Chapter 11
I pressed my blade harder against Lorenzo’s throat, just deep enough to draw blood. One more inch of pressure. That's all it would take. So why couldn't I fucking do it?
"He was my father, you piece of shit!"
Lorenzo went still. The sudden lack of struggle hit me in my body first, my brain catching up a second later. His back pressed against my chest, and his ass fit against my hips like we'd been carved to slot together.
"Do it," he said quietly. "I know you want to."
The blade dug deeper, another thin line of red blooming under the edge. Tears burned my eyes, or maybe it was rage; I couldn't separate them anymore.
His life was in my hands, and he wasn’t even fighting. The bastard had submitted completely, and my body was reacting all wrong.
I couldn’t stop my hips from pressing forward, couldn’t stop closing my eyes to breathe in the scent of him like it was a perfume. Blood rushed south. My cock stirred, then hardened, and for a moment I forgot I was holding a knife to a killer’s throat.
But only for a moment.
"You took everything from me," I snarled. "My mentor. My faith. My father. Everything I thought was real."
"Your mentor was a monster selling children. Your faith was built on lies you helped fund. And now you know I’m right because they’re hunting you, aren’t they?”
I froze. "What? How do you know that?"
"Your father told me. He said you were on your way here for answers. He made me swear I’d protect you, even from yourself.”
I gritted my teeth and shifted my hold on the blade. "Why would he do that?"
"Because he loved you. Because he knew what was coming and wanted someone on your side when the walls came down."
Tears and rage and grief twisted together in my chest until I couldn't separate one from the other. "I came here for answers. You stole that from me."
"He would have told you the same things I already did. About whoever's pulling the strings. About the conspiracy using us both." Lorenzo's next words came quieter, almost gentle. "You'd have made him suffer, and he knew it. I gave him mercy."
I’d spent the entire flight to Rio imagining what I’d do to my father if it turned out he was involved in child trafficking, and Lorenzo was right.
I would have tortured him. I’d have cut him once for every child he’d ever hurt, and once more for every time he’d ignored me to focus on his work with the Pantheon.
Lorenzo had stolen that from me by giving him a clean death.
I dug the blade in harder. Blood ran faster now, hot and slick against my fingers. "Give me one reason not to kill you."
"Because whoever set this up wants you to.
" Lorenzo's whisper barely reached me over the bass thumping through the walls.
"They gave me the coin. Made sure I'd have to kill him.
Made sure you'd find me here." He paused.
"Killing me won't bring him back. Won't answer who did this to us. It just finishes what they started."
He was right.
God help me, he was right.
But that didn’t mean I was going to let him just walk away with my father’s blood on his hands.
Lorenzo suddenly twisted and wriggled free. I lunged after him, and we crashed into the booth's table together. Glass shattered under my back, cutting through my shirt. The Judas coin went skittering across the floor in a spray of liquor and shards that bit into my palms.
His knife sliced past my ribs, fabric parting, then skin.
Fire bloomed along my side. I caught his jaw, knuckles connecting hard.
We went down together, rolling across broken glass that bit into my back, my shoulders.
When we crashed into the bar, bottles exploded around us, alcohol spraying across my face.
He came up bleeding, nose streaming red. "Fuck, Rafael. You really know how to hold a grudge."
"You killed my father!" I threw a punch at his face that he deflected easily. I was getting too angry, too sloppy.
"You think I wanted to kill the only father I ever knew?" Lorenzo barely dodged my next strike. "You think this was easy? That I wanted this? If I’d had any other choice…" His voice cracked and tears welled in his eyes. "He saved from a cage where I was kept like a dog.”
“He bought you like a thing,” I pointed out.
“He did both. Dionysus was the first person who touched me without hurting me.
Who taught me I could be something other than an animal.
Who made me human again." Tears cut tracks through the blood on his face.
"And I killed him because some bastard gave me a coin, and I was too stupid to see the trap until it was too late.
Because I'm just a weapon someone pointed at the only person who ever loved me. "
He gestured at Dionysus's body, and his whole arm shook. "So don't tell me this was easy. Don't tell me I'm not dying inside right now. Because I am. I'm already dead. You're just deciding whether to make it official."
Blood pooled on the stone floor between us, spreading slowly toward the booth where my father sat cooling.
I took a step toward him, but before I could say or do anything, the door slammed open and the same Judge from the courtyard in Rome entered, revolvers drawn. Rhadamanthys. He paused and glanced around with a frown. "It's done then."
Lorenzo stepped away from me. "Here to finish the job?"
"I gave you time to say goodbye. To complete the coin's demands in dignity." Rhadamanthys’ jaw tightened. "But you knew what came after. We both did."
"Like hell," I snarled, pointing my blade at Rhadamanthys. "He’s mine. He killed my father. You don't get to walk in here and execute him on some technicality."
The elevator chimed, and the doors opened, letting six Sacra Custodia pour in armed with assault rifles. Fuck. They’d found me already.
