Legacy (Sociopath Series Book 2)(20)

“That’s his good deed done for this quarter,” Leo says dryly.

“Kindly f*ck off.”

She sighs.

“No, really. Gwen and I have some catching up to do.” I wave Leo off without looking up, and we wait until her heels click all the way to the door. “We have a love-hate relationship,” I mutter, “mostly owing to the fact that she shot me.”

Gwen swallows. “Right.”

“She’s the most perfect woman I know.”

“Well. That clears that up.”

“I’m fine, by the way. Stitched up like the victim of a bad pyramid scheme, but fully functional, I assure you.” I’ve regenerated, and now I have a new assistant. I’m Doctor f*cking Who. “Do you know how to do a background check?”

“I can contact references. Run a credit check.”

In her time, she’s done far more than that. She just doesn’t want to let on before she knows it’s safe.

I twist around in my seat and give her my full attention. You’d miss it in a blink, but she just flinched a little—excellent. “At Lore Corp, we trade in information. We investigate. We hunt. As you can imagine, we have a rather extensive forensics department. I like to know things about people; it makes it easier to initiate a trade.”

Gwen smiles vaguely. “Knowledge is power.”

“With that in mind, I’d like you to run a check for me.”

“Do you have a name?”

“Gwen Cooper.”

She wraps slender fingers around her wrist and squeezes. “I’m sorry?”

I jab over my shoulder at the computer screen. “You know everything about me. It’s only fair that I know everything about you.”

“You didn’t already check me?”

“Obviously.” Knowing Leo, she ran through everything at least twice. “But I want to see if the results match. This could be very interesting. Don’t you agree?”

“I…take your point.”

“Wonderful. Fliss, my secretary—have you met Fliss?”

“Leo introduced us.”

“Ask her nicely and she’ll take you right down to the news room. Grab a body, tell them I sent you, and they’ll get you started.”

“Okay.” She loosens her shoulders, rolls them back. “Thank you, sir.”

Sir. “Gwen?”

“Yes?”

“A little piece of advice: I don’t like words that mean nothing. Thank you is one of them.” I cock my head, pretending to consider the subject. “So’s please. You don’t have to use these words around me.”

“Duly noted,” she says.

“So’s no. Don’t say no in this office.” I turn back around and reach for my glass of water. “Or on the phone. Or in email. Or faxes. Just never.”

Her eyes sharpen with good humor. “I will never say that.” She thinks I’m being sardonic—kind of an * too, but I’m more than hot enough to get away with it. God bless natural selection.

“Have it on my desk first thing, and we’ll take it from there.”

When Gwen has walked her holier-than-most-of-thou Cleopatra ass out to see Fliss, I grab my phone to text Leo.

I’m going to spank you into a whole new corner of hell.

Love you too xxx she replies, almost immediately.

Fuck you xx

Has she figured out what a vile specimen you are yet? xx

That’s it, sweetheart. Make jokes about how vile I am while you shy away from my pretty little blade—whatever helps you get through the day. She can try to distract me all she likes; it won’t be long.

In the meantime, I’ll plan my return to her flesh. The playground. She’ll be the misunderstood mean girl; I’ll be the bully with the salt-and-razors tongue.

On one TV screen, the Blood Honey logo flashes up again. There’s been no breakthrough on this guy besides the victim’s identity—two weeks have passed and we’re running out of steam.

“Fucking cockblocker,” I mutter. And I don’t just mean the news.

***

The evening brings a blanket of rain so thick you could slice it. I’m drenched just walking the ten paces from valet parking to my lobby, and the concierge shoots me a frown of concern as I squelch past him.

“One of those days,” I sigh in his direction.

He nods back. “Looks like there’ll be thunder.”

He’s not wrong. The sky is fat with clouds of translucent tar, each one threatening to roll down and smash through the tower blocks like dominoes. “Gotta love a good storm.”

“I hear ya.”

The thing is, normal people make it way too easy to appear normal. You’ve got your stock small talk phrases and your ideas of common decency, and when you boil it all down, they’re just rules. Rules, I can follow—not instinctively, but logically—and when it all gets too much and I’m struggling with my impulses, I make fun of it. Because that’s another one of your little rules, isn’t it? Lack of empathy is funny. I’m such a sociopath, dude. It’s too f*ckin’ hilarious.

But you’re not a sociopath. You’re just a regular garden-variety *, and you’re too busy laughing to spot my bloody footsteps before they evaporate into the ether. This is almost definitely what Blood Honey is thinking, by the way—when he’s not knuckle-deep in someone’s womb, that is, and then God knows what he’s thinking aside from, ooh, pretty.