The Hitwoman and the Chubby Cherub (22 page)

When he didn’t respond, I risked a sideways glance in his direction.

His jaw was clenched and he stared at the blonde’s house with icy hostility.

“I can’t just give up looking for my sister.”

He turned his head slowly so that his eyes met mine. His gaze was stormy.  Still he remained silent.

“Who is she?” I asked.

“A ghost,” he said in a voice so low it was difficult to understand him.

“A ghost?”

He nodded.

“That’s not much to go on,” God interjected from the dashboard.

Both humans ignored him. We were too busy gazing into one another’s eyes. I was searching for answers in Patrick. He was trying to will me to do as he asked.

We both failed.

Frustrated I turned my head away. “I don’t understand.”

I heard him suck in a breath.

“It’s complicated, Mags.”

“Explain it to me. I’m not a moron.” I smacked the steering wheel for emphasis.

“It’s above your pay grade.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” I fought the urge to smack him.

“I just need you to trust me on this,” Patrick said slowly. “She has nothing to do with your sister.”

I heard the sincerity in his voice and I believed him.

“And if you don’t stop poking around you’re going to get me in trouble with some very powerful people,” he added quietly.

I looked back at him, reading the truth on his face.

“Okay,” I acquiesced.

“Thanks, Mags.” To show his appreciation he kissed my lips softly.

I didn’t encourage him to take it any further. After all, I still really had no idea what the hell was going on.

Instead I pulled back and said, “I have to go. It’s almost time to put Katie to bed.”

He nodded, a great sadness clouding his eyes. “Take care of yourself, Mags.”

He got out of the car and walked away without so much as a backwards glance.

Remembering there’d been something else I’d wanted to tell him, I rolled down my window and yelled, “Thanks for the safe house.”

He raised a hand in acknowledgement, but never looked back.

I went back to the B&B, a shroud of disappointment clinging to me.

I’d barely tucked Katie into bed for a nap when my cell phone rang.

I frowned at the unfamiliar number as I hurried down to the basement, answering just before it switched over to voicemail. “Hello?”

“Gotta! Gotta!” DeeDee whined.

“Quiet! She’s on the phone,” God ordered.

“Hello?” I repeated when I didn’t get an answer from the caller.

“I need your help, Maggie May.”

I sank onto the couch. I’d been expecting the call to be from Patrick, or maybe Delveccio, not my dad.

“It’s not a good time, Dad,” I said tiredly. “It’s been a long day.”

DeeDee rested her chin on my knee.

Piss emerged from the couch to sit on my feet.

“I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t important,” my father said.

“Your definition of important and mine are different. Kind of like our ideas about stability,” I threw in for good measure.

“He’s after me,” Dad whispered.

“Who’s after you?” I bent down to pet the cat.

“The Cupid Killer.”

Considering I’d just seen him try to kill Delveccio, I found that highly unlikely. Still, I found myself asking, “And why would he do that? What connection do you have to Belgard and Delveccio?”

“Just your mother.”

I sat back in my seat. “What?”

“I’ll explain everything,” he promised. “But you’ve got to come get me right away.”

I sighed. “Where are you?”

“Teresa’s grave.”

Personally, I don’t think graveyards are great hideouts. There isn’t much shelter and they tend to be pretty deserted.

“You should call someone,” God said as I sped across town to the cemetery that contained the headstones for my sisters Darlene and Teresa.

“Who?” I asked.

“Patrick,” DeeDee supplied helpfully from the back seat.

“Would that I could.” My lover had provided me with a safe house, but not a phone number to reach him at.

“Angel,” Piss suggested from where she was curled up on the floor of the front passenger seat.

“And what would he do?” God mocked. “Exercise the Cupid Killer to death? I’ve heard him working with Katie. I don’t think he’s capable of counting higher than ten.”

“He’s counting repetitions,” I explained.

“Griswald,” God declared, hanging ten from my bra strap.

“Which one?” I asked.

“Any of them.”

It wasn’t a bad idea, but I didn’t know how my father would react if he knew I’d called in law enforcement to help him out. After all, he already believed I’d ratted him out once before.

