project

by Torrance, Asa

  “Where could he have taken her?” I say out loud, my thoughts moving at a frantic pace. Never mind where? What is he planning to do? I know it can’t be good, and I know it has to do with hurting me.

  Just the way he said he would.

  “Maybe the DBB?” Samaire offers. “It’s deserted this time of year.”

  I shake my head. “No. He wouldn’t go there, not after Jessa…”

  I stop talking. Ace and Fabian are looking at me, waiting to fly off at a moment’s notice.

  “The pier,” I say suddenly. “He’s taking her to the pier.”

  I know it, almost as certain as I am about anything. It’s the only thing that makes sense, a place sure to be deserted with the inclement storm that’s been projected to make landfall this evening.

  “So what do we do?” Ace’s words cut into my subconsciousness, one that’s blanking out with rage. I don’t want to believe this is happening, but then again I know we’ve been revolving towards the eye of the storm for a long time, one where I’ve been set up to lose everything. I had told the Sheriff I didn’t care about anything, and now he’s calling my bluff.

  I look at Sylas, still standing across from me. He’s playing his cards more carefully than normal, because we’re close to making a deal. But I know I need to leave and get to Windy, and that means there’s no way out of this but through.

  “Redwood is my father,” I say suddenly, feeling every pair of eyes turn towards me. “My real father. That’s what all this is about.”

  A smirk cuts a jagged line across his face, one hindered by the natural grimace that wants to form from all the bad memories connected with that name.

  He shakes his head like he doesn’t believe me, but I take a step forward, forcing him to look at me. I’ve gazed into the mirror for what seems like a thousand times since I realized it was true, looking for the similarities in our faces. The fucked up thing had been only having newspaper clippings to go on.

  “The Redwood estate is yours,” I say. “I won’t lay any claim to it. Just the way I won’t lay any claim to the rest of this city, or any of the territories the Daggers currently inhabit.” I step forward again, so close I could almost take him by the collar. “If you help me.”

  He can see it now, see the traces of Mayor Redwood on my face, the step-father who created a monster, and a mad genius.

  I had never stood a chance. A monster’s blood ran through my veins, even if he wasn’t the same monster that raised me.

  “We can change everything this city is becoming,” I say, telling all of them. “We all know we’re in a losing battle, especially if we keep fighting each other at the same time we’re fighting the ones who want us dead. Or in jail. Or broken. But that’s only if we start working together now.”

  A laugh sputters from Sylas’s lips, his palms clapping together in a sarcastically slow clap. “Bravo, Damien. You’ve really discovered the power of friendship since moving back to the DB. But why do I get the feeling you wouldn’t be saying any of this if it weren’t your girlfriend’s ass on the line?”

  I shake my head. “Because, if it weren’t for her, I probably wouldn’t.”

  “Let me guess,” Sloan sneers. “She’s changed you?”

  “For the better, of course,” Samaire adds with a biting edge of cynicism in her voice.

  But I’m willing to take the bait, because every last bit of what they’ve said is true. “That’s what having someone good in your life can do,” I say. “It changes everything.” I look at them. “We can go there now, guns blazing. Raise hell. Take the Sheriff down, together. But we have to go now.”

  Sylas gazes over at me with an unimpressed expression. My gaze shifts over to Carina, but she doesn’t say anything. I know asking for their help after everything that’s happened is borderline insane, but it just might be the best chance we have, and the best chance Windy has, of survival.

  “He’s going to try and crush us,” I say, deciding it’s going to be my final parting words, a warning, but not one made out of animosity. It’s one made from knowing we’re all perched on the same ledge between power and destruction, and if we don’t start acting smart, we could all find ourselves in a free fall towards the bottom.

  “I don’t know,” Sylas murmurs. “Seems like he’s too busy crushing you right now.”

  “Maybe we should let him,” Sloan agrees, smirking at me.

  “Or we could go,” Jax says from where he’s standing just beyond the group. “Fuck shit up. If you want to take something out, you start at the top.” He nods at me, as though he knows that’s what I’ve been trying to do with the Daggers. “It’s not a bad strategy.”

