Chapter 22
RYKER
Agent Larissa Marsha and Agent Timon Jeffries scare the shit out of me.
The two imposing FBI agents seem to innately command respect from everyone in the room. They don’t even see me, yet I can’t seem to look away.
From where I crouch behind a banister, my hood pulled up to cloak my face, I watch the female agent shake hands with Raymond. The man simply nods stoutly.
Then the two agents exit through the front door.
“Did you hear anything they said?”
I don’t startle at the voice coming from directly behind me. I’ve known Landon was there for a while.
I wait for a moment, studying Raymond keenly, watching as the older man scuffs at the floor of the lobby with the toe of his boot. Releasing a sigh—one I see rather than hear—he moves out of sight. Only when I’m sure he won’t overhear do I turn toward Landon.
“The agents wanted updates on POP. Raymond said he had a few people on the ‘inside’ and will have more information soon.” My upper lip curls away from my teeth.
He didn’t clarify that the people on the ‘inside’ are actually his eighteen-year-old niece and three boyfriends.
I can’t imagine the FBI would be too happy about that.
Then again, maybe they would. Heaven only knows how goddamn corrupt shit is here.
Landon moves to sit beside me on the mezzanine, his knees flush against his chest. He runs a hand through his disheveled brown hair and blows out a breath.
“I don’t know how much longer I can do this,” he confesses.
I narrow my eyes. “Do what?”
“This.” He gestures vaguely toward the half-furnished hotel we’ve claimed as our own. “Hiding out. Relying on goddamn Raymond. Being away from Ellie.” His words lower to a whisper, rife with pain.
I know exactly how he feels.
Every day without Ellie is torture. Actually, I think torture is too menial of a word.
It’s death.
I feel as if I’m drowning, falling nonstop into a fathomless abyss where darkness closes in on me from all sides.
I open my mouth, and it’s not water that fills it but dirt.
I’ve been buried, buried alive, and all I can do is struggle futilely against the oppressive weight cracking my rib cage and cutting off my air supply.
“I love her, you know,” I whisper, focusing on my hands, on the patchwork of scars littering them. They’re hands that have seen shit most people can only begin to comprehend.
“We all do,” Landon reminds me, though not harshly. His voice is gentle, like he’s trying to coax a frightened beast out of hiding.
“No, you don’t understand.” I shake my head in a desperate bid to clear the perpetual fog from my thoughts.
“I love her, but I also love you guys.” I clear my throat, feeling immensely awkward.
This is venturing dangerously close to sappy territory, which I despise with a passion.
“What I’m saying is…I’m okay with this. Whatever this is.
This relationship between all of us.” I gesticulate in both directions, as if that allows me to somehow convey everything I can’t articulate out loud.
“I love her, she loves you four as well as me, and who the fuck says we can’t all be happy together?
” I bark out a harsh laugh. “You guys are my family, and this may be unconventional and weird—”
“We are a family,” Landon agrees. When I finally turn to peer at him, I find his silver gaze intent on me, warmth emanating from those metallic depths. “All of us. You, me, Dom, Beckett, Zane, and Ellie. She’s the missing piece. The thing that makes this entire fucked-up relationship work.”
Sometimes, I wonder if we would all still be friends if we didn’t have Ellie in common.
We’re all so incredibly different from one another.
Zane’s sense of humor makes me want to pluck my eyeballs out, and I’ll never be interested in dresses or fashion like Beckett.
Landon and Dominic can both be so goddamn serious.
And I’m… I’m just fucked up. There’s no getting around it.
I carry a darkness that few understand and only one can tolerate.
But don’t we all have a darkness inside of us?
Ellie’s the light we need to survive this fucked-up world. She’s the goddamn sun, and we’re the hopeless planets orbiting her, unable to do anything else, drawn to her warmth and smile and the way she eddies us up with just one word.
“We’re going to be okay, right?” I ask Landon, a frown curling my lips.
