Endless Love

by Drake, Tabatha

  “That’s enough, Ms. Fawn,” she says, her voice teetering on the edge. “You will soon find that you do not have the cards to negotiate with me.”

  I sit back, too nervous to move.

  Chapter 11

  Lilah

  Dante follows me down the stairs into the basement. We walk in silence, me with Elijah’s medkit hanging off my arm and him with a butcher’s knife in his hand. The air is heavy and expectant, like the last few minutes before a thunderstorm.

  We reach the room at the end of the hall and pause in the doorway.

  Myra sits in the chair, her arms latched behind her with a few extra chains to make sure she stays put this time. She raises her head, looking weak and worn. She hasn’t eaten in a day, at least. No water, either.

  Good.

  “Hey, Ra-ra,” I say. “How are you holding up?”

  She doesn’t answer. Her skin is ghostly pale, far more than usual from the blood loss earlier.

  I look at Dante. There’s a stiff eagerness in his eyes but he’s probably thinking the same thing about me. We’ve waited long enough for this.

  It’s time to avenge our brother.

  We step into the room, parting to round the table and take the seats on either side of Myra. I set the red medkit down on the table and unzip the main compartment, relishing in the tepid panic that fills Myra’s black eyes.

  She knows she’s about to die.

  “So,” I clear my throat, “my brother and I have spent the last several hours talking about how we’re going to kill you. Dante here is a fan of quick — not necessarily painless — but quick. Eye for an eye. Bullet for a bullet.” I shrug. “A quick shot through the heart sounds fair and all but we talked it over and we both agreed that you deserve something a little more... excruciating.”

  I pause for a reaction, but Myra just stares at the table.

  “We thought... we could hang you from a tree outside,” I continue. “Or drown you in a tub. Still, not good enough. I suggested stabbing you through the rib cage and poking a teeny, tiny hole in your lungs. It’s not too quick, it’s fucking painful, and you die gasping as you drown in your own bodily fluids. Now, that one... that was tempting, wasn’t it, big brother?”

  “Very tempting,” Dante says, calm and stoic.

  “But no,” I say. I reach into the medkit and withdraw a syringe. “Instead, we came up with this.”

  Myra raises her head. Her eyes bounce from me to the needle and back again. Mouth still sealed shut. For once.

  “You might remember that Elijah had a knack for Chemistry,” I say, flicking the cap off the needle. “He used to make all sorts of fun things. Painkillers, truth serums. Whole bunch of shit. However, he wasn’t the greatest at labeling things. My twin was never the most organized guy in the room but that’s fine. We all have our quirks.”

  I reach into the kit and grab the first vial I feel.

  “Like this!” I hold up the vial, inspecting the deep red liquid inside. “What the fuck is this? Let’s find out.”

  I push the needle through the cap and pull back the plunger to fill it. Myra tries to scoot her chair away from me, but Dante blocks the chair leg with his heel and shoves her toward me, keeping a firm hand on her shoulder to stop her from trying again.

  “Hold still,” I tell her. “This will probably hurt.”

  I jab the needle into her shoulder. She winces as I push it down. A drop of blood seeps out of the hole in her skin as I pull it out and sit back.

  Dante and I wait in silence, watching her face closely for any kind of side effect.

  “Anything?” I ask, amused.

  Myra doesn’t react.

  “Hrmm. Let’s see what else we got.”

  I hand the syringe over to Dante as I reach into the kit again. I grab another random vial from inside, this one a teal green shade, and Dante takes it from me. He pierces the cap and fills the syringe.

  Myra watches him with wide eyes, quickly twitching with panic and fear. He jabs it into her other arm, and she cringes in pain again.

  “Sorry,” I say, wrinkling my nose. “Dante and I weren’t blessed with a soft touch. Maybe if Elijah were here, but then again...”

  “Just kill me,” she spits at us. “Get it over with.”

  Dante and I share a look.

  “Nah,” I say. I grab another vial and Dante gives me the syringe to fill. “Hopefully, mixing all this shit together won’t cause some violent chemical reaction in your system somewhere...” I muse, my voice full of whimsy.