  If anyone was going to be on my side, it has to be the fucker I’ve traded blows with the most.

  Still, I’ll fucking take it.

  Sylas’s brow arches down, but I can tell he’s listening. There’s a reason Jax is more than just an enforcer for the Daggers, and stands as second in command. It means what he says holds weight.

  I shift my gaze over to Samaire. “Get the news out to your father. Tell him the proof that Redwood’s body was exhumed under false pretenses should be enough for a mistrial of Benita Andreas. Everything he should need is there.”

  I turn back to Sylas, knowing there’s nothing I can do to make it right. My real father is someone I’m glad is dead, if only because I can tell the rumors of his brutality are true from the look in Sylas’s eyes alone. If he had raised me, instead of Sylas, maybe things would be different, but that’s not the way it happened.

  If anything, Sylas took the blows for me. I may have traded one monster for another, but it’s the one thing we have in common, and it’s the one thing we can change.

  One of them is dead.It’s high time the other one met the same level of justice.

  “I’m going to the pier,” I say, heading towards my car. I pass Jax, but he doesn’t look at me. He’s done what he could, but if Sylas isn’t willing to budge, so be it.

  The air outside is cold, a stillness filling the air with a stale quality that drips with tension. It feels like the entire city is holding its breath.

  I look at Ace and Fabian and the rest of the Snake Eyes. “At your lead,” Fabian says with a nod.

  I nod back, the wind beginning to whip through dead branches overhead.

  I’ve been ready to make sacrifices for the Snake Eyes, and now they’re ready to make sacrifices for me. It’s about more than power.

  It’s about family, and having each other’s backs.

  Until the very end.

  32

  I sink into my seat in the back, sending prayers out into the universe that my message has been received, and interpreted the right way. But I also know I didn’t know where we were headed when I sent it, and that means even if it did get to the right people in time, no one knows where I am.

  The ocean is undulating with angry swirls of gray and white as the police cruiser makes its way down the highway. The abandoned and silent environment of the boardwalk, its stilled rides jutting into the air like skeleton bones, lies in wait, bracing for impact from the coming storm.

  We shouldn’t be here. Being anywhere near the coastline feels like certain death. Or worse.

  It feels like suicide.

  Especially when I realize we’re headed towards the pier.

  I don’t want to be here, but especially not with Sheriff Black. I have a feeling we’re not just here to do a memorial.

  I swallow the lump in my throat, steeling myself, willing myself to be brave. The cruiser speeds in the direction of the pier, a place no one should be going, especially on a day like today.

  We don’t pass a single car on the road, but even if we did, I have a feeling no one would bat an eye. No one ever thinks to check the authorities in this city. Why would they when half of Diablo Beach has celebrated every blow that’s been dealt to the units of organized crime in this city?

  No one has ever been
the wiser that the real menace sits at the top of the power structure. No one but those of us cursed enough to know, and unlucky enough to experience it firsthand.

  “Take me home,” I utter from the backseat in one last desperate bid to free myself from whatever fate is about to befall me. “We can just forget this entire thing ever happened.”

  “I’m afraid it’s a bit too late for that now, Windy,” Sheriff Black tells me, but he doesn’t seem afraid at all, or sorry.

  It makes my heart hurt for Jessa even more. And it makes me worried for Damien.

  The car pulls up to the small parking lot just past the pier, and I hold my breath as Sheriff Black gets out of the car and comes around to the backdoor. I brace myself, knowing it’s now or never. My legs feel like springs, wound with tension, and when he opens my door, I bounce my feet off its surface, slamming it into him and knocking him off balance. It’s just what I need to give me a fighting chance, and I bound out of the car, my feet hitting the pavement with feet that feel like bricks.

  It suddenly doesn’t feel like I can move fast enough, all my energy zapped from the kick and the anxiety of the drive here. I run anyway, shoulders shuffling from my trapped hands, but a scream escapes my lips as I feel a hand wrap itself around the end of my ponytail.

