Chapter 1.
Reuben
“Mr. Taiga. We weren’t expecting you.” The guard at the door shuffles from foot to foot uncomfortably and I have to force my eyes not to roll.
“That was the point. Take me to Dahlia.”
“Yes, sir.” The grunt doesn’t hesitate to show me inside the mansion. Even I had to admit my cousin outdid herself handling Portland’s affairs on her own. Instead of caving in when her husband died, like everyone thought she would, she fit into the position of Capo like it was made for her.
The moment the door opens, I can already smell the overpowering rosé perfume and the bright red on her lips is like staring into a traffic light at point-blank range.
Two of her bodyguards are plastered to the walls behind her desk, wearing grim expressions, but before she even registers me in the room, I can already tell that something is wrong.
The energy around her is pure black, tinted barely with bits of red.
The shock makes me forget to breathe. I’d only ever seen it this black once before.
.. when her husband died. She never let it show when she started running Portland, but I always knew it was there.
I made sure someone was keeping an eye on her at all times, no matter where she had to go or who she had to see.
Black is not the colour you see on people who want to live.
The past year it’d cleared up so much. I’d been satisfied enough to see the barest hints of gold, in those moments when she laughed, or red, whenever I purposely pissed her off, or even orange when I frustrated the shit out of her—
Anything to get rid of that black.
And here it is, staring me in my face all over again.
“Reuben,” Dahlia relaxes her body as she sings my name. “My first favourite cousin. You’re here just in time.” The corners of her lips have curled up into a natural smile, and if I were anyone else I could be convinced she’s happy to see me.
However, there isn't even a ripple in the dark energy around her.
“What happened?” My gaze hardens.
Her smile freezes on her face. I like that she still tries even when she knows it’ll never fool me. It never has and until the day I stop seeing these ‘energies’ as Abuelita calls them, it never will.
Dahlia ignores me to turn back to the man standing in front of her. The smile never leaves her lips, but it doesn’t reach her eyes and only makes her look more frightening.
“Everett, this man is Reuben Taiga,” she introduces me almost lazily, “the main family’s golden child.”
I don’t bother to correct her since I can tell the situation is serious.
“Reuben, this is Everett,” her smile sharpens into something animalistic as she leans off the table and steps into Everett’s space. So close I’m sure he would’ve choked on the stench of her perfume if he could.
“The sole survivor of the Nash Operation.”
The words sit in the air for a long time, banging around in my skull before finally registering in my brain, and the impact of those words makes my gaze soften.
My poor cousin really never catches a break, but it’s not the time to give condolences, instead, my gaze shifts to Everett. Tall, muscular, clean-shaven. His hair is tied up in a ponytail and his face, bruised and swollen, as though he’d just been in a brawl for his life.
When Dahlia leaves his space, he finally allows himself to take a breath and she walks around the table to take a seat between her guards, leaning back to lap her leg.
She appears composed, but tension radiates from her body.
She’s itching for a fight and her eyes are fierce even though her voice is soft and sweet.
“Tell him everything you told me,” she orders sweetly.
I walk deeper into the room and watch Everett hold his breath again. I’m not a big guy, but people have a habit of being intimidated, no matter how harmless I try to appear. ‘Crazy energy’ or something my idiota brother told me.
When I lean back against the desk and fold my arms, only then does Everett find the courage to speak again.
“Christian set us up.”
The room listens to his story for the second time, and out of the corner of my eyes I watch Dahlia’s knuckles turn white, her grip on the handles of the chair, deadly.
The Adler Squad had been the medicine for her darkness when her husband died. It didn’t cure her completely of her despair, but it helped. I saw it at every family gathering and Christmas party. Noticed it in her prideful eyes whenever she spoke of them.
But now even the medicine is gone.
And I’m not sure I can keep her from going over the edge this time.
Not when this bastard’s energy is a disgustingly satisfied yellow.
“So to summarize,” my voice finally breaks the silence in the air, and I’m trying my hardest to rein in the voice inside me that’s screaming with rage, “Christian Adler, the leader of the Adler squad sold out the team’s plan to let Nash escape.”
“That’s right, sir.”
He’s lying.
Yellow is the tell. It is one of the colours I hate most.
