Fucking great. Just what I needed.
thirty-five
GRAYSON
Flo’s body had been discovered at her apartment, just as Angelo had arranged. He’d greased the right hands to ensure it wasn’t investigated too thoroughly, because it was impossible to stage a scene without any flaws on such short notice. For now, she was in the city morgue, but we had assurances that the case would be closed within the week.
Our task, assigned by Brenda and the Big Noise legal team, was to stay out of the public eye and write our speeches for her funeral. The actual ceremony planning was being handled by Brenda, for which we were all thankful.
Technically, yes, it would have been fine for Billie, Jace, and Rhett to stay in hiding up in the forest for a few more days. But a gut feeling had told me I needed to rescue them from each other, and it seemed like I’d arrived right in the nick of time.
“Big Noise called a press conference last night,” I informed my bandmates as we drove away from their hiding spot. “Big Dick ran most of it, telling the press that Flo was the victim of a home invasion. Did you guys know she had a mountain of debt?”
Big Dick was the label CEO—who was now so far under Giovanni Ricci’s thumb he’d never escape—and a real arrogant bastard. He’d been beyond pissed when I was the only member of Bellerose to show up for the press conference but couldn’t say anything about it publicly.
“No, what from?” Rhett asked, his worried gaze meeting my eyes in the mirror. Jace was sulking, his jaw set as he stared out the window and seemed to pretend he was anywhere but here.
I shrugged. “No clue. But according to Big Dick, she’d taken out some loans from the Vegas crew, and they’d come to collect.” That wasn’t the truth… loan sharks didn’t expend that many men just to claim a bad debt. But maybe there was something else there that needed investigating.
“Bullshit,” Rhett grunted. “Flo didn’t have a drug problem like me or a pussy problem like Jace. Her only lapse of judgment was Tom, and he…” He trailed off with a groan. “He must have made her borrow on his behalf. She said he’d taken everything; I assumed he’d just drained her bank account before she cut him off.”
Billie had been silent the whole time, but now she turned to look at me with a worried frown. “Has anyone spoken to Tom?”
I shook my head. “Much to my frustration, we haven’t been able to find him. Slippery shit is in the wind, which is suspicious all on its own.”
Rhett snorted a short laugh. “Slippery shit. Apt. He doesn’t have the balls to plan an attack like that.”
“Agreed,” I muttered, my hands tightening on the steering wheel like I’d like to tighten them around Tom Tucker’s throat. “Angelo thinks this was an attack on Billie and… the baby.”
“You don’t sound convinced,” she said softly, her face still blotchy from the tears I’d found her crying. My little hedgehog was fragile right now; I needed to tone down the discussion about hit men and mafia wars.
I just opted for a shrug. “We’ll see. For now, I’m taking you back to my place. I have security.”
“Drop me home,” Jace snapped, his voice cold.
I wanted to argue that we shouldn’t separate, but of all of us at the farmhouse that night, Jace was the least likely target. If he wanted to be a little bitch, then it was better he stay at his own apartment and give Billie some breathing room.
“Fine,” I agreed. “But don’t leave. Brenda gave us strict instructions not to be snapped by press before the funeral. Lay low. Got it?”
He met my eyes in the mirror, his lip curled in a sneer. “I’m not an idiot, Gray; I can handle myself.”
Well… that was debatable. But I kept my mouth shut and jerked a nod.
Everyone lapsed back into silence, and Billie tucked her knees up to her chest a few minutes later. Her arms wrapped around them, and her head rested against the window as her eyes fluttered closed. Poor thing. Strong emotions like she must have just gone through with Jace were exhausting.
She fell asleep quickly as the car rocked her gently, and a glance in the mirror told me Jace was also asleep with his arms folded defensively over his chest.
“Anything I need to know?” I asked Rhett quietly when I was confident they were both deep enough asleep not to be woken easily.
He gave me a long look, then glanced at Jace and back to Billie. “Yep.”
I waited for him to elaborate on that, and when he didn’t, it was easy enough to guess. Rhett wasn’t the kind of guy who kissed and told, and this seemed to fall under that category. Somehow, more must have happened between Billie and Jace.
I didn’t like that development, but it wasn’t exactly unexpected. Their roots ran too deep for them to ever move on entirely.
“What about Angelo?” Rhett asked after a minute of silence. “Should we be concerned?”
I didn’t have an answer for that, despite how hard I’d tried to work it out. “I don’t know. I do wonder if something is going on between him and Brenda. Maybe his feelings for Billie are purely platonic or, at worst, self-serving.” Or maybe they weren’t. Maybe he, like Jace, was still head over heels in love with her, but he was better at hiding it. Fuck, I had no clue. Spending the last few days torturing bastards with him hadn’t given me even a scrap of understanding about what went on in his head.
“The sooner we get her away from him and his fucking family, the better,” Rhett muttered, running a hand over his floppy, turquoise mohawk.
I just grunted a response because I had a feeling it wouldn’t be so easy. Not while she was tangled up in his marriage politics or while his family owned our band’s contract.
“What’s the story about her fake baby?” Rhett asked after another long silence. “I assume one of you has come up with a coverup on that.”
I sighed, exhaustion from days of stress weighing me down. “Yeah. The story is that she lost it and has been in the hospital these past few days. The Riccis know about the farmhouse attack—their resources were needed to clean it up—so it was easy enough to make out like Billie got hurt and miscarried. Angelo has a paid doctor who fabricated a medical certificate verifying the baby’s delivery and death, and Giovanni is mourning his heir’s loss. No one knows it was faked.”
Rhett winced like that information was painful. “I wonder if he forged the paperwork or just edited the dates on her legit medical records.”
Shit. What a clusterfuck. Billie was carrying so much on her fragile shoulders; I desperately needed her to let me ease the load. For her sanity and mine.
For a girl I barely knew—prior to her disappearance in New York—she’d well and truly hooked me. Billie Bellerose was a special breed. Our muse, for far longer than Rhett or I had ever known her. Maybe that had contributed to how quickly she felt familiar.
“Will you stay with Jace?” I asked sometime later, as we drove back into Naples. It was a bigger city than Siena, but close enough that the Riccis rule had extended over here. Which, admittedly, had helped a lot in recent days.
Rhett made a frustrated sound, looking over at our sleeping friend. “I guess I have to. He’ll spiral without someone there to smack some sense into him when he’s wallowing.”