  Sheriff Black yanks me back towards him by the hair, and I cry out from the pain. “Let go of me!” I plead, my breath shuddering in my chest, but the pain gives way to adrenaline, shot straight through my veins by a plunger of fear.

  He yanks me back towards him, releasing his grip on my hair and circling a vice-like hand around my arm. His silence is deafening, and it begins to rain as he pulls me with him towards the barrier of the pier.

  I attempt to stick my feet to the ground, the soles of my shoes dragging and skidding along the pavement, but he only pulls me harder, and I careen after him, my arm anchored in his grip.

  The wood makes a hollow noise under our footsteps as we walk out onto the pier. Rain has turned into a steady downpour, soaking through my clothes and needling its way into my bones with an icy bite. My tattoo throbs from all the times Sheriff Black has handled me by my arm, most likely on purpose. The pain ensures I comply, and the worst part is that I do.

  I grit my teeth, tears beginning to form in my eyes. They’re hidden by the rain but I don’t care. I don’t want to cry. I don’t want to feel as helpless as I feel now.

  But maybe it’s true. Maybe the evil in this city really does always win.

  They’ll find my body with this tattoo, the two people gone before me memorialized on my skin, if only for a day.

  If they even find my body at all.

  Grim thoughts, but I know what Sheriff Black is here to do. He’s here to make me pay, the same way Damien had sworn he would make me pay for the role I played in Jessa’s death. Only Sheriff Black has no soul. He can’t be redeemed, not the way Damien could. There won’t be any way I can change his mind. I have a feeling he has nothing else to lose anyway, except for a vendetta against his own son, one who refused to play by his rules.

  The water below us has begun to slam into the beams below with a force that makes the entire pier shiver.

  “Don’t worry, this will be over fast,” Sheriff Black tells me, pulling me towards the final end of the pier. “It’s just a shame a nice woman like your mother had to lose both her husband and her daughter. But that was your original intention, wasn’t it?”

  “Only I don’t want that anymore. I’ve given myself time to grow. I’ve worked and worked and worked, and I—I don’t want to die anymore,” I stammer, attempting to pull away from him one last time. “At least, not by your hand,” I add, spitting in his direction.

  My spit hits him square in the chest, sliding down the stitching of the name ‘Black’ that designates his uniform. Too bad he chose to soil it a long time ago. Someone like him doesn’t deserve to wear a badge.

  “I’ll tell your mother your last words were that you loved her,” he says grimly, a smile carving onto his lips. “I’ll tell her I did everything I could to talk you down from the edge, but that you wanted to be with Jessa. Maybe that will bring her some comfort. And if that doesn’t do it…” He lets his words trail off, a smug look tainting his dark eyes even further. “Well, let’s just say, I will.”

  “My mother wouldn’t touch you with a ten foot pole,” I hiss. “She thinks you’re a freak, a bastard, a loser high on a power trip that’s gone on long enough.” I shake my head, for once truly pitying him, but not enough to keep the next few lines of vitriol spilling from my lips. “Even if I’m not here to see it, I know one day your day of reckoning is going to come. And when it does, this city will turn its back on you. You’ll be forgotten, but that’s not the worst part. A sheriff that put half this town away, including members of his wife’s own family, isn’t going to last long in jail.” I glare at him. “The Valentinos are going to make you bleed until you can’t anymore.”

  “That’s enough,” he mutters, pulling me forward roughly. “I always knew I should have never let Jessa hang around with a little bitch like you. Now you’re going to get what you deserve—”

  The sound of squealing tires cuts across the air, sharp even through the downpour of rain. I jerk my head to the side, and spot Damien’s car leading the way in front of two others. He pulls as close as he can with the Falcon, coming to a stop that nearly turns the car on two wheels. His door flies open, and in an instant, he’s running towards us, followed by other members of the Snake Eyes Crew.

  “Stop right there,” Sheriff Black calls out, and I see him reach for the gun holstered at his side.

