by Hart, Callie
How on earth?
I didn’t take the tarot card from Shelta’s tent. She snatched it up and slipped it back into the pack before I could even get a proper look at it, but I know this is the same card. It’s the exact same one I selected from her pack back at the fair. It has absolutely no business being here, amongst my things from work.
It’s impossible to rip my eyes away from the card. I keep it locked in my gaze like it might disappear if I so much as blink. It doesn’t go anywhere, though. I’m not imagining it, which is a bit of a surprise. Quickly, I throw on a sweater and shove my feet into my Ugg boots, pocket the card, and then I’m tearing up two flights of stairs and beelining for Sarah’s door. Fuck. This is un-fucking-real. I brace myself against the door frame as I wait for her to answer—it really does feel like I’m going to have a heart attack now—but the door never opens.
A minute passes by, and then another. I check the time on my cell, my vision blurring when I see that it’s only six forty-five am. Sarah is not a morning person. There’s no way she’s already up and out for the day. It takes more than two hours for her to fix her hair alone, and she’d never take a booking from a client at the nail salon before dawn has properly broken. That means she’s either dead inside her apartment, or she went somewhere last night, after telling me she was planning on getting to bed early, and she still isn’t back yet.
Sarah’s too stubborn to die alone and unnoticed in her apartment. It’s just not her style. It’s beginning to look like the woman lied to me last night, but I’m too wound up to care about that right now. I need her. I need to know what this stupid fucking card means. I need to know what happened between her and Shelta.
I need to know what her sister is capable of.
17
PASHA
FOR THE BEST
I close my eyes and I see flames. Vibrant red, amber, burned orange, and shimmering gold. The flames sway and dance in a sea of color, and I curse myself for my own motherfucking stupidity. I shouldn’t have taken the phone back to her. I shouldn’t have sat in that bar and waited for her, knowing she would come. Knowing I would speak to her, that I’d look down into her eyes, smell the sweet perfume of that creamy, perfect skin, and that I’d imagine what she would taste like on the tip of my tongue. Knowing that I’d find myself spellbound by the shift of the light over all that glorious red hair, and I’d be unable to stop myself from thinking about it afterwards.
The smell of fresh sheets floods my nose as I pull the bed covers up over my head, growling under my breath. It’s early, too much light pouring through the windows into the loft. My bones ache after last night’s fights. I can tell my torso is peppered with bruises from the way it hurts like hell just trying to fucking breathe, but I don’t give a shit about that right now.
Soft, pliable, bitable lips. Baby pink.
A well-proportioned nose that turns up ever so slightly at the end.
Pale freckles, lightly dusting high cheekbones.
Mercurial, hazel eyes, brown first, then green, then blue, all in the span of a few short breaths.
I want…
I want more than anything in this world to fuck that girl so hard she’ll never want another man again, no matter how long she lives.
I shudder as I close my hand around my erection. I’m so fucking hard, it feels like my dick’s going to break as I begin working long strokes up and down the shaft.
I’ve never seen her smile. I can imagine what it would look like, though. I can also imagine what she’d look like underneath me, naked as the day she was born, her tits bare, her nipples peaked as she writhes and moans my name, begging me to come inside her. She wouldn’t last five seconds in a bed with me. I’d make fucking sure of it.
Doesn’t take long for me to come this morning, either. I can’t hold off. The very thought of her is intoxicating. My senses are alight, my insides combusting as my back bows away from the bed. With my hand covered in my own come, I slide it up and down my dick, shivering at the aftershocks of pleasure that snap through me like electricity. Fuck, that feels good. Seriously good. Zara’s hot, wet little mouth would feel better, but with that out of the question, my palm and my five-star imagination are living up to the task.
I groan as I get up.
Fuck.