  I jab her again, making it hurt.

  “Stop it,” Myra begs.

  I lean back. “What’s wrong, Myra? Do you feel a burning sensation? A sudden kick to the chest around where your heart should be?”

  Dante removes another vial from the kit as I lay the syringe down for him to take.

  “I was just doing my job,” she says, growing short of breath.

  “You know who else always did his job?” I ask. “Elijah. The guy never even took a sick day and you put him down for a little bit of Zappia money. Was it worth it?”

  Myra gasps as Dante sticks her in the shoulder again. “Dante, please...”

  He passes the syringe back to me. “You really think begging me for mercy is going to help you?” he asks.

  “You really think torturing me is going to help you?” she asks, her voice quivering. “I wasn’t lying before. The only thing you can do is run. There’s no happy ending here.”

  “We’ll take our chances.”

  I fill the syringe again with another shot of teal green. “Yeah, I’m not so concerned about my happy ending,” I say, aiming for her shoulder. “I’m more preoccupied with your ending at the moment.”

  I jab her one more time and she tightens in a quick, pain-filled tremor.

  “If you have any last words or final wishes...” I say, laying the syringe down on the table. “We’ll be happy to pass them on. It’s the least we can do.”

  She says nothing as her nose begins to bleed.

  I reach into the kit again and withdraw one of the Boss’ diaries, the end in sight. “You know what I stumbled upon earlier?” I ask, holding it up. “Your mother’s diaries. Or guardian’s, I guess. You were, technically, adopted.”

  Myra glares at me, her chest heaving for short, rapid breaths.

  I flip through the pages. “She has an awful lot to say about Mercer,” I note. “M is at the top of his class. He’s looking more and more like V every day — whoever that is. My heart grows, she wrote. My son makes me a proud mother every time I look at him.” I glance at Myra. “You, on the other hand... I think Mommy had a bit of kidnapper’s remorse.”

  “Shut up,” Myra mutters.

  “She rarely does as she’s told,” I read. “Why can’t she be more like my son?”

  “I said, shut up.”

  I set the diary down. “You tried so hard, didn’t you?” I ask. “To impress her. To make her happy. It must have worked a little, right? She made you her voice. Though... maybe she only did that to shut you up.”

  Myra trembles, her eyes full of pain.

  I look at Dante and he stands up from his chair.

  “You know what, Myra?” I say. “Fox was wrong before. You didn’t ask for this life. You had loving parents, a family, I assume. But she took that from you. You’re as much her victim as we are.” I shake my head. “You adapted and survived in the only way you could. Just like me. I can respect that.”

  Dante lays a hand on her shoulder as her limbs twitch. She tries to speak but she can’t, her nervous system no doubt being torn apart from the inside out. I sit still and watch for a few more moments. I wonder if her pain feels worse than my pain. I hope it does.

  “Truth is, I do feel sorry for you,” I say. “For the woman you could have been. But the woman you are... She killed my brother. She raped my lover. And she deserves every second of this.”

  Myra coughs, spewing blood down her shirt. I could leave her here forever. I want to but
, like all good families, sometimes you have to compromise.

  I nod at Dante and he lays the butcher’s knife along her neck.

  Myra turns her head up and breathes one final, aching sigh of relief. “Thank you. Thank—”

  He opens her throat and turns away as she bleeds out down her chest. She doesn’t fight it at all, not that she could in the first place, but a look of peace settles on her face.

  I return the vials to the medkit and pop the cap back onto the syringe. Dante cleans the knife with a cloth before kneeling behind Myra’s chair and unlocking her cuffs. I catch her as she slinks forward, gently resting her head down on the table and closing her eyes.

  Dante and I glance at each other. We don’t say anything. Not aloud, anyway.

  On the inside, we say everything as we pick Myra up and carry her upstairs. We say how thankful we are to still have each other as we pass through the dark, quiet house toward the backyard. We say how much Elijah would not have been okay with how we used his serums, but he’d disapprove with a twinkle in his eye.

  We lie Myra down next to the other bodies of her squad and Dante covers her with a sheet.