  But Damien doesn’t stop. He unsheathes a gun of his own, but stops just short of pointing it as the Sheriff pulls my body in front of him.

  “Let her go,” Damien growls.

  “Put the gun away, boy,” Sheriff Black says. “You’re going to shoot your own father?”

  “Not possible,” Damien shoots back. “He’s already dead and buried. Unless you plan on having him exhumed again to run his DNA against mine again. Only this time you can’t send me away for not actually being your son.”

  I wish I could see the look on Sheriff Black’s face, but I can feel his grip on me tighten.

  Another sound cuts through the pouring rain, the roar of multiple engines. A black Cadillac slides around the turn of the street, and I recognize it as the one that belongs to none other than Sylas Andreas. A moment later, a motorcycle pulls into view, Sloan on her bike leading the rest of the calvary.

  The gangs of Diablo Beach are coming.

  Sylas parks alongside of Damien’s vehicle, getting out of the car and staring in our direction. He hoists a gun of his own into view, and I hear Sheriff Black laugh, a bleak, helpless sound, the sound of someone who knows he’s fucked.

  Carina follows behind, a different item held in her hands, but one that has almost as much power.

  A cell phone, the camera pointed straight in our direction.

  “It’s over,” Damien says, taking a step forward as Sylas and Carina back him up.

  Sloan steps off her bike a second later, black hair tumbling out of her helmet and beginning to plaster to her face from the rain. “Can we hurry this up?” she calls out with a tilt of her head, her leather jacket lifting open to reveal a gun of her own. “I don’t like getting wet unless penetration is involved.”

  My feet skid along the wood underneath me as Sheriff Black drags us both towards the edge of the pier. I take a breath. I’m so close to freedom, yet so entirely far that everything still feels terrifying.

  There’s nothing more dangerous than a trapped animal.

  “Go ahead, Sheriff, throw her in,” Sylas says, before turning towards Carina. “Make sure you get the perfect panoramic angle, darlin’, you don’t want to be one of those people who makes the news with a video shot in portrait.”

  I lock eyes with Damien, wanting to run to him, but not able to. He’s only feet away,
but it feels like a million miles.

  “It’s over,” he says, and it feels like he’s saying it to me. I latch onto his confidence because it feels like the only thing that can keep me alive. Just the belief that I’ll be okay at the end of this is enough, because at the end of the day, the belief that things will be okay again is all I’ve ever had.

  “The details have already been sent to Benita Andreas’s lawyer,” Damien continues. “Hurting Windy isn’t going to change anything. You’ll only make it worse for yourself.”

  I can’t help but wonder if he feels the irony in having to talk his father down, to negotiate like an officer.

  I can only hope it works.

  But if not, seeing the gangs of Diablo Beach finally come together in full force in the middle of a rain storm was a hell of a final scene to my life.

  “No one is going to believe you,” Sheriff Black calls out. “No one is going to believe any of you. Everyone here today is scum. Hooligans,” he continues, his voice becoming louder and more unhinged. “Trash, each and every one of you!”

  “Hey!” Sloan calls out, finally pulling her gun into her hands. “At least we’re good looking trash.”

  “You’re just a sad man,” I tell him. “About to have a long fall to the bottom.”

  “No, my dear,” I hear him say. “I’m afraid that’s you.”

  A scream leaves my lips as he throws me towards the edge. The last thing I see are Damien’s eyes, locked on mine, widening as he runs forward.

  A swirling ocean is next, visible a split second before the cold hits my skin, and the sea swallows me whole.

  Then, the darkest black I could have ever imagined.

  33

  I fall asleep by her bedside.

  Almost constantly, I feel like any minute someone could come bursting into the room, screaming at me to get away from her. That if it weren’t for me, she wouldn’t be in the shape she’s in now.

  Only that moment never comes. Windy’s mother shows up, and I hold my breath, but she doesn’t tell me to leave. She looks at me like she can see the guilt written all over my face, and her eyes are sympathetic.