Biohazard

Chapter 16

Sierra's mouth was set in a hard line and was breathing quite heavily with clenched fists as I talked to her mother. Her jaw was probably on the verge of bursting. I tried to ignore her and tomato-red face as I looked at her terrified mother.

"I knew about Cassian and his mother, but Lucifer promised it would never happen again," the poor woman was basically trembling, but she kept talking, "I don't know what he does now, but I do know that he used to have a drug dealing business, but he said that he quit. He promised me a lot of things when I found out about his past. Diagnosed with bipolarism soon after we got married and refused to go on medication. He said it made him feel like he was out of control."

I bite my lip to keep myself from telling her that he is out of control. He killed his own son and recruited his kids to keep the drug business that he promised he would quit.

"What kind of drugs was he selling?"

"I don't know, some sort of tightly compacted power...it's white."

"What else do you know about his business?"

"I used to work for him," her face goes completely blank when she says this and a muscle in Sierra's jaw twitches. Mrs. Henderson slaps a hand over her mouth. "After I found out about it, he convinced me to work for him, so I did. He always used this really old bluish-gray car to make his deliveries and I would make those deliveries for him.

I stopped because the people on the receiving end started threatening me. Those people are the same every time, they wore beige trench coats, tall, and looked like trouble. Their symbol was a biohazard symbol, which signifies possibly toxic substances.

They all have special keys that let them into any one of the Biohazard headquarters. It's a worldwide underground business. Either the government doesn't know or is being bribed into keeping the secret. Lucifer's only goal with the business was to get rich. It didn't matter how."

Mrs. Henderson dabs the corners of her eyes with some tissues. Sierra marches off, fuming. She wanted to take care of her mother after Lucifer left them with nothing. He knew that Sierra would find a job one way or another, so he offered her a job. He could keep an eye on her family, the same way he did with Cassian. I thanked Sierra's mother and tried to process the overload of information I had gained while Mrs. Henderson talked to her about Lucifer. For some reason, the beige trench coats are stuck in my head. Could I possibly have seen one of them?

~~~~~~~

Arryn snickers from beside me and it takes every ounce of self-control in my body to not leap at him and scratch his face up. My mother aggressively stirs the pot that was sitting on the stove while my dad read his newspaper on the large grey couch, completely oblivious to the tension that made the room stuffy.

"I was telling her not to go," My mother yelled, "And what do you do? You go with her and make her cry more?" I glare at the 14-year-old train wreck beside me, watching him play with his fork. My dad finally takes the time to look over his shoulder to look at my mother before going back to his newspaper.

"I care about her, too, mom—"

"Well, then you should've told her to stay back," she plops some paella onto our plates. She was still upset that I let Mrs. Henderson meet one of Lucifer's ex-wives. I rolled my eyes and helped set up the table again after Arryn messed it up. Mrs. Henderson went back to her house after we met with Sierra. She said she felt like going home, but I knew that she just wanted to get back to her alcohol.