It’s a question Ellie asked time and time again.
Landon doesn’t even hesitate when he says, “Yeah. We’re going to be okay.” Then, lower, he mutters, “As soon as we can get them back.”
I snort and drop my head against the railing behind me. “Who would’ve thought that I would miss Grove Academy?”
“Everything was simpler then,” Landon agrees.
“Do you think Ellie regrets all of this? Regrets us?” Rigid tension crawls up my spine at the thought.
Landon’s mercury eyes sharpen. “What do you mean?”
“A part of me wonders what her life would be like now if we’d never barreled our way into it.
Would she be happy? Would she have been able to actually graduate?
Would she be checking out colleges or hanging out with friends or seeing guys?
” The last thought makes me physically ill, bile scorching my throat.
“I think this was always supposed to happen, as fucked up as that sounds,” Landon tells me.
“Aria was entrenched in the Paragons of Prosperity before we ever steamrolled our way into Ellie’s life.
And we both know Aria wanted Ellie by her side from the very beginning.
She was just waiting until she was old enough to understand.
I think that, by being in her life, we have a chance to save her. ”
I tap my fingers against my thigh as warmth coalesces in my belly. “I think our girl would’ve found a way to save herself.”
Landon’s lips twitch, and he nods once.
It’s strange to coincide this Ellie with the version of her from only a year ago. That one had been shy and timid, hiding away in the shadows, as if she had any hope of being unremarkable. She became flustered easily, blushed whenever anyone talked to her, and struggled to stand up for herself.
But this Ellie? This Ellie is fierce and strong and empowered.
She may still struggle to stand up for herself, but she won’t hesitate to do it for the people she loves.
Though I don’t love either version of Ellie less, I’m proud of her.
Proud of the woman she has become and the steps she took to get there.
Maybe, just maybe, she has finally learned to love herself the way we do.
A window directly below us creaks, and both Landon and I tense, turning to see over the banister.
“What the fuck?” Landon growls as a figure bedecked in black slips through the open window. They’re followed by a second, then a third, all their features obscured from view.
Panic pummels me.
POP?
Have they found us? Are they here? Have they known about this place the entire time? And if it’s not them…
Who the fuck is here?
I nimbly reach for the dagger I always keep in my hoodie pocket and move toward the stairs, Landon behind me.
It’s been way too fucking long since I’ve murdered someone.
A wicked smile tugs up my lips as I quicken my pace, each step purposeful.
The three figures are still standing by the window, talking in stilted voices. Beams of moonlight illuminate the ski masks on their faces.
Landon grabs one from behind and shoves his dagger to the person’s throat. A feminine squeal escapes her.
Without hesitation, I grab a different intruder and do the same. “Who the fuck are you, and why are you here?” I hiss in the person’s ear.
“Don’t hurt us!” a somewhat familiar woman screams. Where have I heard that voice before? It prickles at my awareness… “We’re just trying to find Ellie!”
“She borrowed my iPod a few months ago, and I was able to track it here,” the girl being held by Landon says, her voice shaking.
“Who the fuck has an iPod anymore?” Landon grumbles.
That voice…
I shove the intruder away from me, and immediately, she reaches for her ski mask, pulling it off her head and throwing it onto the ground. Shiny garnet hair cascades around her in waves as she glares at me.
“You don’t touch a lady without her permission!” Her French accent turns more pronounced in tandem with her agitation.
Landon quickly releases his intruder as well, taking a step backward. Shock splays across his face. “Victoria?” Disbelief rides his tone.
The other two women remove their ski masks as well, revealing Piper’s freshly dyed fuchsia hair and Jane’s blushing face.
“What the hell are you three doing here?” I demand.
But Piper ignores the question and stomps forward until she’s directly in front of me, wagging her finger in my face. “I think the better question is—what the hell are you two doing alive? Aren’t you fuckers supposed to be dead?!”
Oh.
Fuck.