Prohibited (Tulsa City Sinners #1)

41. Evie

Chapter forty-one

Evie

“Evelyn. Evelyn, Evelyn, Evelyn. What am I going to do with you?” Walter blew silken ribbons of smoke out of his mouth as he spoke, watching her from a few paces away.

Deadly, the look in his eyes. His cold beauty clutched at her, the way that it had the first time she’d ever laid eyes on him. The small crescent scar under his eye that she had kissed so many times twisted in her heart like a knife.

“Walter, please,” she said, twisting her hands against the rope that bound her to the chair.

She had never, in all of her life, even with everything that had happened to her in the past weeks, been this frightened.

Because she wasn’t as frightened of anybody as she was of Walter Stanley.

“Walter, let me explain,” she said.

“Explain what, baby?” he asked her in a voice that held no emotion. He took one step toward her, and then another. “Explain how you’ve made a fucking fool of me up and down this town?” He took another step and then slowly bent so that they were eye to eye. “Explain why you had your hands all over the good police Lieutenant? Explain where the fuck you’ve been for weeks while I’ve torn the world apart looking for you, and you’ve had a leisurely vacation? Laughing at me? Taunting me, Evelyn? Taking any fucking cock you want to because you think I won’t find out?” His voice dropped to a deadly whisper. “I always find out, Evelyn. You should have known that by now.”

“It wasn’t like that,” she said, twisting her hands again. She resisted the urge to lean away from him, to show any emotion. “They– They kidnapped me. I didn’t go with them willingly.”

“Then, darlin’,” he said in a voice that was nearly a purr, “explain how you came to suddenly appear in Roberts’ office with his hands practically inside of your dress. No phone call to me. No letter. No acknowledgement.” His fingers bit into her face until she nearly cried out. “Nothing. Not a thought about me, about how worried I was for you. How certain I was that terrible things were happening to you and there was nothing I could do.” His voice rose in a rare show of emotion that stunned her into silence.

He looked radiant, a cold, dark god of death with eyes of glittering frost. It took her breath away and, for the hundredth time, she couldn’t help but think of Ryan. His warm, earthy counterpart. How strange that two men could be so different and yet somehow similar.

“Walter,” she said in a voice that shook. “It’s complicated. Y-You don’t understand–”

“What don’t I understand, Evelyn?” he asked her, in a soft, dangerous voice. He took a drag of his cigarette and then blew the smoke out of the corner of his mouth, never taking his eyes off of her face.

“Y-You killed their brother,” she whispered. Though she tried to keep them still, her lips trembled. Tears stung the back of her eyes. “And you made me help you.”

Walter huffed a humorless laugh. “So that’s how it is,” he said. “They’ve gotten into your mind, sweet baby, and twisted it all around, have they?”

“Nothing is twisted,” she said, trying to jerk her face away, but he held her fast. “You made me help you kill him.”

“That’s the price of freedom, darling,” he said, putting his face so close to hers that their noses were almost touching. The scent of him was intoxicating, made her skin prickle, but she ignored the sensations that were trying to betray her. “For you and for me. We don’t get the things we want in this world without making some sacrifices.”

“Bullshit,” she spat. Her own audacity reverberated within her. She had never spoken that way to him, but her anger was making her bold. “Don’t talk to me about sacrifices. Your greed is what drove you to do it. Enough is never enough for men like you, Walter.”

“Protecting what’s mine, keeping what’s mine, is what is enough for men like me, Evelyn,” he said, watching her closely with eyes that put a chill over her flesh. “It is the fate of men like me to give up everything to do it. And it is the fate of women like you to be ungrateful fucking wretches who wallow in the diamonds and the splendor of our labors without a care for what we’ve sacrificed to give them to you.”

Evie glared at him. “I don’t want any of it,” she said in a shaking voice. “It was a mistake, Walter. You were a mistake.”

To the unfamiliar eye, Walter might have exhibited no reaction. But to Evie, the way he went perfectly still sent a thunderclap of terror through her.

He took a breath and was on the verge of speaking when a commotion sounded outside of the room, causing him to turn his head. Evie looked over her shoulder, relieved for the moment of reprieve that it brought her, whatever it was.

Someone knocked at the door.

“What?” Walter said, sharply.

The door opened and Andrews stepped into the room.

“We’ve got a problem,” Andrews said in his deep bass voice.

“Are you incapable of handling it?” Walter said, straightening and turning to look at him.

Even Andrews, the biggest man Evie had ever laid eyes on, shrank under the look Walter gave him.

“It’s–” Andrews said, scrambling for an answer that might preserve his dignity. “It’s a problem. ”

Walter took a sharp breath in through his nose and then let it back out. Then he looked down at Evie and ran his fingers down the side of her face.

“Wait here, baby,” he murmured but not before pinching her cheek hard enough to make her hiss. “We’ll talk about mistakes when I come back.”

He turned away from her and pulled his revolver out of the leather holster he wore around his shoulders. She’d always thought it made him look sexy. Dangerous. But now it filled her with dread.

What could possibly be going on? What sort of problem could there be?

The idea that Ryan had come for her seized her for an instant, and then she let it go with a settling despair.

Ryan was still sitting in a jail cell because she’d failed to free him. Both him and Alex.

“Goddammit,” she said under her breath and began to work her wrists furiously against the ropes that held them to the chair. No one was coming to save her, so she was going to have to save herself. She gritted her teeth and tried to ignore the horrible burns that were starting to overtake her wrists as she worked at the bindings.

She should have just kept her mouth shut. She shouldn’t have said anything to rile him. She should have just played nice and gone along with anything he said. Then, when she had him convinced that she was back in his pocket, she could have slipped away. Run to San Francisco or back to New York, somewhere where he couldn’t find her.

