Insatiable (The Edge of Darkness, #1)(58)

I announce to everyone, “Nice going, team. Pack up and get some rest.”

I turn to my assistant. “I need to complete a contract. You good to clean this up, head to your hotel and wait for word?”

Barry nods and climbs out, patting the front of the car.

I look at what was once a warehouse filled with a gang, now obliterated and filled with dead, incinerated bodies.

If Bernadette finds out I eradicated an entire MC, she’ll flip. I can’t be fucked with that. I’ll need to lie and tell her we had an altercation and they threatened to out us, so I simply had to blow them up.

It was unavoidable. A travesty. A huge shame.

Maybe people will learn not to mess with my things.





21




KADE

As the sirens buzz in the distance – Barry’s clean-up team, not the emergency services – I make sure everyone has left, and then I input the location of my target, groaning when I realise it’s a security-infested manor. I follow the map, stopping at a wooded area to burn my clothes and pull on a fresh suit I had stowed in a suitcase along with the drugs I’ll use to gain entry.

Before closing the suitcase full of gear, I take two lines of coke, hating myself a little more than I did a moment ago. But I need to ease the vibrating in my bones, something that happens when I go too long without an upper. The drugs aren’t being forced into me now though; I think that stopped when I started craving the highs they offered.

I pull the suitcase from the car, slide the handle up and drag it behind me as I walk onto the driveway that leads up to electric gates. I press the buzzer and introduce myself as a distributor for Mr Lennox, and whoever it is on the other end lets me in.

I roll my eyes at the security team. How easy was it for me to walk right in here fully armed?

I’m directed to the main room, where an overweight, greasy-looking man is planted behind a desk, smoking a cigar. Gold rings flash on every finger. “What do you have for me?” he asks, coughing through his smoke.

He sits back as I throw the suitcase onto his desk and open it, showing him all the white powder inside. A grin, and he disgustingly gargles in his throat.

But Mr Lennox doesn’t have a chance to lift even one bag to inspect it before I yank my gun out from my waistband and shoot him right in the chest four times, the silencer quieting the pops.

His body slumps instantly, and I snap a picture and send it to Bernadette, demanding the rest of my pay.

I leave the suitcase behind, but I only manage to reach the main stairs before shots are fired at me.

I throw myself behind an overturned table, laughing at my luck as I pull my other gun out, so I have two firing as I run to the pillar, dodging the bullets that whizz past my head.

The coke isn’t helping my accuracy, so I drop one of my guns and pull out a blade, then grab a guy from behind and shove it into his neck, using his body as a shield as I make my way to the back entrance.

I’m not sure how the fuck I reach my car, or how long they chase me until I overturn my Bentley in a ditch. I somehow escape unscathed, but I’m pissed I wrecked my new car and have to run on foot until I lose their tail.

There’s blood in my eyes, turning my vision red as I type a message to my assistant on my cracked phone screen.

Barry picks me up at a nearby gas station, and he huffs all the way to the hotel, telling me I need to be more careful. He offers me a handkerchief for my face, but I shrug him off, thank him and jump out of the car.

The receptionist doesn’t ask me if I’m okay as I storm past the desk and head for the elevator. A couple get in on the second floor, but they keep to the corner of the small metal box, far away from me – a man covered in blood with an ammunition belt on full display.

I think my lip is cut; it stings a little.

My steps are clumsy and unbalanced as I get off the elevator, the bright lights making me squint and shield my eyes with a flat hand.

When I reach our rooms, I send Stacey a text that I think might be illegible, and when no response comes, I ignore my own room and sit outside hers, entertaining myself on my phone.

The first clip I have saved is from our last holiday to Greece. I watch the video from the karaoke bar, us on the balcony, another of Stacey sunbathing and me zooming in on her face – to her tanned, freckled skin. One she recorded of us holding hands and walking along the sandy beach. I pause the clip when she kisses my cheek, studying the smile on her face, which matches mine.

Videos upon videos, images upon images haunt me, yet I can never delete them.

I fucking hate myself for opening the file. I usually have it locked and securely hidden from prying eyes. It’s torturous, the way it makes me feel. I’ve struggled with emotions since I was a kid. I felt alive for the first time when I had Stacey, and now everything within me is black.

I’m dead inside.

The thumb I’m using to swipe through the pictures is crusted with blood. Every single image stabs a hole in my already hollow chest; I want so desperately to jump back into that reality, to hide from the person I’ve become. But it doesn’t exist. She’s not the same Stacey from then, and I’m definitely not the same Kade either.

I scroll through our messages, all the way up to some of the first ones we exchanged.

Our first picture together: me asleep with my arms wrapped around her, from when she accidentally stayed the night. She’s smiling at the camera, the usual middle finger up. The caption makes the corner of my mouth lift, even though it shouldn’t.