Skullduggery {sapphic thriller}

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

Desirae wedged her phone between her ear and shoulder, rifling through her purse. Inside, the metal of Cora's broken sculpture clanked together. As she unzipped a pocket, her brows knitted with worry. Greg's voicemail message played out instead of ringing. She slid the phone down from her ear and typed out a text, but I could tell by the frown on her face that it wasn't going through.

The glow of her phone lit up the keypad. Her thumb hovered over the nine.

"I wouldn't," I warned. "If it's..." I couldn't bring myself to say Rafael's name out loud. "This is Pino's warehouse. He's got guys on the force. He won't let his own kid go down for something like this."

"Looks like it's just you and me then." Desirae tapped her flashlight back on and pulled out the pair of bent paper clips I had used last night to break into the room backstage.

I took them from her cautiously. "Should I be concerned that you kept these?"

Lit by the glow of her phone light, her brown eyes flashed with the hint of a smile. "My own little memento mori."

"A reminder to break the rules 'cause we're all gonna die?"

"Something like that."

She shined her light back over the steel door and I knelt down against the cement loading ramp to get to work. Like backstage, this door had a standard deadbolt lock, but as I tried to run the top paperclip upwards in the keyway, the pins wanted to stick, all corroded and rusted to shit like the rest of the door. Even when we had keys, it always gave us trouble in the past.

"A little WD-40 would go a long way right about now," I grumbled, trying to budge free the binded pins inside.

"How about some vanilla mint?"

I looked up from the door to find Desirae holding out a compact lip balm container. Grabbing it from her, I took the opportunity to rub it against my lips first before gouging a finger through the balm, then slathered the clump in the keyway.

My lips pressed together with determination as I raked the clip through the hole again. Vanilla mint soothed the swollen cut on the inside of my lip that I'd been chewing on all day. "Hmm, that's actually pretty nice."

Loosened by the balm's oils, the pins sprung up inside the mechanism. After just a few quick passes, they finally clicked into place and I twisted the paperclips to unlock the door.

"Good girl," Desirae whispered behind me and tucked her phone back into her purse. She swiftly tied up half her locs into a bun, stoic and focused in contrast to my blushing hot mess. At this point, she knew exactly what she was doing. It brought to mind how ancient Greek warriors would fuck each other before battle in order to bond and create loyalty. Reaching beneath the hem of her sundress, she slid it up past the holstered gun on her thigh, just inches from my face. "I'm gonna have you open the door, but then stay behind me."

I couldn't help but stare at the glisten of her leg in front of me as she withdrew the gun, feeling slightly terrified, slightly turned on. "You got another one strapped up in there for me?"

"Are you a good shot?"

"Hell no," I snorted. "Wait, does that mean you do?" My eyes traced the contour of her legs up to her hips, searching for another gun against the moonlight.

"Just stay behind me." She kept the muzzle pointed away and towards the ground, low and ready. "We don't know what we're walking into."

My heart raced as I pushed up from the cement ramp to my feet. I shook my hands out before clasping the door handle. Adrenaline tingled the tips of my fingers. Flush with the brick, Desirae gave me a nod. As I cranked the handle down, my arms remembered the weight of the old door. It had always been a pain to try to open with an extra-large pizza from Dom's in your hands. I made sure to tug it hard and Desirae swiftly slipped inside without hesitation.