3. Rebel
Chapter 3
Rebel
By the time the doctors are finished treating my brother, hours have passed, and I’m ready for a polar dip in the ocean and a long, cold slumber beneath the waves. Not permanently—but long enough to numb the thoughts running through my head. It’s not my body that hurts—it’s my heart.
I should have pulled Ruin out of the building before he ever had a chance to get hurt.
As Celia sits by Ruin’s bedside with his hand in hers, I watch the two of them together. The steady rise and fall of his chest. The way she gently folds herself over his lap, her eyes slipping closed even after she wills them open again. It won’t be long before she falls asleep, but it’ll be longer still before Ruin wakes up. I hope that he’s elated to find her lying beside him. I would be.
My fingers twitch with the need for a smoke. A joint. Hell, a hit of whatever shit they gave Ruin. But ever since I went on a bender and took a few too many pills, doctors don’t like to give me the good stuff. I’ve been left with some extra strength Tylenol and enough burn cream to lube up my entire body twice over, like that’ll be enough, but it’ll have to suffice.
Rage is giving me the side-eye, like he expects me to rummage through the locked cabinets in the back for something stronger.
To his credit, I might have a few years ago.
But back then, the point was to numb myself to everything , and right now, I don’t want to miss a single second of time with Celia or Ruin. I just want to take the edge off so that I can get some sleep. We’re in for a long night in The Box, and it isn’t exactly what anyone would call comfortable.
Thanatos keeps pacing from one end of the building to the other, like he’s on edge, too. He keeps checking his cell phone like it’s some kind of lifeline, but I don’t know what he’s waiting for. News on Sara? Information about our father? A call from our boss Ezra to tell us how fucked we are?
I blow out a breath and fiddle with the cotton blanket in my lap. My burns already hurt, but the pain will double within the next few hours, and I desperately want to be knocked out when they do.
Ruin’s going to be in so much pain when he wakes up. I can hear him screaming in my head, the same way he did all those years ago after the first fire. He was only twelve then, but I’m sure he remembers every cursed moment during the blaze and all the seconds of agony soon after. I know that I do.
Especially after pulling him out of an inferno for a second time.
Rage leans against a desk and crosses his arms over his chest. “You good?” he asks, leveling me with one of those older brother looks that means I shouldn’t bullshit him. He ran into the fire after me and Ruin, receiving the least amount of damage from the blaze, but he’s chugging water like his life depends on it. I’m sure he doesn’t like the reminder of our past any more than Ruin and I do.
“Thanks for showing up,” I tell him. “I mean it. I couldn’t have lifted that beam without you.” I tried. I even threw all my rings to the floor before wrapping some fabric around the wooden beam and lifting as hard as I could, using every muscle in my body the best I knew how, but it wasn’t enough. I wasn’t strong enough to pull my brother out from underneath it before Rage arrived.
We could have both died in there tonight.
Man, I need a fucking cigarette.
I tap my fingertips against my thigh. “I should have noticed all the gasoline on the floor sooner. I should have gone in there after him the second he tried to run ahead. But I just—” I clench the blanket in my fists. “I didn’t want Celia to go in there.” Pinching my bottom lip between my teeth, I try to roll my tongue over my snakebite, but the piercing is missing. I had to take it out shortly after we arrived to The Box. Sighing, I run a hand through my hair, grimacing at how goddamn crunchy it is. “I smell like shit,” I groan, flopping down on the mattress.
All burnt flesh and sour regret.
Guilt curls on my tongue, and I spit onto the ground. “Fucking hell, man. I can’t believe this shit.”
“It’s not your fault.” Rage uncrosses his ankles and comes to sit on the bed next to me. There are two dozen of them lined up into two tight rows in the back of the warehouse, none of them comfy, all of them having seen at least one death in their lifetime. Rage is completely unbothered by this, and I know I should be, too. But I look up at Ruin, hooked up to all of those monitors and tubes, and I can’t help but wonder if he’ll be another name scratched from the Reaper’s list of souls to take.
It’s unsettling, and I’m not fucking handling it well.
My stomach churns and bile rises to the back of my throat, hot and disgusting. I jump up from the bed and bend over a nearby trash can, choking on saliva and what little remains of my dinner. Fucking nasty.
Rage hands me a water bottle as I slip back onto my bed. We stare at Celia and Ruin, both of them unconscious now, as I sip the cool liquid. “It’s not fair, y’know?” I peel the label off the bottle and drop it onto the floor. “We’ve already been through this bullshit once, and now she has to go through it, too.”
“It’s better this time,” Rage muses, his gaze fixed on the couple in front of us. “Don’t you think?”
I crinkle my nose. “There’s not a better. There just is. And what this is, is bullshit.”
My older brother grunts and leans back on his cot, resting his back against the cold metal bars making up a headboard. After a moment, he says, “I don’t want her out there looking for him.”
“If she wants to go, she’ll go. Better that she do it with us than alone.” I close my eyes and try to picture what it will be like to travel the city with Celia, but all I see are bright red flames licking toward the ceiling of her boutique. I snap my eyes open and take another swig of water. “You can’t lock her up again, Rage. She won’t forgive you.”
He scowls, suddenly looking older. The lines around his mouth crease into deep grooves, and there’s a twin row of wrinkles in his forehead. He doesn’t like hearing the truth, much less adhering to it. “I know.”
I lie down and turn onto my side to look at him. “So what are you going to do?” He’s grinding his teeth like he used to do when our father would tear a belt across his back. Funny how you remember the most terrible details in times of crises.
Swallowing hard, he sets his water bottle down on the floor and throws his arms behind his head. I bet he wishes he could escape to the gym right now to lift weights. If we were home, I have no doubt that he would spend hours bleeding out his frustrations on his body, lifting twice the amount of weight than he should just to exhaust himself.
