Chapter 19 Konstantin
nineteen
Konstantin
Maps are scattered across the table of ports, alleys, service corridors, sewer lines, air vents, and any other place that someone could use against us.
Red grease pencil circles the places where a man can disappear and not be found until spring.
Misha draws an X over a cold storage near the river and another over the church basement where our people swear the floorboards whisper after midnight.
“Your cathedral,” he says, tapping the blueprint I stole from the sacristy cabinet. “Two entrances we can’t seal without starting a war.”
“Side chapels,” I answer. “Left transept has a delivery door for flowers. Right has a confessional with a private exit for the priest.” I slide a sealed envelope across the table. “Both now have ushers.”
“You mean shooters dressed as ushers.”
“Details.”
He grunts, amused against his will.
We’re all fucking tired, but there is too much shit to get done before our wedding and bonding ceremony to act like we are.
Repeat it back,” I order.
Misha rolls his eyes but does as I say. He’s quick about it and doesn’t leave anything out, not that I doubted he would. The man hasn’t been my second in command since I stepped into my position of power.
He leans against the table, fingers pressing into the edge of the blueprint. “This many families in one holy box, if anyone coughs at the wrong time, we could be stacking bodies in the baptistery.”
I shake my head, refuting his claims. “You need to believe in these men more than you do, my friend. They don’t want war any more than we do. The last time blood spilled into all our streets, we lost people we cared about.”
“Maybe not, but Giselda does. She’ll take the chance to create havoc wherever she can. She’s seeking attention. She wants the spectacle,” he warns me again.
“Then let her set the stage.” I cap the grease-pencil and toss it down. “We’ll take the bow.”
Misha watches me for a second before nodding. That’s why he’s the only one I’ll ever trust to stand at my shoulder when I start taking people apart. He knows when to argue and when to start loading magazines.
My phone buzzes and I pull it from my pocket.
A notification from Cressida lights the screen, so I tap my thumb on it to bring up the thread.
CRESSIDA
Clinic back lot. WED. 1am. No men. We’re going. Tell me you’ll be smart about it.
My mouth tightens as I read over it multiple times. The bond answers her before I do, heat sliding under my skin in a wave she’ll feel as permission or warning depending on where she stands when it hits.
ME
You will take L and S. You will wear the blade L gave you because I know she did. You will keep your phone on. I will not be seen. But I will be there.
Three dots appear then vanish, then reappear again only for her to leave me with a single word.
CRESSIDA
Deal.
The single word makes me smile in a way that I don’t like people to see. Soft and intimate, reserved only for my little fox.
The sacristan is an old man whose spine looks like the inside of a question mark. He keeps a brass key on a chain around his neck and a rosary in his pocket worn thin. He knows exactly who I am but refuses to ask me to leave.
“You can’t arm a church, Mr. Kirovsky,” he murmurs in his small office, his voice papery thin.
“I can arm me.”
“That, I believe,” he says, sliding the blueprint across the desk. He traces the transept with a tremor. “This door sticks from the humidity. You’ll think it’s locked when it isn’t.”
“Thank you.”
He studies my hands as if the answers were stamped into the ink and scars. “Do you love her?”
“Yes.”
It costs me nothing to say it, but it sure in the hell costs me everything to mean it. Everything like the black heart inside my chest that I never expected to hand over willingly to anyone.
He nods like that was all that he wanted to know. “The brides who come in white assume the dress wards off the monsters,” he says sagely. “It is the ones in colors who have already made arrangements with them.”
“Cressi will wear black,” I assure him.
That I have no doubt. Rebellion should be my little fox’s name. She will punch tradition in the face and wave with her middle finger afterward.
“Then she will be fine,” the old man says.
We walk the aisles as I scope out the areas where I believe have the weakest points, pointing them out with a head nod to Misha so that he can get it handled.
In three nights, I will bind Cressida to me so thoroughly that even possession will choke on its own meaning. She will live inside my blood, my breath, my violence. She will be mine in a way no definition could ever cage.
Across from me are rows of votive flames guttered in the shadows.
Each one a whisper of penance, each wick burning down a promise someone was desperate to keep.
There’s one near the stained-glass window that catches my eyes.
Something about it pulls me in, daring me to come closer.
Corrupt and toxic, the energy wraps itself around me.
Sourness coats the back of my throat when I realize it’s the same kind of thread from the battle where we found her scythe calling card.
I gaze down at the one that has the black aura around it and there, pressed into the soft wax, is another small, black scythe charm.
She was here.
“She?” the old man asks and I realize I must have spoken out loud.
“A child who learned the wrong prayers,” I say, reaching into the warm wax and lifting the charm free.
