Total pages in book: 145
Estimated words: 135792 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 679(@200wpm)___ 543(@250wpm)___ 453(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 135792 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 679(@200wpm)___ 543(@250wpm)___ 453(@300wpm)
“You’ll be okay,” Liv reassured him and pulled off his jean jacket to remove the T-shirt he’d put on before leaving home. It had come straight from the wash and was as clean as it could be. “Give me your arm.”
Defeated, Knox extended his arm to Liv. While ugly, the wound was shallow. “You shouldn’t have been here,” he mumbled, staring into the pit, but at least his breathing was leveling out.
Liv swallowed hard as he wrapped the fabric around Knox’s forearm. He suddenly got a flashback to years ago, when Knox had gotten into a fight with boys who tried to bully him over an arrhythmia attack he’d suffered in school. Back then Liv and Knox hadn’t managed to fight off the older kids and had to lick each other’s wounds just like this. Because who could they talk to, if not to each other? None of their parents cared.
“And what would have happened then, huh?”
Knox rubbed his eyes with the ball of his palm. “I don’t know. Maybe he would have beat the shit out of me. At least you wouldn’t have been involved.” He took a deep breath and bit the inside of his cheek so hard Liv could see it. A technique he’d confessed his dad had taught him so he wouldn’t “be a cry-baby”.
And if there was someone who deserved death more than Vlad, it was Knox’s bastard of a father. But he’d been put away for twenty-five years, so it wasn’t like Liv could reach him.
Unless…
Fuck.
“It’s fine. At least you’re safe now,” Liv muttered, sucking in cool air and refusing to acknowledge the dead body. He wanted to pretend it wasn’t there for a while longer.
He tied his T-shirt around Knox’s forearm, struggling to think clearly when he realized that had Vlad cut in two inches farther, Knox might have bled out before Liv even got to them.
“I’m not safe! Neither of us is.” Knox’s voice broke when he pointed toward the corpse. “We’re fucked. I should have known I won’t amount to nothing.”
Liv swallowed and looked toward the pit. It was too deep for him to see the body from his current position, but he knew it was there, and that was enough.
“I should turn myself in. Maybe then… they’ll believe it was in self-defense,” he said, though deep in his heart he knew that wouldn’t happen. Guys like him never got a second chance. Not guys from where he lived.
Knox seemed to startle awake, and his eyes sharpened when he glanced at Liv. He grabbed his jaw. “I’ve had many reasons to hate you lately, but this ain’t one. We’re in this together, and you’re not turning yourself in. We’ll do… something.”
The warm touch made Liv’s skin tingle. “No?”
“No.” Knox took a shivery breath that tickled Liv’s skin and smelled of blood. “If we go down, we’ll go down together. Who’s gonna protect your ass in prison otherwise, huh?” He patted Liv’s cheek and pulled away, but Liv shook his head.
Knox could not go to prison. He might be a proficient fighter, but he had a disability that sometimes made him faint or dizzy. A man could not appear weak in the can, especially not with a face as pretty as Knox’s.
“No. I pushed him, and if someone does go down for it, it’s gonna be me. End of story.”
“Let’s at least fucking try, okay? We’re fucked either way. No one will believe us this was an accident. But Vladdy was a piece of shit. Everyone knows this. Didn’t he have loan sharks on his ass? It’s probably why he didn’t want to pay me.” Knox took a deep breath, which hopefully calmed his racing heart a little. “We could take the body and cover the bars he fell on with cement. Hide the blood.”
Wow. They were seriously doing this.
“There’s just one problem,” Liv mumbled and used the side of his hand to wipe blood off Knox’s mouth. He already knew it would not win him Knox’s approval, but that was no longer important. “Amanda knows you were here, and that I went to pick you up. If he disappears, we’ll be the prime suspects.”
Knox stayed silent for a long moment. “Fuck! You just had to tell her my car broke down? So I look like a loser?”
Liv bit the inside of his cheek. “Come on, Knox. Not this again. She didn’t respect you, so why are you so fucking hung up on her?”
“You wouldn’t understand, because you’ve got girls lining up to suck your dick. You know what? It doesn’t matter now. We’ve got much bigger problems. Should we… disappear too?” He gave Liv an uncertain glance. As if Liv held all the answers. “I’ve got nothing on me. A change of clothes, my wallet, some meds.”
In another life, his delicate features could have landed him modeling jobs, but in this one, Knox had been told they made him look like a girl even though no girls Liv knew had sharp blond scruff nor a jawline as strong as his. And regardless of what Knox claimed, girls loved him. It was keeping them at his side Knox had trouble with.