if Vicky were here. "When are you coming home?"
Vicky's response was immediate. "Soon, sweetie. Did something happen today?"
Tears for the flies started rolling down my cheeks. Salty. Hot. "Hale is dead," I whispered. "He hurt me, Juliet."
Vicky gasped. The men watching me stood taller. Someone was coming.
"Oh my God, Juliet. Are you okay? That’s it, I don't care what Nick says, I'm coming home."
More tears started to flow down my cheeks. I wanted my best friend. I wanted to find out what happened to my mother. I wanted to watch Hale die again and again and again. I wanted Malice to hold me after we fucked. I wanted to take away Anthony's nightmares. I wanted to get lost with my secret stranger.
I wanted to kill the fucking fly.
The streets were made of flapping wings. Eyes followed me everywhere I went. They covered every surface. They crawled over my skin. They were digging in my ears, my eyes, my nose, my mouth.
"I miss you, Vicky. I'm not okay."
She let out a slow breath over the receiver. Time passed. I sobbed into the phone. The wall of guards shifted on their feet. "Maybe your mom wasn't walking home. She said she had a crush on that single dad that frequented the store. Maybe she finally made her move," Vicky offered, distracting me. It was a theory we discussed often.
"Jeffrey Dahmer disguised as a single dad working the night shift," I said, disgusted.
"It's possible," Vicky offered, placating me. "Hey, Juliet? Is anyone there?"
I looked up just as Malice, Anthony, and William exited a car. "They're all here."
Vicky whispered in my ear. "Great. Why don't you go home and get some rest? I'll stay on the line if you want? We can talk about theories again. I got a notepad to take notes."
William held his hand out to me, and I stared at it like his body was a weapon. Anthony started pacing the concrete, staring at trash on the ground, smudges on the windows, and shops lining the street. Malice wore a shirt splattered with blood.
"Let's go home, Miss Cross," William said.
The reality of this moment felt very heavy all of a sudden. "But...but I have to kill the fly..." My words weren't real. There was no fly.
"Where is the fly, Killer?" Anthony asked while taking off his shoe. More tears streamed down my cheeks. It was this never-ending grief. No closure. No answers. This was a pain that would never let up.
I nodded at the shop that was too cheap to invest in video cameras. "There," I whispered. Anthony nodded, moved to the window, and swatted it with his shoe. The loud smack was satisfying.
"Where else, Killer?"
I swallowed. I both hated and loved that nickname. Pointing at the ground, I said, "There."
Anthony stomped. He looked ridiculous, swatting at my imaginary demons.
Malice finally spoke up, his words dark and cruel. "Where else, Little Fighter?" I looked at him for a moment, memories of what we’d done together still haunting me. Did he deserve to know about my flies? "Tell me," he insisted once more. I then pointed at the stoplight. Malice got out his gun, aimed it at the street light, and fired a bullet. Glass shattered, and the boom got rid of one more fly buzzing in my brain.
"Show me where all the flies are, Miss Cross," William begged.
My face twisted into agony, and I looked down at my chest. "Here," I whispered while pointing at my heart. "It's here."
I hung up on Vicky and walked to the car. The shock was wearing off, and all that was left was overwhelming sadness. The Civella brothers followed me. Anthony started talking about electric fly swatters. Malice insisted I sit in his lap. William drove.
Shaking.
Sobbing.
Laughing.
Dying a little, too.
The buzzing stopped.
My heroes had killed the fly.
And we never spoke of it again.
23
After a couple self-care days, I demanded normalcy. The shock I’d experienced was intense but not necessarily unfamiliar. Vicky called twice a day to make sure I wasn’t pacing the streets again. Malice wouldn’t talk to me. William practically lived at work. Anthony was building a sophisticated fly trap in his dungeon of doom.
I was embarrassed.
I knew what shock was. I knew that I had a temporary moment of insanity. I knew it was reasonable. I knew. I knew. I knew.
I needed out of the Civella home. I couldn't sleep in the guest room because, despite the team scrubbing every inch of evidence from the room, it still reminded me of Hale. I was tempted to knock on Malice's door and sleep in his bed, but every time I worked up the courage to do so, I convinced myself that it was for the best that I didn't. Malice didn't have to say a single word in order to let me know how he felt about what we'd done. He’d shown up to fight my demons on Gwendola Lane because I was a security risk, not because he cared. I wasn't the girl who tamed the beast. I was a body to pass the time with.
This morning, I left to stay at Grams’s house. I craved something familiar, and I needed to check on things, anyway. I had a pile of mail waiting for me, and my cheap but warm mattress. After tossing and turning for hours, I got up to get ready for my shift at Eden's Place. Maybe keeping my distance was better. Staying at Grams’s house made it easier for me to go back to my life.
"You okay, hon?" Kelsey asked as I updated some client profiles.
"Yeah, why?"
"You keep huffing and seem distracted today." She paused to lower her voice. "Is it the shooting that happened? You'll get used to it. Next time, close your eyes though, okay? See nothing, say nothing, babe."