Everything hurts. Like I went head to head with four different guys last night and got my ass kicked. Funnily enough, I did go head to head with a bunch of fighters last night, but I came out on top. I did the ass kicking. The shitty thing about winning a fight is this, though: no matter how quick you are, no matter how hard you hit, no matter how fast it’s all over, your opponent’s bound to get a few hits in on their way down. That’s just the way it goes. I was on fire last night, knocking the wind out of men twice my size, embarrassing the fuck out of them in front of their fake-titted, fake-lipped, Barbie doll girlfriends, and all because of my encounter with Zara.
I felt invincible. Unstoppable. Undefeatable. The way she looked up at me, sitting there on that bar stool, attitude and defiance laser-beaming out of those beautiful eyes? Holy fucking shit. It had taken everything in me to not grab a handful of that luscious hair, to tip her head back and lay a kiss on her that would have branded her down to her very bones. She would have been mine right there and then. I could have made it happen—I saw it on her. Hidden amongst her anger and the shadow of her concern, I witnessed the desire on her face, and my blood had roared in response. My lust was a primal song that blasted through my body, and it hasn’t stopped singing ever since. Walking away from her last night was one of the most difficult things I’ve ever had to do. Firstly, because my dick was so hard that by that point walking in general had been a very painful thing to accomplish, but secondly, more importantly, it was difficult because I knew I wasn’t going to see her again.
Yeah, I invited her to call me, but I knew the truth of it then just as well as I do now. Despite the way she was looking at me, like she wanted to climb up on top of me and ride the living shit out of me, she’ll never call. She’ll never seek me out, the way I sought her out. She’s too sensible. Too smart. I like and detest that about her in equal measure.
I may have shown some restraint and stopped myself from going through her shit, but I did do one thing with her phone before I gave it back to her. The number I stored will probably go unnoticed for months, and when she does stumble across it, she’ll probably have trouble recalling who she met that would have warranted the contact name, ‘Raised By Wolves.’
That had entertained me more than it should have—her little parting shot across the bow on the street outside the fair. Little does Zara Llewelyn know, but she was right. I was raised by wolves. One wolf in particular, with a penchant for ripping people’s throats out and leaving them to exsanguinate in the dirt.
As I brush my teeth, I allow the mantra that’s been pounding like a drum inside my head for the past twenty-four hours to repeat itself over and over again: She could be yours. She could be yours. She could be yours.
There’s a sharp, determined light in my eyes as I stare myself down in the mirror, and even I recognize it as dangerous. If I listen to that voice in my head, telling me to take what I want and to make it mine, the consequences…god, the consequences will be catastrophic.
Shelta forbade me from pursuing her. I wouldn’t normally give a shit what my mother thinks about anything, but there was the threat. ‘If you get involved with her, the two of you will end up regretting it for the rest of your lives. I will personally make sure of it.’ Not to mention the final, warning note to her words. You will stay away from the woman in your dreams. She’s not for you, do you hear me? She’ll be the ruin of us all.
If Shelta believes as I do, that Zara is the woman I’ve been dreaming about for half my damn lifetime, then I can’t go fucking near her. I can’t. Shelta will see her as a threat, and my mother does not take kindly to threats. She dispatches them swiftly, and she does so without a second thought. I’ve seen the fire in Zara’s ey
es. I’ve heard it in her voice. She’s a warrior, but Shelta is fucking ruthless, and I wouldn’t wish my mother’s wrath upon the heads of even my worst fucking enemies.
Still. The chant will not leave my head.
Claim her. Mark her. Fuck her. Bind her. Sink yourself so deep inside her that she doesn’t know which fucking way is up.
I spit into the sink, and then I bare my teeth at my reflection in the mirror, growling at myself under my breath. You can’t have her. Fuck someone else. Get your dick sucked by a pretty blonde. A bartender with big tits, who’ll make you a whiskey sour after she’s made you come.
This is what my mother would say to me. She’d never curse the way I curse, but Shelta was born blessed with the innate ability to string a series of common, inoffensive words together into a sentence and make you feel like you just got fucked in the ass. Four nights ago, she did precisely that as she reminded me (apparently for the last time) of my duty, and what must be done to protect the Rivin family. What I have to do: find a woman. Marry her. Accept the crown. Be a good son, and a good king, and don’t dare fucking complain about it, not once. Not even under my breath.