  I take a few steps back to the house, but I pause when I realize Dante isn’t following me.

  “You good?” I ask him.

  He nods, his eyes on the ground. “Yeah,” he answers. “Just going to stay here for a while.”

  The strong, silent type. That’s Dante.

  “Goodnight, big brother.”

  “Goodnight, little sister.”

  I walk back into the house. It’s getting close to midnight now. The others have long since claimed their beds. Boxcar sits quietly on the couch with his laptop. We say nothing to each other as I pass him, but I offer him a nod.

  I reach the top floor, quickly navigating through the dark to the room Archer and I share. I open the door and step inside. Before I can adjust to the darkness, the bedside lamp flicks on and Archer sits up in the bed.

  “Lilah?” he whispers, wide-awake.

  I nod as I walk over to my backpack on the bench by the window. I sift through it in silence, quickly finding the small, hollow, glass pendant hidden in a pair of socks.

  I turn it in my hand and a lock of brown hair tumbles from one side to the other inside. Elijah’s hair.

  I swallow hard and reach back into the bag to grab a pair of shorts and a tank top to sleep in.

  Archer gets out of bed and walks up behind me as I unbutton my jeans. Thankfully, Archer’s always had a talent for reading the room. He keeps his mouth shut as I undress and waits for me to turn toward him before reaching out and putting his hands on my shoulders.

  I cradle the pendant softly between my palms. “It’s done,” I say, my throat dry.

  Archer takes a breath and exhales slowly as he studies my face. “What do you need?” he asks.

  I look down, losing myself a little in his bare, enticing chest, but a cruel numbness takes over my gut. Oh, there are plenty of things I’d like to do, things that Archer will no doubt oblige without argument, but I let the urges fall in favor of his arms.

  “Hold me,” I finally say.

  Archer doesn’t blink. He reaches for my hands and I surrender them without a second thought. He guides me to the bed and lays me down with him. I ease as close to him as possible and he flicks the lamp off, plunging the room into darkness before wrapping his thick arms around me again.

  The sob grows fast, taking over my chest before I realize it’s happening. My throat locks and warm tears spill down my cheeks. I hold the pendant against my heart, willing Elijah’s to beat with mine again, no matter how impossible that may be.

  Archer pulls the blanket around us, his body heat bleeding into my skin as he embraces me closer. He kisses my forehead and strokes my arm, saying nothing as I cry into the breathless void one last time.

  You can rest now, Elijah.

  We’ll meet again someday.

  Soon, my tear ducts run dry and I stop shaking. I lay my head down, slowly catching my breath with each lingering exhale. Archer’s lips never leave my forehead. His arms never lose their strong hold on me.

  My hunter never lets me go.

  “Close your eyes,” he tells me. “I’ll be here when you open them again.”

  I look up, somehow finding his deep blue eyes in the dark. He runs his thumb along my cheeks to banish the tears stuck to them. I kiss him once, a sweet kiss goodnight, before resting my head back down on his chest.

  I settle in for one night of peace. One night of quiet to mourn all I’ve lost.

  But tomorrow, I will burn these motherfuckers to the ground.

  Chapter 12

  Dante

  I know a thing or two about grief.

  I’ve been in the middle of it. I’ve been on the outside looking in. Life can be as cruel as it is wonderful and we’re all just waiting around for the tide to suddenly turn on us and show us the other side.

  But I can’t take much more of this.

  My parents. Lucy’s father. My little brother.

  No amount of vengeance will be enough to save me if I have to bury Lucy Vaughn, too.

  I walk back into the house, quietly shifting from room-to-room. A light shines from the kitchen down the hall as the refrigerator door opens and closes again. I follow the sound to find Fox standing by the counter with a whiskey bottle and two glasses.

  “Right on time,” he says, pouring a healthy amount into both.

  I reach for the nearest glass. “Can’t sleep?” I ask.

  “Never.” He raises his own. “Cheers.”

  We take a drink and Fox refills them to where they were before. A bit of whiskey spills over the side of my glass and glides along my finger. I watch as it slowly makes its way to the counter, mesmerized by the simplicity of it.

