Making Angel (Mariani Crime Family Book 1) (8 page)

A few days later Leilani’s roommate reported her missing. Cops questioned me, but I told them the truth. I didn’t know what had happened to Leilani. The police had to know my family was in on it, but my building’s doorman and surveillance videos kept us above reproach. Leilani never surfaced, and I learned my lesson and stayed the hell away from the dating scene. Just thinking about it now made me cringe.

“I’m good for now. Maybe I’ll talk to the belly dancers later.”

Thankfully, Bones didn’t press the issue.

A tall dark-skinned man paused beside our table and bid us a good evening. He wore a tight smile, a tailored suit, and what was left of the hair on his head had the appearance of running away from his face. “I’m Greg Pines, the manager here, and I wanted to stop by and personally welcome you.”

“Thank you, Mr. Pines,” I replied, keeping the conversation polite but professional and wondering what the hell he wanted from me. “The service has been prompt. Your people are very attentive.”

“Happy to hear it. Thank you.” He pulled a six-by-two-inch gray box out of his inside pocket and offered it to me. “Please accept this gift as a token of our appreciation of the family, and all you do for the city.”

Bones took the box and angled it away from me as he opened it. Then, he placed it on the table so I could see the contents. A beautiful hand-carved pocket knife was tucked into a dark velvet liner. According to the knife’s label, the blade was forged of Damascus steel and the dragon-carved handle was fashioned from twenty-four-karat gold and platinum. It was more than a gift. It was a business offering.

“My father will be pleased,” I said, snapping the box closed.

Mr. Pines smiled and tilted his head. “If you need anything at all, please let me know. My card with my personal cell number is under the knife.”

“Noted,” I replied, careful not to commit to anything.

Mr. Pines thanked me for my time and left. I kicked Bones under the table and glared at him.

“What?” Bones asked, rubbing his knee. “I can’t help it if people love you.”

“Yeah, that’s it. They love me. Now
my
brain is beautiful.” I shook my head, disgusted and ready to go.

All of a sudden Bones stood up, knocking his chair back. “That lying asshole!” he said, glaring at the dance floor.

I tried to see who he was looking at, but the place was packed. “Which one?” I asked.

“Matt Deter. That guy right there. The one wearing the giant condom wrapper. That bastard owes me three g’s. I called him yesterday and he was whining that his mom was in the hospital and he needed to go take care of her. Looks like I need to send
him
to the hospital.”

Bones jumped over the railing “Matt! Hey, Matt!” he shouted.

Matt turned toward us, and his eyes bulged when he spotted Bones. His lips formed a couple of obscenities, and then he turned away and wove through the crowd. I grabbed Mr. Pines’s gift for my father and ran around the railing in time to follow Bones toward the side door. It opened and Matt slipped out. We followed him out the door and searched the street. Matt was gone.

Bones swore. “I was lenient and he took advantage of me. I can’t wait to catch up with him and rectify the situation.”

To be honest, I was glad Matt had gotten away. Bones was my best friend and my constant protector, but when he fought, it scared the hell out of me. He went into some sort of crazed rage that usually ended in me trying to pull him off some unconscious victim before he killed the guy. Not exactly what I wanted to do with my evening.

“Well, looks like he got away.” I shrugged. “What do you want to do now?”

“I know where he lives,” Bones said.

Shit!

Hoping Matt wasn’t stupid enough to go home, I retrieved the Hummer and followed Bones’s directions to a run-down apartment building off West Bonanza Road. We parked the car and crept up to apartment one-fourteen.

“Are you sure this is a good idea?” I asked after Bones knocked.

In answer, he knocked again, harder this time.

The door swung open.

Nothing could have prepared me for the person who answered.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Markie

A
FTER LUNCH WITH the nice guys at the pizzeria, I took a cab to my sister’s last known address. Ariana had sent me pictures of the place, but the photos didn’t do it justice. In person it looked more like a high-end resort than an apartment complex. As I walked past the landscaped common area and swimming pool toward the manager’s office, I wondered how much the rent was. No doubt way more than I could pay.

It took a while to convince the apartment manager I wasn’t a stalker or a bounty hunter, and was legitimately worried about my sister, but he finally gave me her forwarding address. This time the cabbie deposited me in front of a dilapidated building without landscaping or swimming pools. The manager had never heard of Ariana Davis, and since I wasn’t interested in renting an apartment, she promptly showed me to the door and went back to her soap opera. Disheartened and unsure of what to do, I wheeled my luggage to the curb and sat down beside the apartment mailbox.

I pulled out my phone and scrolled through our correspondence, searching for clues of where she could be. She’d mentioned a waitressing job, but didn’t specify the name of the restaurant. I googled Las Vegas restaurants and the number of them was somewhere north of infinity. But with nothing better to do, I started making calls. The sun set and costumed adults and children emerged from apartments, trick-or-treat bags in hand.

Halloween. Great.

As if it wasn’t going to be difficult enough to find Ariana without masks and wigs. Feeling frustrated and a little overwhelmed but unwilling to give up, I dialed restaurant number twenty-three on the list.

Then, my sister almost walked over me. Life is sometimes funny that way. The people you’re looking for sometimes pop up and mow you over.

“What the hell?” Ariana said. It took an impressive acrobatic act to keep both her phone and her body from hitting the ground. “Why would someone sit right in front of the mailbox?”

Her attention was still on her phone.

“Probably the same reason someone would try to text and walk at the same time,” I replied.

