Chapter Twenty – Elaria
His palm rests against the back of my neck. The pressure should be grounding, but it only reminds me how violently I’m trembling. My teeth knock together. I can’t make them stop.
Guillermo’s blood sticks to everything. It seeps into the seams of my shirt, into the creases behind my knees, into the lines between my fingers. It’s warm, and it’s everywhere. I can feel it soaking through the back of my waistband, slipping down the inside of my arm.
The blade is still on the floor.
My knees press into stone. The nerves in my legs went numb minutes ago. Or maybe longer. Time’s soft at the edges.
After they caught me, they hauled me back to the house.
Guillermo looked at me. Then at them.
“She tried to run,” the guard on my right said.
Fausto chuckled once.
Guillermo’s eyes drifted down, “She’s a spirited thing.”
Guillermo raised two fingers and snapped. “Take her upstairs.”
They obeyed and I was led to his private room and thrown in. His footsteps came. His boots met the floorboards in quiet strikes. He took his time closing the door.
He crouched. One knee dropped beside me.
His fingers caught my chin, pinching too tight. His thumb pressed against the hinge of my jaw until I opened my mouth without meaning to.
He leaned in. His lips crushed mine. His breath stank—sweet and sharp and rotten. His tongue forced its way inside. I tasted alcohol.
I shoved him. My palms pressed flat against his chest, but he didn’t budge.
He walked me backward. My knees buckled when the backs of my legs hit the bed. I landed hard. My spine arched. He came down over me.
His knee drove between mine. I turned my face away. The mattress was coarse beneath my fingers.
I kicked. My heel caught his hip. Not hard. Not enough. But it shifted him.
I rolled. Hit the floor. The wood cracked beneath me. The pain flared white along my back and my hands split wider when I caught myself.
I crawled. The door looked so far. His hand closed around my ankle. He dragged me back.
The rug peeled skin off my knees. My elbows. My hips.
He rolled me onto my back. Climbed on top. His breath rasped as he pulled something from his waistband.
The blade caught the light. He held it between us, the edge just above my cheekbone.
“Maybe if I mess up your pretty face,” he said, panting, “you’ll realize I’m all you’ve got left.”
I spat at him. The spit landed on his chin. He licked it. Smiled. The knife came closer. I could feel it. Cold. Metallic. Clean in the worst way.
His other hand pressed harder into my shoulder. I drove my knee up.
It landed. His breath stopped. His body folded. The knife slipped free.
He fell sideways, hands clutched between his legs.
A sound came from him—no words, just pain. I grabbed the knife. The handle burned in my grip.
His shoulder slammed mine. We crashed to the floor again. The knife skittered. I caught it just before it rolled free.
He clawed at my wrist. I twisted. Drove my knee into his ribs. My body shifted above his. My legs locked around his waist. The knife hovered.
His eyes found mine. I didn’t look away.
I drove the blade down. The steel slid in, catching at first—then breaking through. His mouth opened. In disbelief.
His breath hitched. Then again. Blood surged around the hilt, thick and warm.
I sat on top of him as his blood oozed and he let out a groan of pain.
The groan of the dying man under me fades into the noise outside—boots slamming against tile, the sharp crack of gunfire, shouts echoing down the corridor. The walls pulse with it.
Cassian’s arms close around my ribs. He lifts me gently, cradling me into his chest, but I can’t stop shaking. The blood between us is sticky and hot. My forehead drops against his collarbone. His vest is warm from the fight, his chest solid beneath it.
A shadow cuts across the floor to my left. I barely register it. A figure breaks from the smoke near the doorway. He’s sprinting, shoulder angled, knife high.
He’s aiming for me.
Cassian turns before I can flinch. His arm snaps up. The blade meant for my neck meets the metal of his forearm guard with a sound that rings like struck iron.
The man’s momentum drives him forward, but Cassian steps into the blow. His shoulder slams into the attacker’s chest. They collide. The man stumbles back, off-balance.
