Skullduggery {sapphic thriller}

CHAPTER SIX

"Kirby..."

Desirae's voice faded to the background as my eyes lowered once again to Gabriel's purple feet nailed to the cross where the tattoo of Artie's signature wrapped around his ankle like my own.

"Just hold still..." I could still hear her laugh in my head as she pinned me down on the couch, wrestling my leg onto her lap with the cheap tattoo gun. "I want you to always take a piece of me wherever you go."

"Kirby!" Desirae gripped a hold of my arm, pulling me back to reality. "Bay City PD is on the way and I need you to listen to me. I can't risk exposing myself to Landon and the staff. Can I trust you?"

"You're a cop," I restated, trying to focus on her, but I couldn't stop looking at Gabriel's pieced together corpse looming over us. "And undercover?"

"FBI." Loosening her grip on me, she glanced around one last time before returning her gun to her holster. "I've been looking into the museum's finances. I assumed Landon was laundering money for his in-laws, but now—"

"You're after the Cassini family?" I swallowed hard as my self-preservation finally started kicking in. "I can't be here when they show up—the police, I mean. I need to go. I need to leave."

"Kirby, what do you know?" Faint sirens echoed through the lecture hall as Desirae's eyes seared into me. "Are you on the run?"

Darting around the curtain, I whipped the heavy fabric behind me, but it barely slowed her down. I knew if I could just get back into the Renaissance Court, I could lose her in the crowd, but that thought died right quick. I hardly made it to the edge of the stage before I felt her on my heels. Definitely should've kept up with my cardio while I was away. In a second, she had a hold of my arm again. Throwing her body weight into me, she hip checked me right into the wall, my cheek squished flat against the cold brick.

"I can't let you run away." Her ribs pressed against me, expanding in heavy breaths. "Not like this." She slowly turned me around, waiting to see if I'd run again, but I knew it'd be pointless. "Come with me."

Desirae held tight to my wrist, leading me down the steps and back through the door that exited into the court. As my heart finally began to settle, I started thinking a little more clearly. And my head was telling me to keep my fucking mouth shut.

But very rarely do I ever listen to it.

"I'm pretty sure this is like entrapment or something."

"This isn't entrapment," she murmured, staring past me. "Are you okay to walk a couple blocks in those heels?"

"Walk?" As I tried to meet her eyes, they were busy scanning the crowd. "You're not arresting me?"

"Did you want me to?"

"I uh, never really got into the whole handcuff kink, if I'm being honest."

She still wouldn't look at me, but I thought I caught a hint of a smile on her lips. "I have a feeling you'll be more help if I don't. Now, come on."

"So we're just leaving?" I asked, my feet not moving. "Shouldn't you stay? In case you forgot, there's like a hacked-up corpse reassembled and sewn together on the stage."

"Look around, Kirby." I followed her eyes this time as she glanced back over the crowd. "Notice anyone missing?"

"There's at least two hundred people here, plus the staff, how—"

"And the host?"

My eyes continued to dart from each cluster of guests to the next, but Desirae was right. Landon was nowhere to be found. Looking back towards the entrance, I panned along the bar again, searching for a shaggy head of dark unkempt curls, but didn't see Rafael anywhere either.