She froze midstep. We locked gazes, and her heavily-lined eyes grew round.

I stood abruptly, knocking my suitcase over. “Ari.”

She blinked.

Shock and awe wasn’t quite the reception I’d been going for. But that didn’t matter. My little sister was alive and well. Relief washed over me, stripping away weeks of worry and stress. Frustration and anger crept in as I stared at her phone. If she wasn’t dead, why the heck hadn’t she returned my calls or texts? She knew I was worried out of my mind. I’d texted her that exact statement at least six times. Why wouldn’t she put my mind at ease? Why wouldn’t she save me the plane ticket? Before I could decide whether to hug her or yell at her, she awoke from her stupor and wrapped her skinny arms around me.

“Markie!” she cried, squeezing.

Tears stung my eyes. Ariana wasn’t dead. Anything else we could work through.

“What are you doing here?” she asked, releasing me. “I mean… I thought you were still in Africa.”

“You stopped communicating and I freaked out. What happened to you?” I looked her over. Her long curls had been chopped to just below her jawline and straightened into a cute do. She wore short shorts, revealing knees knobbier and legs thinner than I remembered. The dark circles around her bloodshot eyes were natural, not from eyeliner like I’d originally thought. She looked older. Much older. Like five years had passed since I’d last seen her. “Are you okay? Why didn’t you answer any of my calls or texts?”

Her eyes cut to the side and she shrugged. “Yeah, about that… I forgot to pay the bill and my phone got shut off.”

Your phone got shut off?

My gaze cut to the phone in her hand. As an aspiring actress, Ariana lived and breathed by the phone, waiting for “the call” that would give her her big break and launch her career into super stardom. No way would she forget to pay her bill and leave it off for weeks. If my baby sister needed money, she’d be selling plasma or a kidney before she let that phone go. Yet the state of this apartment building compared to her last one led me to believe there were definitely cash flow issues.

“The phone doesn’t have service. It’s on the building’s Wi-Fi.”

Which meant she had plenty of options for reaching me, and had chosen not to. “Ari, if you need money, all you have to do is ask.”

“Thanks, but I don’t need your money.” She walked past me to get to the mailbox.

I stared after her, wondering what was going on. Sure, she’d been mad at me when I left for Africa with no plans to return, but we’d worked that out over several lengthy international calls. I had the phone bills to prove it.

I ducked my head and tried again. “I’m sorry. That came out wrong. I know you can take care of yourself.”

When Ariana turned back around, she wore an apologetic smile. She grabbed my hands. “I know. I’m sorry. It’s just such a shock to see you. I didn’t know if I’d ever see… I can’t believe you’re here. How long are you staying?”

Her hands trembled in mine. No, not trembled; shook. She shook.

“I don’t know yet. Ari, are you okay?”

“Yeah, of course.” She pulled away and reached for my carry-on bag.

Goose bumps sprouted up my arms, giving me very bad vibes. I grabbed the handle of my suitcase.

She shrugged my carry-on over her shoulder. “Come on, let’s get inside.” Then she gave me a pleading look and added, “Promise me you’ll be cool.”

Be cool with what?

“Okay.”

“Say the words, Markie.”

The last time Ariana had told me to ‘be cool’ she’d gotten nail polish all over my favorite sweater, which the brat did not have permission to wear. Since I’d given her any clothes I hadn’t taken to Africa, I had no idea what to think. I followed her into a small apartment with mismatched furniture, dim lighting, and a haze of smoke, not of the cigarette variety. Someone had been smoking pot in my baby sister’s apartment. I really wanted to freak out about it, but before I got the chance, a man asked, “Babe, was the check there?”

Ariana frowned. “Nope. Still not there.”

“Damn. I was counting on that money. Well, hurry and get ready. We gotta bounce!”

Babe?

Ariana gave me another apologetic smile. “Matt—my boyfriend—kind of… lives here. You promised you’d be cool.”

I was actually thankful for the smoke, because it hid the steam coming from my ears. I was planning to grab my sister and bolt when Matt came around the corner dressed in a giant condom wrapper and holding a beer. My breath caught, and not in a good way. In a bad way. A very bad way. An ohmigosh-my-baby-sister-who-isn’t-old-enough-to-drink-is-living-with-a-guy-wearing-a-giant-condom-wrapper-and-drinking-and-smoking sort of way.

Ariana’s smile turned to a grimace. “Matt, this is my sister, Markie.”

He nodded at me. “Hey, babe.” He wrapped his arm around Ariana’s waist and pulled her into his lips, and then proceeded to stick his tongue down her throat. At least that’s what it looked like from my perspective. She squirmed against his grasp, casting sideways glances at me, but he didn’t let up until she pushed him off her.

“Whoa, what was that for?” Matt asked, his words slurring together.

Matt could make me reconsider my stance on violence.

“My sister is right there.” She gestured wildly at me.

“Yeah.” He shrugged and smacked her on the butt. “Now go get your costume on.”

“Actually, I was thinking maybe we can stay home? Markie just got here and I don’t feel good.”

She didn’t sound well, either. She sounded tired. In fact, now that we were in the light, I got a good look at her, and she looked like crap. She shivered while sweat beaded across her forehead.

“Are you kidding me right now?” Matt asked. “After—” His eyes cut to me. “After what I just gave you, you’re going to stay in? Tonight?”

What he just gave her?

While I chewed on that little tidbit, Ariana frowned. “No. I’m sorry. You’re right. I’ll go get dressed.” Then she turned toward me and asked, “Do you have a costume?”