Reaching the cemetery, I quickly cut through the winding narrow paths. It was a route I’d taken too often.

Jumping out of the car, I let the cat and dog out before marching toward the spot my father had declared our meeting place.

“I don’t like this,” God declared.

“Me neither,” I whispered back.

I was relieved to see Dad was alone. I was alarmed that he didn’t seem to be the slightest bit aware of his surroundings as he sat on Teresa’s gravestone.

“Dad?”

He turned around and raised a bottle of whiskey at me. “Drink?” Then, realizing I was flanked by the cat and dog he added, “She brought her pets. I tell her my life is in danger and she brings her pets.”

“Maybe that’s because last time you attacked her,” God ranted from my shoulder.

Dad squinted at the squeaking lizard and laughed.

“Let’s get out of here,” I said, trying to take control of the situation.

“And go where?”

“Someplace safe.”

“Where’s that?”

“I know a place. Come on.” Without waiting to see if he was following, I turned back and trudged toward the car.

“You should leave him here,” God said.

“He smells,” Piss hissed.

“This isn’t my fault you know,” Dad said.

Looking behind me, I saw that he was stumbling along. “Nothing ever is,” I muttered under my breath.

“I didn’t ask for any of this to happen,” he continued.

I marched on toward the car. I opened the rear door on the passenger side and let him climb in.

“Watch him,” I instructed DeeDee as I opened the door behind the driver’s seat for her.

“Protect Maggie,” God told her as I climbed behind the wheel.

I watched in the rearview mirror as the dog bared her teeth at my father and growled softly. “Maggie protect.”

“Your dog is going to attack me,” Dad complained, pressing away from her.

“Only if you deserve it,” I told him, putting the car into drive.

The ride to my safe house was silent as the animals kept a close eye on my father and I concentrated on my driving.

Once I got him inside the shop, I was ready for some answers.

The dog and cat lined up beside me, letting him know where their loyalty lay. God perched on my shoulder.

“You’re the one in control,” he whispered in my ear. “You can do this.”

Balling my hands into fists, I asked a tad too loudly, “What does Mom have in common with Delveccio?”

“One of them, Tony or Anthony, I don’t know which, I’m not sure she ever did either, was in love with her. Just like Belgard.”

Chapter Twenty-six

My first reaction was that he was lying.

After all, telling untruths was his modus operandi.

“You don’t believe me?” he asked, seeing my incredulous expression.

“Can you blame me?”

“What’s so hard to believe? Your mother is beautiful. Charming. Magical.”

“On her good days,” I agreed.

“She used to have more good days than bad.”

I tried to determine what was true in his story. Delveccio had never mentioned even knowing who my mother was and when he’d referred to my father, he’d only seemed aware of him because of his criminal exploits.

Yet…

If he knew her, if he was infatuated with her, it might explain why he’d been so willing to take me under his wing.

I hated the idea that the mobster had fooled me for the entire length of time I’d known him. Our relationship was odd, but I’d always thought we were honest with one another.

“And that’s why he wants to frame me,” Dad continued.

“Who? Delveccio?”

“Cupid.”

“What does
he
have to do with anything?” I asked.

“Excellent question,” God opined.

Dad shook his head at the squeaking lizard. “He’s trying to frame me for the murder of the cop
and
the mobster.”

“But you said he was after you,” I reminded him.

“He is. He wants me to be blamed. If I am, I’m a dead man. It’s just a question of whether it’ll be the cops or Delveccio’s men that will kill me.”

I shook my head. His story bizarrely made a kind of strange sense, but there was one major component that hadn’t been addressed. “Then why did he kill Fern Cardinale?” I challenged.

“Oh that was just business,” Dad assured me.

“Just business?” I remembered standing in Cardinale’s restaurant and hearing Cupid use those very words just before he’d killed the old man.

Dad nodded.

“So he killed Belgard, tried to kill Delveccio, and is now framing you?”

“Sounds about right.”

“And how do you know all this? Do you know him?”

Dad shook his head.

“Then how?” My voice cracked with exasperation.

“She told me.”

“Who?”
 

“Is anyone else getting a migraine from this conversation?” God groused.