The Slayer (Untamed Hearts #2)(19)

Clay shook his head. “There’s one church in this town, and they f*cking hate my ass.”

“Why?”

“Because of what I do,” Clay said. “They think we’re all heathens. Maybe we are. I wouldn’t know. We weren’t exactly friends before I started fighting professionally either.”

“Wow, no shit?” Chuito mumbled as he thought about it. “Do they hate the Conners too?”

“Fuck, yes, they hate the Conners.” Clay laughed at him. “They have been trying to get someone to run against Wyatt since he got elected. Who’s gonna take on Wyatt as sheriff? He’s the only name on the ballot. Most folks in this town know he’s a good sheriff. It’s just a small group of crazies who ain’t never approved of him because he used to be a fighter. Even the fools going to church every Sunday approve of him. It’s just Reverend Richards and his little pack of cronies who don’t like him.”

“What about Jules?”

“Jules?” Clay laughed. “Carries-a-gun, businesswoman, doesn’t-take-shit-from-any-man Jules. They hate her most of all, especially since the preacher’s daughter has been living over her office since she was eighteen.”

Chuito turned back to him at that, feeling his breath catch in his chest. “She’s a preacher’s daughter?”

“Alaine, yeah?” Clay frowned. “I guess y’all live next door to each other now. I didn’t think ’bout that.”

“She baked me cookies,” Chuito said with a smile. “They were good. Like, spice or something.”

He’d actually eaten them for dinner. The sugar seemed to help when he’d started to crash, and he was sort of mourning not having them anymore.

“I would not f*ck with Alaine,” Clay warned him. “That girl is Jules’s prodigy. Jules even pays for her college. She will bury you for that shit.”

“Yeah, she communicated that.” Chuito dropped his head to his folded arms resting on his knees as he took a deep breath. “Why does she pay for her college?”

“She says it’s an investment. Maybe one day she’ll help Jules with the law office. You know she’s the only lawyer for two towns. She’s swamped with work.”

“You guys make a lot of shady investments,” Chuito observed, because he’d been a businessman of sorts before he left. “I’m not sure if that chica has what it takes to be a lawyer.”

“She did tell her daddy to f*ck off and moved out on her own the day after she graduated from high school,” Clay said with a laugh. “That ain’t nothing to dismiss. Her daddy scares the f*ck out of me with all that hell-and-brimstone shit.”

“Switch to Catholicism,” Chuito suggested. “We’ve got a patron saint for everything. Sinners are welcome as long as you’re willing to confess it.”

“I don’t think there’s a Catholic church near here. Not even in Mercy,” Clay said with a wince. “Sorry, buddy.”

“It’s okay. I’ve been putting off confession for this long; what’s a little longer.” Chuito forced himself to stand up rather than lie down on the mat and fall asleep like he really wanted to. “Let’s do this, Powers.”



Chuito lay on the floor in the living room, staring at the ceiling.

Every muscle in his body hurt, but he didn’t know if it was from crashing or from Clay Powers, who was hard-core about working out. Chuito hadn’t slept in over forty-eight hours because he was f*cking terrified of what was going to happen when he closed his eyes.

He wanted to go back and fight some more because he was just so angry at life. He wanted to drink, but that was a downer, and he suspected that would just make the crash worse.

He wanted sugar and caffeine and some of his mother’s cooking.

Chuito wasn’t incompetent. He knew how to cook.

He just lay there instead.

Staring at the ceiling, trying to breathe past the misery.

Over twenty-four hours and no blow.

He wanted to f*cking die.

Like really die.

Instead he was counting the popcorns on the ceiling because he needed something to focus his mind on. His skin felt like it was crawling. A cold, uncomfortable sweat covered his body, but the back of his neck was hot with the longing for an escape from the misery. All he could think about was the blow. Everything in him told him to get into his car and drive back to Miami as fast as he could. He wanted to get high so bad he could taste it, bitter and sweet in the back of his throat.

He closed his eyes against his will, imagining that first wild rush when it hazed the pain and heightened the anger, making it easy to take out all the f*ckers who had killed Juan and Tiá Camila. God, he wanted it back. Desperately. He wanted ten more gangbangers to hunt down and kill to give him some sort of satisfaction.

But there was no one left to take out.

And there was no more blow to hide in.

No cars to steal.

No business to manage.

Just Chuito, alone, in his own private prison that was too cold because the heat in this place sucked, and it was f*cking snowing outside.

He should have turned himself in to Miami PD.

At least then he’d be with his cousin and uncle.

He had more people on the inside than out.

It was late, and these Garnet pendejos all went to bed at nine o’clock. Clay wanted Chuito to meet him at his gym at five a.m. tomorrow.