Fatal Beauty (9 page)

EJ is quiet—still. Thinking.

“Do you love him?” Charlie asks.

“The car is safe,” EJ murmurs. She’s staring into nothing, and
Charlie watches her, a tiny frown on her face. EJ jerks out of the chair and
grabs the keys to the Nova. “The car is safe,” she shouts at Charlie, and then
she’s out the door, running and Charlie is scrambling to keep up.

She catches up on the staircase to the parking garage. “Want to
tell me what the hell we’re doing?”

EJ huffs. “Why does the car need to be safe? Why keep it in my
name and away from search and seizure laws, unless there was something in it?”

Charlie’s eyes widen, and she grabs EJ’s arm. Jerks her around to
face her. “What the hell did we just steal from him?” She demands.

A hysterical laugh bubbles in EJ’s throat and she shakes her head,
a spastic motion as fear rolls in her belly. “I don’t know. But I think we need
to find out.”

Chapter 18

Charlie stares at the little, wrinkled envelope. It could be any package,
sent from any state to EJ and tossed in the Nova and then forgotten. It’s that
unremarkable.

It took almost three hours to find it, and she had to stop twice,
to placate
Pax
when he returned. EJ came in the
second time, and met Charlie’s eyes wordlessly across the living room before
she vanished into the bedroom. A shower started a few minutes later.

She isn’t sure she’s ready for another bombshell. This
morning—finding out everything she had about EJ and Jacobs—had been enough. But
there will be more.

EJ steps up next to the bed, smelling of orange blossoms and
something rich and undefinable. She’s wearing a pair of tiny shorts and a black
bra and pulling a plain white tank top on.

“Open it,” she says, tugging her hair into a ponytail.

“You open it,” Charlie says. “It’s your brother who hid it in your
damn car.”

EJ makes a small noise. “Really hung up on that little
technicality, aren’t you?” she mutters, grabbing the envelope. She shakes it
out and three things fall out—a passport, a plain black thumb drive, and a cell
phone. They stare at them for a long moment, and then EJ hisses a curse. She
sits down on the bed, hard, and flips the passport open. She pales, and her
hands are shaking.

“We have to go. Now.”

“We can’t.
Pax
hasn’t finished.”

“Then he comes with us,” she says. She stands, and shoves the
passport and thumb drive into her pocket. “Tell him, and see if you can find a
charger for this.”

“Are you going to tell me what the hell is happening?” Charlie
snaps.

EJ laughs, “Yeah. We didn’t just steal his car. We stole the
fucking keys to the kingdom. He won’t give us a pass because it’s me and he’d
never hurt me. Jacobs is going to send everything he has after us and if that
doesn’t bring me to heel, he’ll come himself, and you need to move your ass
because I’m sure as fuck not going to be here when his hired guns come
knocking.”

The words are spoken simply, with no inflection. Just a matter of
fact that makes Charlie’s skin crawl.

“We need him, EJ.”

“Fine. Stay here. Let him work his magic and move the money. And
when the guys with guns show up, you’ll be here, but you know. You’ll have lots
of money.” She gives Charlie a shaky smile as she stands. “You’ll be dead, but,
money!”

She sounds slightly hysterically and Charlie blinks at her.
Whatever this is, it scares EJ, in a way she hadn’t been scared before. “Ok. He
comes with us. We’ll figure out what to do with him when he finishes setting up
the accounts.”

“Good. Move your pretty little ass, Charlie,” EJ says, and turns
her attention to the computer in her lap.

Charlie watches her for two seconds, and then she shakes her head
and leaves her there.

Pax
is in the home office. His
blonde hair is ruffled, a halo of white around his head, a hard set to his
lips. A Bluetooth hangs from one ear and he’s nodding as he types into a
computer.

“That’s fine. Just tell her that the market will bounce back—we
all take the occasional hit and the dip isn’t so serious that she needs to
panic. Remind her that her investments had a banner year last year—if she needs
any more hand holding than that, set up a phone conference with my assistant.
I’m going to be out of the office the rest of the day.”