Once I’m showered, dressed, and I have a coffee in my hand, I plant myself out on the sprawling balcony and I turn on my cell.
I usually only turn it on for a couple of hours a day. One hour, early in the morning, if I can manage it. If I only have to live with the torture of potential contact with the outside world for a mere sixty minutes, then I find I’m less likely to punch holes in my walls. Anyone who needs to reach me knows how this works, and they make contact accordingly. Anyone who doesn’t know the system doesn’t need to know it and can go fuck themselves for all I care.
My irritation levels rise as I sit, sipping on my coffee, eyes scanning the city skyline, waiting for the first chime to disturb the silence. It’s bound to fucking happen. It always does. There’s no escaping it. I’m almost surprised when ten minutes tick by. Then another five. I begin to settle into the hope that maybe today I’ll be blessed with a little peace and quiet. And that is my mistake. I should know better than to even form the thoughts in my head, because the moment I do…
The ringtone blares out, loud as fuck. I pick up the phone and answer it, already knowing who it is. She hasn’t called me since the day I was banished, but I knew I’d opened a floodgate when I visited her the other night. My mother’s voice is even more flat and monotone than usual as she greets me. “I hear you made it out of the cage alive again. I suppose I should be relieved.”
The coffee, black and thick as tar, just how I like it, turns bitter and acerbic in my mouth. “Touching. Really touching. I’m so glad to know you’re concerned about my wellbeing.”
Her tisk of derision makes me clench my jaw. “Just because you don’t seem to care about your responsibility to me as my son doesn’t mean I’ve foregone mine to you as your mother. Tell me you made enough to walk away for a few weeks, at least.”
She’s never liked me participating in the fights. Always gave me grief about earning money with my fists, even before I was cast out. “Did you give Jamis this much shit when he was a bare-knuckle boxer?” ‘Jamis’ not ‘my grandfather.’ I never got to meet the man; he was long dead before I was even born. “Everyone talks about him like he was a legend. I’m sure the money he won fighting back in the day, the money that put food on their table when the fair wasn’t doing so well, wasn’t considered shameful.”
Something clangs in the background. A pan, most likely. She has a penchant for banging pots and pans whenever she doesn’t like what she’s hearing. I learned at a young age never to break bad news to her when she was cooking. “Times have changed,” she says sharply. “The clan has changed. Good or bad, we made the decision to modernize.”
“Good or bad?” I laugh. “You think that was a mistake? You wanna go back to the old ways? Kids getting married at thirteen? Women chained to the kitchen sink? No education for girls whatsoever? Superstition restricting every single move you make?”
“Watch your mouth. You know what I mean.”
I don’t really know what she means. If she had her way, I think we would still be living like her father, and his father before him. You still can’t talk about bodily fluids without her bursting a fucking blood vessel. Back in the day, any mention of blood, sweat, saliva, or even needing to go to the fucking bathroom would have meant immediate bad luck for the entire family. If she’d heard what I said about fucking a girl on her period in that bar last night…ha! Holy shit. I’d have had to beg for forgiveness from the entire clan to avoid being banished for six months, or paying a fucking fine. Shelta might claim that the Rivin clan are beyond the traditions of the past, but I know she makes Patrin turn people away, refusing them entry into the fair, if they’re wearing even the smallest scrap of red, and her skin still crawls whenever she sees a cat. If she had any idea that I regularly feed a stray that lives in the alley behind the studio, she’d never fucking talk to me again.
Maybe I should tell her.
“The fair makes plenty of money these days. You’d know that if you’d even bothered to ask how we’ve been doing the other night. Yes, my father did make money fighting, but things were a lot harder for us then. After the war—”
“Oh god, don’t start on about World War II again. I can’t fucking bear it. Jamis wasn’t even born until nineteen forty-seven. And guess what? Our family was here in the States. Had been for generations. Hitler didn’t kill a single one of our relatives.”