Kind of like how I’d kill for a bottle right now.
“I’m going to sleep,” he says finally, turning his frown onto me. “And so should you. We need as much rest as we can get if we’re going hunting tomorrow.”
I glance over at Celia, expecting her to be alone with Ruin but finding Thanatos hovering nearby. He drapes a blanket over her shoulders and retreats to another folding chair sitting near a partition wall, apparently settling in for a night of staring. I guess silent contemplation runs in the family, after all.
“What about Sara?” I don’t really care to help strangers, but Celia will tear herself apart if it brings her one step closer to finding the college girl. “Did they ID the body yet?”
“Not yet.”
“Have the cops called?”
“No, but when they do, I don’t want Celia answering.” Rage closes his eyes like he’s going to sleep sitting up. “We need to keep her as calm as possible, and answering questions from the police about the fire will make that difficult.”
“You underestimate her, man.”
He takes a deep breath. “I don’t want to lose her.”
Yeah, neither do I.
* * *
If there’s one thing I know for certain today, it’s that Celia’s twin brother Mikhail is an asshole.
The man is a splitting image of her, except for the fine-lined stubble on his jaw and his lack of tits, but everything else is eerily similar. Same skin tone, same hair color, and same piercing hazel eyes. Hell, they’re even the same height, coming to about five foot eight or nine. That, and he can be just as stubborn as she can.
“What do you mean, I can’t see her? She’s my sister ! Who the hell is she to you?”
Thanatos is running bouncer at the door to The Box, refusing him entry. I’m sure it’s not just on Celia’s behalf, but all of ours. We all slept like shit and could use another few hours of rest before greeting the world.
Mikhail Monrovia either didn’t get that memo, or he doesn’t care.
“I’m her protection detail,” Thanatos replies, squaring up to the smaller man. “And you won’t see her unless she approves it.”
“You work for me!” Mikhail’s grin is sharp. “Stand down, Riot.”
There’s that name again—the one Than programmed into Celia’s phone contacts beside his real name.
I quirk an eyebrow. “Since when did he decide to be cool like us and get a new name?”
Rage chuckles. “Remember what he was wearing when he worked for Katya?”
Rolling my eyes, I chuff. “There’s no fucking way he picked that name because of that stupid gear he wears.” Then again, he’s never been the most creative. “There’s no way.”
Footsteps shuffle behind us, and Celia slides in beside my brother and me. “What’s going on?” Loose strands of hair stick to her cheek, and I brush them back with a smile.
“Morning, sleepyhead. You were out like the dead.”
She throws a halfhearted glare my way. “Not funny, Rebel.”
I wrap my arm around her waist and pull her into my side, pressing a quick kiss to the corner of her lips. “I thought it was pretty funny.”
“Seriously, who’s yelling? Because they’re gonna wake Ruin up—” Her eyes widen as she spots her brother beyond Than’s— Riot’s —broad shoulders. She gasps and slips from my arms to greet him.
Great.
Rage and I follow closely, neither of us keen on having her deal with her asshole brother alone, but it quickly turns out that she doesn’t need us.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” She hisses, grabbing his wrist in a vice grip and hauling him toward the front door. “This is a medical facility! People are resting!”
My heartbeat trills with pride. Yeah, that’s my girl.
Mikhail steps outside with her, but so do my brothers and I. We form a wall of muscle behind her, the three of us ready to jump in at a moment’s notice.
“What are you doing?” Mikhail asks, gesturing towards us. “I find out that your shop burnt down, and then you’re not even home! The police have put out an APB for you, Celia, and our mother is about to tear down the city looking for you!”
Celia winces. “I’ll call her.”
“Oh, really? Like you’ve called me over the past few weeks?”
“Cool it!” She shoves his chest. “I love you, Mikhail, but you did a shitty fucking thing, and you know it!”
He shakes his head. “What would you have had me do? Let that fucker take my wife? Let all his constituents get away with it? I’ll burn the city to the ground to keep her safe. You know that, and you know that I’d do the same for you!” He turns the heat onto us. “So what the fuck are you doing with these guys?”
Celia looks at the three of us, her expression softening. “They’re mine, Mikhail, the same way that Valentina is yours.”
It takes Mikhail a second to process this, and then he’s not glaring nearly as hard. “I need a drink,” he says finally, engulfing his sister in a hug. “And I think we need to talk.”
I clap my hands together and grin. “Count me in for that drink.”
Rage smacks my shoulder before he remembers that I’m injured. I hiss, and he quickly mutters an apology. “No drinks, but we can talk.”
Mikhail releases Celia and nods. “We can head back to the estate if you guys are discharged.”
“We’re not,” Celia says quickly, “we have to stay. Ruin’s still inside.” She loops her arm through her brother’s and walks him toward us. “But you can order us some breakfast as an apology for the rude awakening.” Her cheeks flush a pretty pink and she clears her throat. “Mikhail, you’ve already met Rage. This is his brother Rebel, and that’s Thanatos. They’re my—” She takes a quick breath and smiles the sweetest damn smile I’ve ever seen. “They’re my family now. So be nice.”
“Family?” Mikhail’s face pinches. “What, did you get hitched, or something?” He inspects Celia’s left hand for a wedding band and frowns at the bruising on her wrist from the handcuffs last night.
Oops.
“Not yet,” I chime in, “but by the time the baby comes, you bet your ass, she will be.”
“ Baby? ”
Celia’s blush deepens. “Maybe we should, ah, have that drink after all.”
This time, it’s Thanatos who grumbles his agreement. “I think I need a whole damn bottle to get through today.”