  “They’re alive.”

  I look up at Fox. He’s staring at his glass the same way I am.

  “That’s what I keep telling myself,” he says. “Gio needs them alive to...”

  His voice falls.

  I pick up my glass. “There are only so many rocks a man like Gio can hide under.” I raise it and nod. “We’ll find them.”

  Fox follows my lead and chugs his glass to the bottom.

  “Oh, good.” Boxcar wanders in from the other room. “Are we drinking now? Or is this a tattoo-only binge?”

  Fox turns to the cupboard for a third glass. “Come on in. There’s plenty for everyone...”

  Boxcar walks up, looking tired and hopeless. I don’t blame him. None of us know where our girls are but at least we know what to expect from Gio. But the Boss? Marilyn Black?

  Who knows what she could be putting Caleb through right now?

  Fox fills his glass and hands it over.

  “Thanks,” Boxcar says, barely making eye contact with him.

  “I can’t believe Casey is an agent,” Fox says.

  “You didn’t know?” Boxcar asks. “Because I was gonna ask…”

  “No. I never would have kept that from Caleb.” Fox exhales. “What was he like?”

  Boxcar chugs his glass and thinks. “Tall,” he answers.

  Fox chuckles.

  I shake my head. “I couldn’t imagine taking this job if I had kids,” I say. “I couldn’t even keep it from my brother and sister.”

  “Yeah…” Boxcar sighs. “Casey didn’t seem like the remorseful type, but I hope I’m wrong about that.”

  “Guess we’ll know tomorrow,” Fox says.

  Feet shuffle in from the hallway and Luka appears in the entryway.

  “I knew I smelled booze,” he says.

  Fox smiles and grabs a fourth glass. “How’s Sofia?”

  “Restless,” he answers, his head down. “She blames herself for this.”

  “I don’t think any of us blame her. Not even a little bit.”

  “As I’ve told her, but…” Luka sighs as Fox fills his glass. “Her heart is too big. I’ve never known a woman who feels emotion as purely as she
does.”

  Boxcar tilts his head. “So, she was a Zappia?”

  Luka nods. “Yes.”

  “Gio’s wife?” I ask.

  He nods again. “Yes.”

  “But she seems so…” Boxcar pauses, “normal.”

  Luka smiles. “They tried to subjugate her, but… it never took. She asked for my help and I got her out.”

  Fox clears his throat.

  “We,” Luka corrects himself with a smile. Fox nods. “We got her out. Sofia and I have been fighting the Zappia way together ever since.”

  “And Snake Eyes,” I point out.

  He stares into his glass. “Snake Eyes murdered my father and grandfather,” he says. “My family does not forgive those who spill Lutrova blood.”

  I raise my glass. “My family has a similar policy.”

  He raises his own and we both drink.

  Archer saunters in from the hall and sighs. “Looks like I’m not the only one who needed a nightcap…” he says. “Hello, gentlemen.”

  Fox silently grabs a fifth glass.

  “Is Lilah sleeping?” I ask.

  Archer takes a spot next to Boxcar. “Yes, she is.”

  I wince. “Uh-oh.”

  “That’s a bad thing?” Boxcar asks.

  “When Lilah sleeps, that means she’s calm,” I say.

  “And...?”

  “And when Lilah’s calm, that means she’s got a plan.”

  Fox offers him a glass, but Archer grabs the whole bottle instead.

  “And I’ve got my work cut out for me,” he says.

  I chuckle as he chugs a large amount at once. “Welcome to the last thirty years of my life, Arch.”

  He sets the bottle down. “Then, you, sir, deserve bloody sainthood.”

  “Me and Eli, we...” I pause, taken by memory. “We always knew that when we woke up and her bed was already made, we were in for a rough day.”

  I look down and they go quiet.

  It’s not over until I get Lucy back, but I can rest a little easier now knowing that my brother can, too.

  Fox raises his glass. “For Elijah.”

  The rest of them do the same, their soft eyes on me.

  “For Elijah,” they all repeat.