If my mother knew how to drive, if she knew where I lived, she’d be over here in a heartbeat to flay the skin from my bones. Thankfully, she doesn’t. She is seething, though. “We were the lucky ones. Imagine if things had been different. Imagine if the Rivins had still lived in Europe.”
I get where she’s coming from. I do. Our people have faced persecution and prejudice since the beginning of time, and never so much as than back then—millions upon millions of Roma died—but she’s right. We were the lucky ones. And clinging to a brutal past that never actually happened to us just doesn’t sit right with me. She’s borrowing someone else’s tragedy to serve her own purposes.
I rub my eyes a little too hard, sighing down my nose. “If you’re calling to find out if I’ve made enough money to stop fighting the rest of the month, then the answer is yes. I have. Will I stop fighting for the rest of the month? Probably not. Now, if you don’t mind I have some stuff I have to be ge—”
“Brigid Clay’s coming to the fair tonight. Her niece just turned eighteen, and she sent a photo. She’s very pretty. I want you to come and meet her.”
Across the city, a plane climbs over high-rise buildings, soaring upward like a bird. The early morning sunlight bounces off its metal exterior, almost too bright to look at, as three or four hundred people leave Spokane behind, headed off to god only knows where.
For one hot-tempered moment, I seriously envy those bastards.
“I will not meet with Brigid Clay’s niece,” I snarl. “And I will not be meeting with anyone else, either. I will not tolerate this. Please don’t call me again.”
I hang up the phone before she can fire one of her viper-tongued retorts down the line. I can’t sit here and listen to another single word come out of her mouth. Now that I’m aware of her agenda, I also know that she won’t give up on this. She’ll call again tomorrow, and the day after, and the day after, if she thinks she might be able to work on me, like an ocean’s tides work against a shore, trying to break it down, one grain of sand at a time. I won’t be weakened by her constant badgering, though. My will is not made of stone. Its diamond-edged and sharp as a fucking razor, and it will not be eaten away by her sheer determination, or anyone else’s for that fucking matter.
I’ve dreamed of the woman I’m supposed to be with for years. I’ve finally found her, finally met her, finally touched her with my own cursed hands. And if the vitriol that fuels my mother’s deranged heart is going to prevent me from finally having he
r and keeping her to myself for the rest of time, then I will not fucking have anyone. To keep Zara safe, I won’t get involved with her. I’ll never marry, and I’ll never accept the crown.
There’s still so much to know about my firefly. Still so much to learn. I do know that Zara and I are fated to be, though, and that she is supposed to complete my fucking soul. And if my own mother is so determined to damn me to roam this earth with only half a soul, and half a heart, and half a fucking life…then I’ll also be damned if I give her any other part of me.
I clench my hand around my phone, daring myself to crush it. To shatter the screen into a million little pieces. My hand is throbbing when the device buzzes, registering a text message. I don’t even want to look at it, but I do.
Patrin: Homer’s Sports Bar on Longview. One hour. We need to talk.
18
ZARA
LAST RESORT
Lightning lashes across the sky like a whip. This morning might have been crisp, bright and sunny, but now the sky is a dark and angry gunmetal grey, and there’s enough electricity in the air to make the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.
I’ve always loved storms, but there’s something ominous and worrying about the tempest that’s brewing now. I’m restless. Agitated. Can’t sit still. And nothing I do seems to take the edge off my anxious energy.
Sarah still isn’t back. Or she’s still locked inside her apartment and she won’t answer the door. A suffocating blanket of silence greets me every time I jog up there and hammer against the wood, and I’m growing more and more concerned by the second. My paranoia has reached psychotic levels. So far, I’ve theorized a number of scenarios, some of which are strange and unlikely, while others border on downright terrifying and ridiculous. All of them involve Sarah being in some sort of trouble, and it’s driving me fucking crazy.