by Lana Sky
I don’t know what to feel as Arno cuts through alleys, running through several stoplights, in order to reach the part of town where the Petrovs reign with an iron fist.
In the span of just a few hours, someone set their kingdom on fire.
“Holy shit.” Arno has to park at least ten blocks back from the building that I assume is the hotel. What used to be one, anyway. A plume of flames paints the sky orange, streaked with hints of red and splotches of yellow.
It’s more than the typical blaze. It’s a fucking calling card.
First, Moe’s. Now, this. Someone’s starting a goddamn war.
“You take the left,” Arno tells me. “I’ll take the right. Find out what you can. We meet up in the center.”
There isn’t much to find. The cops barricaded the area closest to the hotel, fishing out stragglers who manage to escape the flames. There aren’t many.
Someone wanted revenge—that much is fucking clear. There are no signs of sabotage, and something tells me that any money, drugs, or other shit Piotr had tucked away inside the place has been lost to the blaze. This wasn’t about dominating.
This was obliteration.
Who’s next? The question crosses my mind just as I see him. A man lurks far back from the crowd, in an alley, his face partially covered by a hood and shadow. I can’t make out any definitive features from this distance, but I know that it’s him. The same way I know, deep down, he won’t wait for me to catch up.
I’m already shoving my way through the crowd anyway. Past police. Past civilians choking on the smoke-laced air.
He sees me. I know he does. A flashing siren illuminates his face in red for a split second. I see his eyes.
“Dante!”
He turns, disappearing into the alley before I can bolt across the street. By the time I pass an overflowing dumpster, he’s already gone.
I can’t even muster up the energy to feel pissed or angry. I don’t feel like hunting him down tonight, the way I have for months now, either.
I’m too damn tired.
I watch him go. I find Arno, and when he asks me what I found…
I tell him nothing.
Within minutes, Arno has the pub resembling Fort Knox. Men are patrolling every inch of the block, guns in hand. There isn’t a fucking beer in sight.
“You know what this means,” he tells me the moment I walk through the door. His jaw is clenched, his eyes searing; he’s still sober. “You know what this means.”
I don’t say a damn thing. It’s a packed house tonight, but one person is missing. One face. One Russian.
“I’ve got to go.”
It feels like déjà vu when I race out onto the street and head for my place. Turns out, there’s no point in running. The house is empty. She’s not here.
I tear it the fuck apart anyway, ripping through the cheap, mismatched furniture. Throwing everything out of my damn closet. Flipping the mattress over. With every hole I make in the wall with my fist, I don’t find her.
Or Dante.
Like always. Chasing after people is what I do best, after all.
I don’t even have a goddamn cigarette to chase the self-pity away. I wind up staring at a pool of my own blood as it drips from my fingers instead, desperate for relief. My kit might hold the answer. Half a vial. A full hit. One push of the syringe and I wouldn’t have to feel a damn thing anymore.
Maybe I’ll do it. Maybe I could.
I already have the needle in my hand when I smell her. Smoke, blood, death, and fire. A perfect mixture of fucking yellow. She strides through the chaos of the kitchen, her gaze hunting, searching. It finds me, and the next minute, she’s in my arms, holding me. Crushing me.
“Are you okay?”
I’m too fucking tired to play nice; I kiss her. Hard. Brutal. She can slap me if she wants to. Maybe I’ll feel guilty tomorrow.
She kisses me back instead. Harder. More. I already have my hands down the front of her shirt when she pulls back.
“Wait—”
When I let her go, she’s halfway across the room before I can grit out a half-assed apology.
A part of me has to laugh. Go fucking figure, I have to go and repel her too. “I’m sorry…”
Tears run down her face. I try to catch one with my finger, and it winds up dripping wet. Her pain fuels me like nothing else. Nicotine in the purest goddamn form.
“What’s wrong?”
“I need to leave the city,” she says in a rush. “My sister… She’s alive.” Her eyes gleam gold at the thought, shining with hope and pain and fear. “But I have to get her out now. But…”
She digs her nails in so deep that she draws blood.
“I wanted to say goodbye first.” Her voice cracks on that one word. Bye.
Ironically, that’s a word I’m not used to hearing. Few people take the time to tell me they’re leaving to my face—even Dante couldn’t do much. Maybe this icy burn in my chest is gratitude. Relief. I got my wish at least. I don’t have to chase after her.
She’ll cut out while I’m still high on her. It’s more than lust. Breathing her in feels like a necessary evil. The way I need a cigarette. The way Arno needs liquor. The way I’ve developed a certain fondness for the damn color yellow. I need to be used.
And I can’t leave. I have Arno to babysit. Dante to chase. I have a life tied to this damn city. Good old Espi still has to do his part and play his supporting role.
He can’t leave. Not until the fat lady sings and the fun and games are all over. It’s his fucking fate. I’ve told myself that for so long. But maybe I’m the only fucking one who ever really believed it.
“Where?”
She shakes her head. “I don’t know. We just have to go tonight.”
It’s like I’m in her head, seeing what she can’t admit out loud. Her soul. My name is written on it in gold—her new addiction. Her way to cope. She smokes me up like heroin, and I take her in hits and lines like fucking cocaine.
But the high’s gotta wear off sometime. I bail on him now, and Arno would hate me. Dante wouldn’t give a fucking shit.
She leaves? I’ll wind up like Parish. The way she would have even had she not been a casualty of her brother’s war. A speck on the sidelines. A forgotten side note.
“I’m coming with you.” I never knew that those four words could be so fucking hard to say.
And whether it’s the dimming lightbulb in the ceiling that casts a golden glow over her skin or my own imagination, my entire world is yellow.
It’s not darkness or light. It’s something in between. And, for some reason, it’s easier to stomach than anything else.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chloe
I never thought dawn could be beautiful. Not after my family was torn apart. Not after mornings ceased to be a lazy affair that consisted of eating warm cereal on my father’s lap while he smoked a pipe and read from the paper.
I never thought the sunrise could be so welcome. That a day would come when I craved the sight of it. When I hoped to see many, many more. If only they could all be like this—reeking of smoke, death, and…freedom.
It’s been hours since we left the city and he still hasn’t told me why he came. A part of me really doesn’t want to know. Maybe Arno did something to piss him off. Maybe his choice has nothing at all to do with me.
I don’t care. For the first time in my life, I feel content to be an addict with a limited supply of her chosen narcotic. I’ll take him any way I can. Standing beside him, crammed within the bow of a tiny fishing boat, is enough. I don’t even know where we’re going—Ivan wouldn’t say. But, somehow, just moving is enough.
Breathing him in is enough.
I look over at him, but his face reveals nothing. It’s just a mask of exhaustion. Regardless, his fingers tighten over my own, and in the smoldering ruins of my soul, which Piotr left behind…
I feel the stirring of something that might be hope.
Afterword
&
nbsp; If you or anyone you know is or has suffered from sexual abuse, please get help via the National Sexual Assualt Hotline: https://www.rainn.org/about-national-sexual-assault-telephone-hotline
A Word from the Author
Hey there!
Thank you so much for reading! If you enjoyed the story, please leave a review and recommend the book to any friend you think would love this twisted world. You’d have my eternal gratitude. Even a short sentence goes a long way!
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About the Author
Lana Sky is a reclusive writer in the United States who spends most of her time daydreaming about complex male characters and legless cats. She writes mostly paranormal romance, in between watching reruns of Ab Fab and drinking iced tea. Only iced tea.
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