His hand closes around the man’s wrist and twists. The blade drops to the floor. It clatters once before spinning to a stop near the foot of the bed. Cassian brings his elbow down hard across the man’s jaw.
The sound of impact cracks through the room. The man’s legs give.
Cassian throws him against the dresser. The wood splinters at the edge. The man crumples, head turning sideways, blood trailing from his mouth. He doesn’t rise again.
My breath sticks in my chest. My arms are still clutched to my ribs, wrists smeared with blood.
Cassian anchors me to the floor beside the wall, just before another man comes charging behind me.
There’s shouting in the hall. Footsteps scatter across stone.
A flash of movement draws my eye—something small, black, flickering against the dusty floorboards.
Allegra’s phone, it must have fallen out during my tousle with Guillermo. It’s still lit, the screen dim but alive.
I reach for it. My fingers close, joints stiff, skin too raw. The phone is cold.
I bring it to my lap. The light flickers across my hand. I stare at it. Something pulls at the edge of my vision.
Across the room, just beyond the ruined doorway, a figure steps into view amidst the chaos.
Fausto. My eyes meet his and Giovanna appears at the edge of the wall, half in shadow, half in light.
Her eyes are focused on him.
Her mouth is close to my ear.
“Kill him.”
Something cracks open inside my chest. A sharp pain under my ribs, like the breath I’ve been holding since the fire finally snaps loose.
Rage.
I slide the phone into the folds of my shirt, tucking it against my ribs where it won’t slip. My fingers brush sticky fabric—blood and sweat soaked into the seam. I push it deeper and let my hand fall.
Guillermo’s body lies just a few steps behind me. The blade is still in his chest, the handle tilted slightly where it caught against bone. His arm has fallen to the side, palm open. His eyes are rolled toward the ceiling, mouth slack.
My knees burn as I crawl to him. One hand on his chest, the other on the blade.
I brace. Then pull.
The steel drags out with a wet sound. Resistance, then release. Blood wells up, sluggish. I wipe the blade against his shirt before I push myself to standing.
My legs tremble. The room pitches slightly to the left, and I hold the edge of the dresser until it levels again.
I turn back to the doorway. Fausto is still there.
But he’s not composed anymore.
His eyes flick down—to the knife—then back up. Something in his expression buckles. He turns sharply and disappears from the frame.
I follow.
My knees threaten to buckle but don’t. Every stride scrapes against ruined nerves in my legs. Pain roars under the skin, but it no longer dictates the pace.
Outside the room, the hallway is chaotic.
Cassian’s voice cuts through the noise, he’s further down, driving a wedge through enemy lines. A man slams into the wall to my left, another tumbles down the stairs ahead.
Fausto shoves past two guards mid-fight. One swings and misses. He ducks low, arm raised, coat whipping behind him. He reaches the end of the hall, shoulder-checks a man in his path, then barrels through the foyer doors. The light from outside floods in briefly.
I keep walking. He’s the one running.
By the time I reach the entry, he’s halfway down the gravel drive.
The car door opens ahead of him. A driver lies slumped against the front wheel, motionless. He grabs the handle, pulls it wide.
I reach him just as he throws himself into the seat.
My hand lifts. I strike.
He twists and my blade hits the doorframe. The metal screeches. My body collides with his shoulder as he shoves me back with both hands. I stumble.
The ground beneath me gives. My knees hit the gravel. The wind leaves my lungs.
The door slams shut. The engine growls.
He throws the car into gear. The tires kick up dirt and crushed stone as the wheels spin. The car jerks forward, fishtailing once before straightening down the drive.
He’s gone.
I stay where I am, chest rising in short, tight bursts. My arms shake. The knife is still in my hand.
Then—Giovanna appears.
She doesn’t touch me. She points.
I follow her gesture.
Another car sits at the edge of the courtyard. Its front door hangs open. The keys are still in the ignition, chain swaying faintly from the motion.
I push to my feet. My legs nearly collapse as I go. I catch the edge of the hood to balance.