He ends the call and pulls his earpiece off, tossing it in the
desk and directing his attention to Charlie. She sits in the chair across from
him and gives him a searching stare.

"We have to leave. I thought we had the time to stay, go let
you work. But we don’t."

Paxton frowns, “I don't understand."

Charlie laughs. "Neither do
I
. But
EJ says it's time to go, so it's time to go. I don't ask questions."

He's quiet for a long moment and then, "What do you want from
me?"

"Come with me," she says, softly. His eyes widen and his
breath catches in the back of his throat and he shakes his head, hard. Not quite
denying her as much as he's disbelieving. She swallows the urge to smile and
stands. He looks nervous but hopeful, completely willing to do whatever she
asks.

"Please," she murmurs, slipping into his lap. Her hands
are in his hair, that angel soft halo that makes her want to corrupt him.

"Charlie," he whispers and then she kisses him.

There are, she knows, a thousand ways to get what she wants. A
thousand ways to manipulate the situation. But the way she prefers has always
been the one that comes the most natural. She kisses him and lets her lips do
all the work, teasing and soft, pleading and quietly begging. And his hands
tighten on her for a moment, the bruising grip of desperation and hope
fulfilled and she allows herself the tiniest of smiles. Too easy.
Pax
had always been too easy.

"Of course, I'll come. If that's what you need," he
murmurs against her lips. She nods and he sighs. "How soon?"

"Now," EJ says from the door. The
girls
suitcases are still packed and she abandons them there to walk into the office
and take the phone from where Charlie left it on her chair.

Pax
looks between the two
girls, and Charlie can feel the concern coming off him. She ignores it and
presses a kiss to the soft skin under his chin. He shudders when her tongue flicks
out, licking over him, and his grip tightens just a little. “Can you be ready
in ten?”

*

He doesn’t ask any more questions. Just rises and starts gathering
his computer equipment. They wait in the kitchen and EJ rummages through his
drawers before finally finding a dusty old charger that plugs into the phone.
She makes a low triumphant noise and shoves it into her purse as
Pax
emerges from his room with an overnight bag over one
shoulder and an apprehensive look on his face.

The car is crowded now, even with the almost empty backseat.
Crowded with
Pax’s
eyes on her and his concern like a
tangible thing as EJ pulls out of the parking garage. Crowded with EJ’s quiet,
frantic energy, making her knee bob and her fingers drum against the steering
wheel.

“What now?” Charlie wonders aloud.

EJ is quiet for a long time, as they drive, almost until they’re
out of the city itself. For whatever reason,
Pax
is
silent. Charlie has figured out that when EJ gets like this, the best course is
to let her have a little time to think.

“We need to go someplace safe. Somewhere he wouldn’t think to
look.” She’s quiet. “The problem is, anywhere I would suggest, he’d know. Same
for you, Charlie.”

“Me?” she says, her voice going shrill. “Why the fuck would he
care about me?”

EJ gives her a dirty, disbelieving look, before she refocuses on
the road.

“Go north,”
Pax
says abruptly. “I’ve got
a place we can go.”

*

EJ is numb when they pull into Memphis. She didn’t think she would
be, but there is only so long you can linger on the edge of frantic madness
before it ebbs into a kind of numb waiting. They stopped only once on the five
hour drive for gas. Charlie made a face, but allowed
Pax
to coax her into eating some chips and chocolate, drinking a little bit of
water before she curled against him and fell asleep.
Pax
watched EJ drive for a while, holding the sleeping blonde.

He was withholding judgement, for now, but EJ wasn’t so stupid she
didn’t know it was coming. It was just a matter of time and severity.

Not that it really mattered. At the end of the day, Charlie would
chose her. Would follow her. Not because she didn’t like
Pax
—she
probably did, in her twisted way. But because
Pax
was
like so many other boys they had both seen. Sweet. Fun. But ultimately,
disposable.

She tucks that thought deep, where it won’t reflect in her gaze
when
Pax
searches her eyes, and concentrates on the
road.

