A Very Merry Hitman (Holiday With a Hitman #2)

18. Chapter 17

Chapter 17

I don’t always put my foot in my mouth, but when I do, I put both feet in.

“Hey, Nessa’s working on something for Christmas with my mom so I’ve got some time,” Aileen said as she sat down with her laptop in Theo and Elli’s living room. “And I’ve gone over notes I kept from various videos over the last six months to try to streamline which videos we’re looking closer at. Because no one’s messed with me since recently so…this has to be a new thing.”

Sitting next to her, Elliana nodded as she turned her own laptop toward Aileen, kicked her feet up on the ottoman. “The videos are important but the why of your cell phone is the root.” She shook her head slightly. “And I still can’t find anything on any of your videos. I did find a comment you made once about recording your ASMR videos on your phone so maybe there is a link. I just…don’t know what.” And her sister-in-law sounded absolutely ready to pull her hair out.

Theo was sitting on a smaller chair, catty-corner of them, his gaze on the muted television above the electric fireplace. It wasn’t cold enough to turn it on but they had the flames going, giving the room a nice glow.

Aileen’s gaze flickered to the TV and she saw the face of a teacher who’d been missing for the last few weeks on-screen. “They found her?” she murmured.

Her brother nodded and turned up the TV. As he did, she heard the front door open then close and when she glanced over her shoulder, she saw Dante striding in. They hadn’t wanted to arrive at the same time because she needed to tell her family about the two of them. First, however, she wanted to tell Nessa. When she met his gaze, her cheeks heated at the dark look he gave her. She murmured a greeting before turning back to the TV.

The solemn-faced newscaster was still talking. “The body of beloved teacher Christina Fraser has been found in the Everglades by a tour boat. It appears to be a fluke that she was found at all and it’s clear that whoever committed this horrible crime wanted to…”

Dante sat on the edge of the couch close to her, made a disappointed sound. “I figured this was how it would end.”

Yeah, Aileen had too, but she’d been holding on to a little hope for the beautiful teacher who’d been missing since the beginning of the month. Her face had been splashed everywhere when she hadn’t shown up to work. And not just in Florida, her face had been shown nationwide. Probably because she was a platinum blonde with extraordinary good looks. And she’d once done some modeling before she found her passion of teaching. And Aileen knew it had to be a passion because the pay was crap.

“Poor woman,” Aileen murmured. Hadn’t shown up to work and had been seen leaving her condo the night before she’d disappeared around eight o’clock. There had been no footage of her returning so the police had a good idea of when she’d been taken. Unfortunately it didn’t seem they knew much more. Or they weren’t sharing it with the public.

“Do they know who did it?” Elli asked without looking up from her own laptop.

Sighing, Theo muted the TV as he said, “Doesn’t seem that way.”

“Can you turn it off, Theo?” Aileen murmured, not wanting to watch it as they went over stuff. It was too depressing. Her brother nodded as he lifted the remote control. “Since last night was a bust, I wanted to ask you guys what you thought about me dropping another video tonight? One I would create with the sole intention of leaving clues about some place I’ll be tomorrow. Nothing too obvious, but enough to bait a Santa into coming after me.”

“Hell. No,” Dante growled before she’d finished.

“It’s not a terrible idea.” Elli still didn’t look up from her laptop as she scanned another video.

Not terrible? Aileen would take it. “Yeah, and I’m not saying I’ll go off on my own. If you would let me finish , I was thinking that we could set up whoever is behind this. Like a little sting or whatever. At least bring them out into public, or someone they hired. We have absolutely no leads and I don’t want to keep living in fear.” And more importantly, she wanted to keep her daughter safe. “So we could take control of the situation, drop some hints that I’ll be somewhere of our choosing. This way it changes the dynamics.”

“No way.” Dante was already shaking his head.

“It’s…not bad.” Theo cleared his throat when Dante shot him a dark look. “If we’re baiting whoever this is, or someone they hire, we’re in charge. Aileen won’t be blindsided or in danger because we’ll all be there. We’ll recruit some others too so it’s not a small group.”

“We could ask Sarah. She’s been bored,” Aileen said. The former hitman had retired at the top of her game, and had been trying to do all sorts of things to fill her time since then. Sarah loved crocheting, but said she needed something more. She needed a project and this could be perfect. “And Hudson doesn’t have any jobs lined up until after the New Year. We could ask him too.”

Dante’s dark gaze swiveled to hers. “How do you know Hudson doesn’t have any jobs?”

She blinked. “Uh, because he told me.”

“You’re not doing this.”

She blinked again, staring at him in shock. “Um, excuse me?”

“You’re not doing this. You’re not putting yourself in danger.”

Elli cleared her throat. “If it’s a controlled environment—”

“No.” Dante’s tone was resolute.

“You’re not in charge of me.” Aileen slid her laptop onto the ottoman and faced Dante.

“Well someone needs to be.”

She was aware of Elli sucking in a breath and couldn’t see her brother’s face, but she didn’t care about them. She couldn’t believe the way Dante was acting right now. “Someone needs to be in charge of me? Someone other than me?” Oh, she was definitely raising her voice now.

“I…didn’t mean it like that.”

“Sure sounds like it.”

“I’m just saying that this is dangerous and stupid.”

“Oh, so now my idea is stupid? Am I stupid?” Okay, she was pushing his buttons now and knew it, but he’d pissed her off. Insinuating that she needed someone to take care of her… It was her hot button.

“That’s not what I said at all!” He stood now and paced to the fireplace, looked at Theo beseechingly.

Her brother, to her surprise, didn’t say a damn word, simply looked back and forth between the two of them, his eyes a little wide. Good . This wasn’t his business.

She kept her gaze pinned on Dante. “I’m not talking about running into a situation half-cocked. I’ve thought this out thoroughly and would have the best backup—and I wouldn’t be alone. We’d choose a public place, and we have so many people in the neighborhood and beyond who would happily help with this. It makes more sense to do this now and make this person come to us instead of waiting for something bad to happen later.”

“No, this isn’t happening.”

Okay, that was it. Standing, she snagged her laptop up and tucked it under her arm. “I’m done with this. Just because we’re sleeping together doesn’t mean you can tell me what to do. Order me around as if…well, whatever. You don’t get to tell me what to do as if you know better than me.”

She probably shouldn’t have said the whole “sleeping together” thing in front of her brother, but she was an adult. Her family could deal with it because she was absolutely over everyone treating her as if she didn’t know her own mind.

Aileen turned to look at Elli. “I’ll leave it up to you and Theo to come up with a place I can mention in tonight’s video. I’ve already got a handful of videos completed, so if anything, I can add in some whispering and just splice it in to make it flow. I’m heading over to my parents to spend time with Nessa and them… Just call or text once you’ve figured things out.” Because it was a great plan, she felt it to her bones. Having a controlled environment was the best option in a lot of shitty ones that involved her waiting around in fear.

“Aileen—”

“Dante, I don’t want to do this right now. I need some space.” She left without waiting for his response because she couldn’t deal with his high-handedness right now.

Or ever.

This was a side of Dante she’d never seen and couldn’t deal with. She’d never thought in terms of deal-breakers, but this… This type of attitude was one.

She was just starting to spread her wings again and she wouldn’t let anyone clip them. And he’d just shut down her idea without listening to it fully. Just decided that he knew best.

She couldn’t be with someone who wouldn’t listen to her.