Rhadamanthys swung his guns toward them. "What the hell is this? This is a Pantheon matter. The Church has no authority here."
The Sacra Custodia fanned out without a response. Lorenzo shifted behind the bar, hand moving toward where Dionysus's pistol must be.
Rhadamanthys kept both revolvers trained on the Sacra Custodia, his entire body coiled tight. "I said stand down. You're violating an international treaty. Leave. Now."
The Sacra Custodia in front tilted his head, listening to something through his comm. Then he raised his rifle and opened fire on all of us.
Rounds cracked past my head. I dove behind the overturned table as wood exploded around me. Rhadamanthys spun and fired. Two operatives dropped, masks cracking. He dove for cover as return fire chewed through the space he'd been standing.
"This is insane!" Lorenzo shouted from behind the bar. "How did they even know—"
The main door slammed open, and six more figures marched in. These weren’t Sacra Custodia though. They wore the black tactical gear of Pantheon enforcers.
Rhadamanthys’ head snapped toward them. "What—"
The Pantheon enforcers didn't hesitate. They opened fire on the Sacra Custodia operatives.
Chaos erupted.
The Sacra Custodia spun, trying to engage threats from two directions. Pantheon enforcers advanced in tight formation, weapons barking. Rhadamanthys pressed against the bar, both Colts empty, confusion written across his face.
One of the Sacra Custodia rushed my position. I caught his rifle barrel, redirecting it. The burst went high. I drove my knee into his groin and slammed his head into the wall. The mask cracked. He slid down, leaving a red smear.
"Your Honor!" one of the Pantheon enforcers shouted over the gunfire. "Get down!"
But they weren't protecting him. They were firing at everything that moved.
More gunfire erupted from behind the bar. Lorenzo had Dionysus's pistol, firing at the men advancing on his position. One dropped. Then another.
A Pantheon enforcer turned his rifle on Lorenzo. I drove my knife into the side of his neck where the armor was weak.
"This doesn't make sense!" The Judge shouted. "Why would Pantheon—"
More Sacra Custodia poured through the elevator. More Pantheon through the main door. The room became a killing floor, three factions tearing each other apart with no clear allegiance.
Someone wanted everyone in this room dead.
"Move!" Lorenzo shouted, already running toward the windows.
A Sacra Custodia tracked him. I shot without thinking, catching him in the shoulder.
The Church wasn't killing Lorenzo before I got my answers.
Lorenzo grabbed something from under the bar and hurled it at the massive stained glass window depicting Christ's ascension.
Glass exploded outward, and wind howled through the opening.
"You're insane!" I shouted.
"Better insane than dead!" Lorenzo glanced back at me. "You coming, Father?" Then he ran straight for the opening and leaped through it, disappearing into the Rio night.
Bullets tore through the air from every direction. Operatives closed in. Enforcers advanced. Rhadamanthys was still fighting, both Colts blazing, but even he couldn't hold this many.
I ran for the window and jumped.
Wind tore at my clothes, whipping fabric around my face. My stomach lurched into my throat as the concrete below rushed up to meet me. This was how it ended. Not in glory. Not in redemption. Just gravity and stupid choices and my father's killer laughing all the way down.
Except—
Through the rushing air, I caught a glimpse of the fire escape. Lorenzo crouched on the platform below, one level down, body braced low.
The bastard had actually stayed.
My hands shot out and caught the iron railing. The impact slammed through my palms, my wrists, my shoulders. Metal bit into my skin. My body swung hard into the platform, ribs cracking against iron bars. Air punched from my lungs, and I wheezed out a breath that felt like fire.
My grip started to slip, fingers sliding on metal slick with my own blood.
Lorenzo's hands locked around my forearms, and he hauled me up over the railing.
We both crashed onto the platform in a tangle of limbs.
My shoulder throbbed, probably dislocated.
Blood ran from my palms where the railing had torn skin.
But I was alive thanks to Lorenzo. The bastard had saved my life a second time.
Lorenzo yanked me to my feet. “Move!”
Bullets sparked off iron around us as we half-ran, half-jumped from the fire escape to the alley below. I hit the alley at a dead run. My shoulder was definitely fucked, but adrenaline kept me moving. Lorenzo stayed ahead, weaving between dumpsters. I followed because stopping meant dying.
"There!" He pointed at a motorcycle against the far wall.
Lorenzo straddled the bike and fired it up. The engine's roar bounced off alley walls. I climbed on behind him and wrapped my arms around his waist because physics didn't care about my rage.
My father's blood was still under my nails, and Lorenzo's hands were painted in it. Yet here I was, holding onto the man who'd killed him because both our organizations had decided we were better off dead.
"Don't get any ideas," I said against his ear, loud enough to carry over the engine. "This doesn't change anything. The second we're clear, you and I are finishing our conversation."
"Hold tight," he said. "And maybe try not to stab me in the back while we're moving."
"No promises."
He gunned it, and we tore into Rio's night with the taste of blood and betrayal thick on my tongue.