Hush (Black Lotus #3)(71)

I start when the bathroom door busts open and Declan rushes out with only a towel slung around his waist.

“Are you okay?” His words shoot out quickly. “Who’s on the phone?” He doesn’t wait for me to respond when he takes it right out of my hand. “Who the f*ck is this?” He pauses and then holds the phone out and clicks it onto speakerphone.

“Can she hear me?” Matt questions.

“She can hear you.”

“They know you’re in Washington.”

As soon as he says those words, I reach over and end the call.

“What the f*ck is going on, Elizabeth?” Declan ferociously demands.

I tell him about Matt, about his calling me when we were back in London, and about the loan shark. And then I tell him that Matt traded me in to save his life.

“There’s a bounty on my head now.”

Rage takes over Declan in a deadly way that scares the shit out of me. He stands in utter silence as he bores his eyes down on me, and when his nostrils flare angrily, he fumes in an even tone, “Why didn’t you tell me about this sooner?”

“I thought I handled it. I thought it was under control.”

“You thought wrong, goddammit! And now you have a hit out on you!” His voice ricochets off the walls, his neck blotching the color red in white-hot anger.

“I’ll just pay them off, Declan,”

“You think that’ll solve this Matt situation? The ease at which he was able to dispose of your life is not something to f*ck with. And what happens when he finds himself in trouble down the road? You really trust him when he says he’s going to leave you alone after this?”

Declan rips his hand through his wet hair and paces off across the room. I watch as frustration and fiery anger boil over, and I’m quick to make my resolve.

“I’ll kill him,” I say too fast and too eager.

Declan snaps his head over to me with a look of horror on his face. Maybe I should be worried about how he’ll respond or how he’ll think of me to know I can rid someone of their life so easily, but I’m not. Declan knows I have three kills under my belt. Hell, he has two himself. He knows the tar my black heart pumps. And when he speaks, I know we’re one and the same—two monsters bound by one soul.

“No,” he states. “I’ll kill him.”

“Declan, no. I can’t let you do that. Matt’s my problem.”

He strides over to me in quick steps. “I won’t let you kill anyone else, you hear me? I don’t want your hands branded by any more blood. I’ll take care of it.”

“Declan—”

“I’m not arguing with you about this. My word is final,” he states adamantly. “Pack your suitcase. They know where we are, so we’re getting the f*ck out of here.”

“Are we going back to Chicago?”

“Yes. We’re taking care of this issue now and then going back to London,” he says. “But listen to me . . . Bennett’s money . . . we’re dumping it on the loan shark. Not only will we finally be rid of it, but it’ll be enough to make these people forget you ever existed.”

Taking a hard swallow, I know this is ultimately the best resolution for us. And now, once again, I’m plagued by my past, which is now forcing the man I love to take another life.

Declan’s able to schedule the plane to go out today, and with the vicissitude we now face, there’s no time for me to mourn the loss of my dad. We move with urgency, making sure our belongings are packed and ready to go before we head out.

We sit hand in hand during the plane ride.

“Declan, you don’t have to do this.”

“It’s not up for discussion.”

The plane lands and we drive straight back to Lotus. Every step Declan takes is purposeful, wasting not a second.

Tension is ghastly as I watch Declan take out the pistol he always travels with. He releases the cylinder and gives it a look before spinning it and locking it back in place.

“Declan?”

Laying it flat on the table in front of where I sit on the couch, he looks down at me. “You’re going to call him from your phone.”

“It’s an unknown number he’s calling from.”

“There’s an identification service I had Lachlan install on your phone. It traps the numbers from any restricted calls your phone receives.”

I pull out my phone so Declan can show me where to retrieve the number, and with a few simple clicks, it pops up.

“What do I say?”

“You tell him you’re here in Chicago and want to get this over with tonight.”

It’s after two a.m. and my heart rate picks up. “It’s the middle of the night.”

Disregarding my hesitation, he goes on to instruct me on everything I need to say.

“You got all that?”

Taking a deep breath, knowing what’s about to go down, I steel myself for the inevitable as I dial Matt’s number.

“Hello?” Matt says after two rings.

“It’s me.”

“How’d you get this number?”

“Everyone is traceable. Even you, *,” I tell him, slinging his words back at him from when he first made contact with me. “I’m here in Chicago.”