Chapter 24 #3
He sneered, walking closer to me. “I allowed you to leave the convent. I gave you a king’s ransom every month. And this is how you repay me?”
I laughed—wild and broken.
“You allowed me?” I screamed. “Monthly payment? That’s bullshit! I lived in hell with no money, doing things I didn’t want to do just to eat. I had no papers. No phone. No way out.”
The masked man grabbed at me again, but I was too quick.
“You ignored me for almost two years!” I shouted. “I called. I begged. I needed you!”
My voice cracked.
“I hate you.”
“You’re pissing me off, Scarlett,” my father snarled. “And there will be consequences.”
The masked man grabbed my arm.
I screamed—and the world exploded again.
The man’s head snapped forward—and then it wasn’t a head anymore. Blood and brain matter burst out of his face, spraying the wall in front of him in wet, heavy chunks.
His body collapsed at my feet.
His hand was still locked around my forearm, fingers twitching, dragging me down with him.
I ripped myself free, my boot slipping on blood, my heart trying to claw out of my chest.
I looked up, finding Lucian in the doorway with a gun in his hand.
My father lunged and latched onto my arm and yanked me off the bed, his nails digging in, his grip desperate and wild. “You’re coming with me,” he hissed. “Right now.”
“Let go of me!” I screamed.
He pulled a gun from under his jacket.
Lucian fired, the shot punching through the room.
My father flew backward as though he’d been hit by a truck, slamming into the wall and dropping hard to the floor.
I tried to step forward, but my boot snagged on the rug, and I barely caught myself before I went down on the blood-slick floor.
For a second—just one—I thought he might get up.
But he didn’t.
The room tilted.
I blinked at Lucian.
“You killed my father!” I screamed. “You killed my father. You killed my father.”
The words tore out of me, over and over, my voice breaking, my throat burning.
I snapped my head back and forth between Lucian and the body on the floor, my mind refusing to accept either one.
Then my stomach revolted.
I turned and puked violently, my body emptying itself onto the floor.
My hands shook so badly that I couldn’t catch myself. My legs gave out, and I slammed back against the dresser just to stay upright.
Blood was everywhere.
On me. On the walls. On the floor.
Lucian moved slowly toward me.
He slid his gun back into its holster and lifted his hands, palms out, the way you would approach a cornered wild animal ready to bolt.
“Scar,” he said softly. “It’s okay. You’re okay. I’ve got you.”
I couldn’t hear him.
Everything was noise and color and cold, and nothing at all.
A scary-looking man with lots of tattoos and Henri burst into the room—and stopped dead.
The tattooed man lowered his gun. Henri’s brows shot up, his eyes sweeping over the bodies, then to Lucian, and finally to me.
“Jesus Christ,” the man I didn’t recognize barked. “We have to go. Now.”
Lucian didn’t argue.
He crossed the room in two strides and scooped me up.
My arms hung uselessly at my sides. My head lolled against his chest. The world turned into a slideshow—blurred edges, flashes of light, sound without meaning.
As they carried me up the stairs, boots pounding, Lucian barked, “What the hell happened?”
The tattooed man didn’t slow. “The reason the NYPD bugged out of your place so fast? Hayes got tipped off about the safe house.”
Lucian’s chest went hard against my side. “Who the fuck tipped him off, Nik? This place has been DarkMatter’s stronghold for years.”
“Yeah,” the man said coldly. “We’ve got an internal compromise. One of ours burned us.”
So the man with all the tattoos was Nik. Lucian’s boss. The words landed, then scattered before they could organize into meaning. Everything was a jumbled mess.
“Whoever sold us out,” Nik continued, his voice lethal, “will lose their head after a few days of Bratva torture. Whoever did this will live long enough to regret it while eating his own intestines.”
Henri was right behind us at the top of the stairs. “We ended not only those two,” he said, pointing to the floor behind us, “but fourteen others. A few of our guys took hits, but they’ve been cleared from the scene. Radios are going crazy, gentlemen. No time for conversation. Time to disappear.”
The more bloodied bodies I saw, the more my vision tunneled. I was hearing and seeing, but nothing was registering.
Nik’s voice sliced through everything. “Get her to the hangar. I want her off the continent. It’s time you found out the truth about this girl.”
The back door slammed open, and cold air hit my face as Lucian rushed down the steps.
Sirens wailed somewhere in the distance.
Lucian said he’d handle it, and Nik was already firing off orders into his phone.
Lach waited by the SUV, doors open, engine running.
Lucian kicked the back door closed and climbed into the front seat, holding me in his lap. Tires screamed as we tore out of the driveway.
I caught one last glimpse of the house disappearing behind us.
Minutes later, tall security fencing slid open next to Jet Aviation. The SUV roared through and then went straight to a hangar.
My thoughts floated, unanchored.
Everything blurred into motion, light, and the sound of engines.