There’s an itch building inside me. It’s familiar and scratchy, clawing at my ribs to be let out, but I ignore it for now as I continue. “He killed the rest of the team, but you were able to avoid a fatal shot, so you killed him, and then Geoffrey Nash before he could escape.”
“Yes, sir.”
It makes the itch worse. It’s inside me in a spot I just can’t reach. Begging me to grab him by the hair and pummel his skull into the desk until I’ve split it open.
It’s the only way to make the yellow disappear.
But I can’t do that, I tug on the reins of those urges and instead, tilt my head to one side, “Were the cleaners sent?”
Dahlia casually reaches for a remote beside a stack of papers and when she turns on the TV, billows of smoke and flame colour the room and the new headline stares back at us like a punch to the guts:
‘Tragedy at the Nash Residence.’
Ha!
“You fucking torched it.” My smile is widening into something a lot more sinister as I lean off the table, and this time, Everett has the sense to step back.
“I—I didn’t,” Everett stutters as he looks between me and the screen with wide eyes. “When I left, everything was intact.”
“So it just happens to torch itself when you come back here without the rest of your team?”
“Reuben!” Dahlia snaps but I know she’s not thinking clearly. She’s happy to have at least one member back. She won’t accept the reality that the survivor is the snake responsible for killing them all.
But if I force the truth out of Everett now... there won’t be any way of curing her darkness again.
“Christian maybe set it up for the aftermath,” Everett’s wide eyes beg me to believe him, but I’ve already seen him through, “I don’t know anything about the fire, sir.”
His emotions are practically blinding me—hovering over his shoulders like a nauseating mustard fog and my eyes narrow as I watch him.
Even he must know his story is too clean.
Too convenient. There are no witnesses. No video records.
And with the feds all over the scene now, no way to send our guys in to verify his story.
Only that disgustingly annoying colour.
Even without evidence though, I could still make the call and kill him. The family recognized my gift for reading people since I was 5; they and I both know I’ve never been wrong about anyone…
But if I do that, it will break Dahlia.
And Dahlia is family.
Though I suppose I could always kill Everett anyway and lock Dahlia in a room so she won’t give in to that darkness.
I’m seriously contemplating it when Dahlia’s phone buzzes and she pulls it off the table to take a look. I put my hands in my pockets as I turn to watch her, but her expression freezes and her eyes go wide.
She stares at her screen for a few moments and it takes all my patience not to snap and wait until she finally looks up from the screen.
When the dark energy around her finally breaks, it’s converted completely to a bloodthirsty shade of red.
“Let him in.” Her command is laced with unhidden poison.
I’m not entirely sure what’s happening when the door to the office opens, revealing a man with curly black hair and intense blue eyes. Under the dim light of the room, I can barely make out sculpted cheekbones and a defined jawline, but that’s not what’s pulled me in and made me lose my breath.
It’s the energy around him—a cacophony of colours I’ve never seen before, comparable to those auroras you can supposedly see in faraway places and northern night skies. It is a shimmer of sapphires and scarlets, like a galaxy filled with furious stars staring right back at me.
And I think I’m having a stroke.
His shirt is damp with blood from a wound somewhere on his body and with one glance I can already tell he’s lost too much, that his life should be hanging by a single thread.
But his eyes are clear, just like the energy around him, unfazed and calm, like a cool breeze spreading into my chest and easing that mad itch inside me.
The moment his focus is directed towards Everett in the centre of the room, the gorgeous energy around him transforms into a raging red and the chaos inside me practically sings along with it until Everett breaks the spell with his annoying voice.
“You—You’re—”
“Alive after you shot me in the fucking back?” The man’s voice is like honey in the air and my dick twitches. I have to remember to breathe but my heart is suddenly running a marathon in my chest and my thoughts are suddenly so fucking quiet.
“Hey, I think I’m having a stroke.” I reach for Dahlia’s hand and when I put it to my chest she’s looking at me like I’ve lost my mind. I think for a moment I probably have, and she smacks me on the chest with a glare before turning her attention back to the man in the doorway.
“Dahlia.” The man greets her with a gentle look and the timbre of his voice tingles through my spine.
No one’s taking me seriously but I’m sure as fuck I’m having a stroke.