It’s a warning that no matter where we are, she will always be there. It’s a reminder that she’s coming after what is mine and she’s not afraid to let me know it.
The mansion I bought for my little fox sits on its throne at the top of the hill.
If Cressida was a house, she’d definitely be something dark and mysterious with ominous gothic vibes.
I bought it straight away. Also, because the fucking realtor kept trying to sell me something with white columns that made me want to commit a crime on principal.
After describing my Cressi to her, she thought white would be perfect?
She should be punished for such a slight.
The caretaker meets me at the gate with the keys. “Had some . . .occurrences since we signed. Doors closing. A smell of smoke in the small hours,” he says delicately, as if those would deter me from taking the keys from him.
“Good.”
He blinks as his hands freeze against the doorknob. “Good?”
“She’ll love it.”
We walk through the halls as he tells me the back story of this place. The floors beneath our feet protest in a language that belongs to history books. In the library, the fireplace eats wood with the appetite of a beast that remembers winters when people had no choice but to feed it furniture.
I stand in the doorway and see her the way I do even when my eyes closed. Chin lifted, eyes full of defiance, throat full of laughter. She’ll claim this place the same way she’s branded me.
“Do you want me to set up security?” the caretaker asks.
“No. I will have my men come in and do what needs to be done. Keep an eye on the property until I bring my wife home. Anything happens to this place and I will take it personally. Understood?”
“Absolutely, sir.”
“If there is anything you need, reach out to me or Misha. Until then, this place will remain a surprise for Cressida.”
“Understood.”
I glance over my shoulder one last time at the place that I will call home with my wife before blending into the night to head back to the war room.
“Port decoys set. We swapped two reefer boxes with our own empty and wired ones. She wants product in the night, so she’ll send men. We’ll greet her with our own and send them back to her with fewer parts.”
Cressida’s satisfaction purrs at me through the bond, telling me that she’s proud of herself.
Today was her fitting, so she must have found something perfect for her.
I send her back a possessive touch. One that won’t make her stop what she’s doing, but one that lets her know the wall at her back is a man with a knife who loves her.
“You’re doing that face again,” Misha says. “The one where you’re smiling without actually smiling.”
He statement doesn’t require a reply, so I don’t give him one.
“Sleep,” I tell him.
“You first.”
“I will sleep when I’m dead,” I reply.
Misha chuckles and moves toward the door. “Call me if that happens.”
“If I get dead, I’ll be sure to phone you from hell,” I say dryly.
His footsteps fade and the war room hums in the quiet as I go back to studying all the plans laid out in front of me.
I’m not leaving anything to chance when it comes to Cressida.
It’s not something I will take pleasure in, this is home, but I will burn it to the ground if I need to in order to save her.
She knows that too which is why she made the deal with me about the clinic. She’s the only person on this planet that I can trust to treat my threats like promises and my promises like oxygen.
Someone knocks on the door. It’s not Misha’s rhythm or a soldier’s code, so I slide my knife from the holster at my side and grip it in my hand as I make my way to the door.
The door swings open after I tell them to enter and a boy with a shaved head and a scar across his mouth stands in the frame, holding a bakery box. His hands shake so hard the box nearly slides from his hand.
“From a lady,” he tells me, his eyes on his shoes. “She said to tell you to have your little party. She will be sure to bring the candles for the cake.”
“Open it,” I order.
He peels the lid back and inside is a single cupcake sitting in a black paper cup with white icing and a scythe pressed into the top in red sugar. The black candle jammed in the middle is the trick kind that relights itself even after you think you’ve won the battle against it.
Reaching into my desk, I pull out a lighter I keep stashed in there for when I’m in the mood to inhale the bitter and sweet taste of cigar into my lungs. I light the candle, watching as the flame dances along the wick, and then I blow.
It fades out only to reignite seconds later.
I blow out the flame again and this time when the flame flickers back to life, a slow smile curves my lips as anticipation for the fight curls up my spine.
The intercom buzzes to life when I press the button on the side of my desk. “Take the boy home.”
Zavid arrives quietly, ushering the boy from the room just as quickly as he came.
I watch the candle burn until the wax runs like blood and the sugar scythe sags. “You want her to see you. You want me to see you. You want all eyes on you, don’t you Reaper?”
She may not be in the room with me, but there’s a dangerous stirring in my gut that tells me she’s hearing every word I say.
I pinch the wick between my forefinger and thumb and watch as it goes out with a little scream. Then I flip it over and stick it wick down in the icing for extra measure.
“It’s too bad, really, that you will not get the spectacle you want. Bring your candles but know that it will do no good. Hers will always burn brighter.”
The bond tightens inside my chest until it feels like a leash I’d kill even the gods to keep.
Three nights, my little rebellious fox. Three nights, then I claim you in front of the world.