Chapter 6 #2
He shakes his head when I don’t respond.
“Doesn’t matter. Doesn’t fucking matter because I’d do it again.
That little shit was going to ruin everything.
You know what he said to me when I told him to keep quiet?
” His eyes find mine. “He said, ’I have a brother.
I can’t be a coward and let him think that this is okay.
’ Like he was some kind of fucking hero. ”
The words hit like bullets. Marco. My Marco, who tried so hard to keep me safe, to keep me clean.
And just like that, the doubt doesn’t matter anymore. Maybe Enzo’s telling the truth. Maybe he’s not. Maybe I’ll never know for certain who gave the final order that put my brother in the ground.
But I know who carried it out. I know who arranged the transfer, who paid off the guards.
“I heard he cried,” Sokolov continues, watching my face. “When they started beating him. He called out for you, actually. ‘Luca,’ he kept saying. ‘Tell Luca I’m sorry.’ Sorry he couldn’t be there for you anymore—”
I’m on him before Enzo can stop me.
My fists connect with his face, his ribs, anywhere I can reach. The chair tips backward, and we go down together, me on top, hitting him over and over while he laughs through broken teeth.
“That’s it,” Sokolov gurgles. “Just like your brother. All that rage, nowhere to put it—”
I grab his throat and squeeze hard. Watch his good eye bulge as he struggles to breathe.
“He died scared,” I snarl into his face. “But you’re going to die knowing exactly what’s coming. Knowing that everything you built, everything you stole, it meant nothing. You lost.”
I let go. Sokolov gasps, coughing.
Firm hands land on my shoulders, pulling me back. I let them. Let Enzo haul me to my feet while Sokolov rolls onto his side.
“You think you won?” Sokolov spits blood. “You think killing me fixes anything? Your brother’s still dead. And you, you’re just Valerio’s whore now. Probably spreading your legs every night, letting him breed you like the bitch you are—”
The gun is in my hand before I register reaching into Enzo’s jacket for it. I don’t remember making the decision. Don’t remember anything except the weight of it and Sokolov’s face and six months of grief crystallizing into this single moment.
The gunshot is deafening in the enclosed space. Sokolov’s head snaps back. Blood and brain matter spray across the concrete behind him. His body twitches twice, then goes still.
Dead.
He’s dead.
The gun slips from my fingers, clatters to the floor.
I stare at Sokolov’s body. At what’s left of his face. At the blood pooling beneath him, spreading across the concrete in a dark, lazy tide.
I should feel something. Relief or satisfaction that justice has been served on the man who murdered my brother.
But there’s nothing.
Not even guilt for taking a life.
I feel…
Empty.
A hollow, aching emptiness where the rage used to live.
Marco is still dead. Shooting Sokolov doesn’t change that. It doesn’t bring him back or erase six months of grief that has been eating me alive.
My hands won't stop shaking. I look down at them and barely recognize them as my own. They’re covered in blood, some of it my own, leaking from split knuckles, some of it Sokolov’s from when I beat him.
These hands just took a life.
I stare at them like they belong to someone else. Like I’m watching this happen from very far away.
“Luca.”
Enzo’s voice. It’s close. I turn, and he’s right there.
“I killed him,” I say stupidly. Like he didn’t just watch me do it. “I actually killed him.”
Enzo steps closer, and his hands come up to cup my face. His thumbs caress my cheeks, impossibly gentle despite the carnage we’re standing in.
“You did good, baby.”
The endearment shatters something inside me.
I’m falling apart. Actually, literally falling apart. My knees buckle, and my chest caves in as the wall I’ve been holding up for six months starts crumbling into dust.
Enzo catches me before I hit the ground. His arms wrap around me, and he pulls me against him. Lets me collapse into him.
I’m not crying. I tell myself that firmly. I’m not.
The wet streaks sliding down my cheeks aren’t tears; they’re just the violence finally leaking out of my system.
I just need to breathe.
Just need to breathe.
But my lungs won’t cooperate. The air keeps catching in my throat, and I’m shaking so hard I can hear my teeth rattle.
“It’s okay,” Enzo murmurs into my hair, his breath warm against my temple. One hand moves down my back in a slow, grounding stroke, over and over. “It’s okay. I’ve got you.”
“It doesn’t—” My voice breaks on a sob. “It doesn’t feel how I thought it would. It doesn’t feel good.”
“No. It never does.” His honesty is brutal and kind all at once. “But it’s done.”
We stand there for a long moment, me shaking apart in Enzo’s arms, surrounded by the smell of gunpowder and blood, while Sokolov’s body cools on the concrete.
Then Enzo tilts my chin up, forcing me to meet his eyes. They’re dark and serious and full of something I’m afraid to name.
He kisses me.
Softly. Lips brushing mine like a question, giving me space to pull away. When I don’t, he deepens it. The kiss turns thorough and searching, as if he’s trying to communicate something he doesn’t have words for.
I kiss him back and taste copper. I don’t know if it’s Sokolov’s blood on my lips or my own. It doesn’t matter. Right now, I just need this contact. I need the solid, immovable weight of him to anchor me to earth while the rest of the world spins into a blur of red and gray.
When we finally break apart, I’m breathing hard.
Enzo rests his forehead against mine, and for a moment, we just stand there, sharing air, existing in the same space.
“Get me out of here,” I whisper when I find my voice again. “Please.”
His hand finds mine, fingers lacing together. “Of course.”
The choice of where to go sits between us, unspoken. Now that Sokolov’s threat is gone, I could ask him to take me to my apartment, and go back to the life I had before.
Or I could choose this. Choose him, and embrace the violence and the danger and the terrifying possibility that what I feel for Enzo Valerio might be more than heat-bonded attachment, or our shared vengeance against Sokolov.
That it’s something deeper.
Something that could destroy me worse than any bullet or death.
“Your place,” I say. And then, quieter, the words that feel like crossing a line I can’t uncross. ”Take me home.”
Enzo goes still, like the word hit him somewhere deep.
“Okay,” he says softly.
Just that. Then he’s guiding me toward the door, one hand on my lower back.
I don’t look at Sokolov’s corpse as we leave. Don’t need to.
That chapter is closed.
Whatever comes next—whatever this is with Enzo—that’s still being written.