When they stopped for gas, she grabbed a cheap adapter and the phone
has been charging for the better part of three hours when they finally reach
the outskirts of Memphis. She follows
Pax’s
directions and when he directs her to park the Nova on the street, she balks.
There’s a brief argument that ends when Charlie sweetly asks
Pax
if there is any place safer for the car.

Charlie might think that
Pax
is wrapped
neatly around her finger, and the perfect toy to use and throw away, but EJ
isn’t so sure. He’s resistant already, especially when EJ is involved, and that
almost guarantees problems down the road.

It occurs to her that he’ll need to be removed.

She wonders if Charlie knows yet—if
Pax
does.

The phone throws sunlight as she turns the Nova into a parking
garage, and her stomach drops.

He always told her that she didn’t have the balls for the hard
decisions. Mocked her for playing his game while keeping her hands clean. She
wonders if he’s still laughing.

Once they’re parked,
Pax
leads them
upstairs to a corner loft. She leaves her bags at the door and drops onto the
couch, her fingers running over the curves of the phone.
Pax
is moving around the apartment, a high end loft in a renovated warehouse that
had to cost a small fortune. She hears Charlie making the appropriately
impressed noises. It's vaguely annoying how attentive Charlie has been to
Pax
. She didn't expect that, when Charlie suggested his
place to hide.

She’s dissembling, letting herself be preoccupied by anything but
the thing that’s been forefront in her mind since she opened that damn
envelope.

“Stop being a weak bitch,” she mutters to herself and thumbs the
power button. She tosses it on the couch beside her and pulls out her laptop,
connecting the USB as it comes awake.

The files start scrolling and the phone goes off, buzzing
persistently against her leg as she reads the file names. There are dozens,
name after name after name. So many she knows, and more that she doesn’t. A
list of locations. She murmurs a low curse.

“What?”

Charlie sinks into the couch next to her, and leans over, resting
her chin on EJ’s shoulder. Her breath tickles EJ’s chin, and for a moment, she
considers pulling away. The phone buzzes again.

“It’s a list. Jacobs was preoccupied with being raided by the
authorities. It’s why he put the car in my name. When I was in college, he
hired a kid who hacked NORAD to encrypt his records and files. But it wasn’t
enough for him. He kept the most important stuff on a thumb drive.” She laughs
softly. “We have everything, Charlie. All of his accounts, safe houses,
everyone he’s ever blackmailed—everything. We could cripple Jacobs with this.”

Charlie is silent and still next to her.

“Is that what we want to do?” she finally asks.

That is the question. Being able to do something doesn’t mean that
they should do it. But. She closes her eyes and sees Jacobs smiling at her
across from that damn kitchen table in his bayou mansion, sending her home and
dismissing everything she’s ever wanted. Dismissing her.

“Yes,” she whispers.

The phone buzzes.

“Are you sure,” Charlie asks, shifting away to study her. “We can
explain this right now. Tell him it was a mistake. He’d believe that, wouldn’t
he?”

“Yes.” But the idea is taking root and she doesn’t want to claim
it as a mistake. Jacobs has spent a lifetime teaching her and believing that
she will never be good
enough.

Too girly. Too weak. Too emotional. Not strong enough for the hard
decisions.

She cuts a quick look at Charlie. “I’m doing this.”

“Why?” Her look is endlessly sympathetic, almost painful to look
at. “You love him.”

She laughs, “Because fuck him. Fuck him sending me home, for
letting me see behind the curtain and then deciding that it’s too much me. Fuck
him, Charlie.”

Charlie nods. "Ok."

"Ok?"

"Ok. I'm here, whatever you want to do. If that means we
cripple him, I'm here. If that means let's go home and pretend that this was
all a bad dream--I'm still here. You tell me what you want."

"You know he'll come after me. After us."

Charlie smiles, a slow, sexy thing that, for just one second, makes
everything vanish except for the almost uncontrollable urge to kiss her.
"Let him," she murmurs, and then she stands. Saunters away from the
couch and EJ.

Which leaves her alone with a phone she doesn’t want to answer.

It goes off like clockwork, every five minutes. Buzzes against her
palm twice before the call ends and it sits silent in her hand.