But she couldn’t leave Ryan or Alex or Lindsay. Not now .

Maybe Walter was right. Maybe her mind was all twisted now, but the fact was that none of this would have happened if she hadn’t trusted Walter. And for better or worse, she had involved herself in something that led to a man’s death. His family and friends had responded accordingly. Could she hold that against them?

Could she hold that against Ryan, with his golden beauty, his firm but gentle touch, his tenacious loyalty?

Could she hold it against Lindsay, with his moral nature, his radiant freckled beauty, his good hearted stubbornness?

Could she hold it against Alex, even, with his frigid beauty, his cruel determination to avenge his brother, and his tender affection for Lindsay?

No.

No, she couldn’t.

Her wrists were raw now and she could hardly think of anything but the pain. Perhaps if she just got the ropes loose enough–

A small sound made her freeze. The pit of her belly filled with dread, certain that Walter had settled his business and was on his way back to deal with her.

But then another sound and another reached her ears until she realized that it was coming from the bank of windows along one wall of the room. And that, in fact, someone was opening one of those windows and crawling through.

If she had been in a better mind, it wouldn’t have scared her so badly. But with the tension coiling through her, she nearly screamed when a dark shape dropped to the floor beyond the sheer white curtains.

“Evie,” said a voice in a loud whisper.

“Yes?” Evie said, unable to even breathe.

The shadowy figure behind the curtains beat back the long linen, revealing itself.

A bright shock of copper curls and a grim look of determination.

Saoirse.

“Oh my god,” Evie said. Her eyes stung with tears. “W-Where did you come from? Saoirse, you shouldn’t be here, he’s–”

“Alex is distracting him,” Saoirse said, limping as fast as she could to close the gap between them. “We’ve got to hurry.”

“Saoirse, I–” Evie said, jumbling up all the words that wanted to come out of her mouth as Saoirse bent over her hands and began to work at the rope. “Did you say Alex? How did he– And where is Ryan? Saoirse, you can’t be here. Get away while you still can!”

“Yes, Saoirse,” said a chilling voice that made both of them go perfectly still. “Run away, little girl, while you still can.”

Saoirse straightened slowly and stepped to the side, opening Evie’s line of sight. Walter stood in the door of the room, leaning with his hand on the doorknob, the signet ring he always wore glinting on his pinkie finger.

The look on his face was predatory. Amused. It made Evie nauseated with worry for Saoirse .

“Walter, leave her alone,” Evie said in as intimidating a voice as she could muster. “You’ve already harmed her enough, leave her alone.”

“This time, she’s turned up on my doorstep of her own accord,” Walter said, advancing on Saoirse slowly, who took a step back, and then another. “Did you miss me that badly, little cherry?”

Evie began to tug against her bonds until her teeth hurt and she was nearly screaming with frustration. “Walter– Walter, don’t! Leave her alone!”

“You know what?” Saoirse said, coolly. “I forgot to tell you something, Walter.”

“And what is that, pet?” Walter said, continuing his advance one step at a time as Saoirse moved back. Evie twisted desperately in her chair to see what was happening.

“Saoirse, run!” Evie cried.

“Go fuck yourself,” Saoirse said. And then her hands moved, throwing out a series of explosive noises–pop pop pop pop pop pop–that made Evie’s ears ring and filled her nose with the rank smell of spent gunpowder.

Walter dropped to the floor.

Evie screamed.

Terror suddenly filled her to the brim, stealing the breath from her lungs, drowning her for one horrible moment with a black panic at the sound of gunfire.

Saoirse swore, ripping her back into the present. Very dimly, over the ringing in her ears, Evie could hear the sound of the empty chamber in the revolver clicking. Dear God, she’d emptied it trying to kill him. Some of the bullets had gone wide, splintering the door and the wall behind him. But three or four of them had struck home.

Blood was soaking his white shirt.

Saoirse was beside her again, filling her nose with the smell of honey and apples while her nimble fingers made quick work of the ropes.

Evie couldn’t stop staring at Walter, who was down on all fours, turning a very appalling shade of white. He coughed, sending a spurt of black blood onto the carpet.

Her first instinct as Saoirse freed one hand and then the other was to run to him. But, as if Saoirse read her mind, she caught her by the wrist and gave her a sharp look. “We’ve got to go, Evelyn.”

“Evelyn.” Walter’s voice was fractured. The cold veneer that she was so accustomed to seeing on his voice fell away and for the first time, she saw the raw vulnerability that existed at the core of him.

She desperately wanted to look away but she couldn’t.

He slowly rose up and sat back on his heels. He drew his hands away from his abdomen and stared at the horror of crimson staining his fingers. His eyes were wide, the first show of fear she’d ever seen in his face. His eyes moved to Saoirse. “You fucking bitch,” he said between gasps for air.

“I’d tell you to remember it, Walter,” Saoirse said softly and blew him a kiss. “But I don’t think you’ll make it that far. ”

Then, she took Evie by the wrist and hauled her toward the window. “We’ve got to go,” she said.

“But, he’s–”

Saoirse stopped and looked at her, face lit with a mad fire. “He’s dead,” she said, flatly. “As he fucking deserves to be for what he’s done to my family.” She threw one more dark look at him and then tugged Evie toward the window.

“Evelyn,” Walter called behind her. “Don’t you dare fucking leave me here.”

“Go,” Saoirse said, practically shoving her out the window. In the distance, she could have sworn she heard police sirens. “Hurry.”

Evie took one more look at her dying lover and climbed out of the window.