“I can’t drive,” I whisper. The words scrape my throat. My mouth tastes like copper and dust.
Giovanna stands beside the driver’s side.
She looks back at me. Her voice is calm. “But I can. Get in.”
I obey. Sliding into the seat is agony. The moment my legs bend, fire licks up the backs of them. My feet don’t rest fully on the floor. I shift forward and grip the wheel.
As soon as my hands touch the leather, the world blinks.
I see a road at night. I see fingers flick the turn signal. I feel wind whipping through an open window. The wheel beneath my hands is like memory. Her memory.
I inhale, then turn the key.
The engine jumps to life. Gravel sprays behind me as the tires catch.
The car surges forward.
****
The wheel pulls to the left when I take the corner too hard. Tires scream against asphalt. My fingers stay locked around the grip—white-knuckled, blood drying in the creases. The seatbelt bites into my shoulder where the bruises already live.
Giovanna sits beside me. Her hands folded across her lap. She doesn’t flinch when the back tire lifts for half a breath before slamming back to pavement.
The road ahead splits. I spot his car—cutting across the next intersection without slowing. His brake lights flash, then vanish.
I steer into the lane.
The engine growls. Not smooth. This car wasn’t built for this. The frame rattles when I hit a crack in the road. Something beneath the passenger side scrapes the ground.
Giovanna sits without moving. Her eyes track the road but never flick to me. Her silence isn't passive. It's watching.
A truck pulls into the road just ahead—wide load, slow turn, no clearance. I swing into the other lane. The car tips for a second as it glides around the edge. The mirror clips the fender. A burst of glass scatters into the night. My shoulder jars from the impact.
His car turns sharply into a narrower road lined with chain-link fencing. The headlights barely light the path before I’m in it.
The street tightens.
There’s no shoulder. Construction debris lines the edges. Metal barrels. Broken signs. The car rattles when the wheel dips into a trench.
I keep the blade in my lap. My right leg trembles each time I press the gas, not from fear but from the tremor that’s been climbing since the fire. My feet stick to the pedals—skin torn, blood drying.
A figure darts across the road up ahead. Fausto swerves. The silhouette stumbles and falls into the gravel. He gains speed. The road curves into a blind bend.
He takes it wide. I cut close. The passenger door scrapes a concrete barrier—paint peels. Sparks fly.
My grip holds. I adjust without thinking. The docks come into view. His brake lights stutter once.
Steel fencing lines the edge. Beyond that—water. Shipping cranes. A row of warehouses slouched low against the sky.
His car slams to a stop near a rusted security gate. He leaves it running. Door flung open.
His coat flies behind him as he runs.
I slow just enough to keep control. The tires scream once, the rear end sliding before it corrects. The car comes to a full stop ten yards behind his.
He’s halfway across the lot. A boat waits at the end of the pier. Running lights flicker.
I reach for the handle. The door doesn’t open at first. My shoulder hits it once. It pops.
The night air hits hard. Gravel shifts underfoot. Each step scrapes the shredded skin of my feet raw again. My grip tightens around the knife. The hilt presses into bone where my fingers lock.
Giovanna steps out beside me, she turns to me.
“Get him,” she says.
Fausto is almost on the boat when my feet strike the dock.
He hears me.
His head turns—just enough to catch me coming.
The blade rises, but he’s faster. His forearm knocks mine aside. The knife swings wide and misses his ribs. I stumble forward and he grabs the back of my shirt, yanking me down.
My knees crash against the dock. The jolt tears fresh skin open.
He steps over me and kicks.
The heel lands between my ribs.
Bone shifts. My body folds sideways. I push up, one arm shaking.
Another kick lands at my thigh. The edge of his boot digs into burned skin. Fire shoots up my leg. I grit my teeth.
He kneels, one knee pressing into my shoulder, pinning me flat. His fingers curl into my hair and yank my head back.
“I should’ve cut the tongue out of you when I had the chance.”
My elbow strikes his side—low, sharp. He grunts but doesn’t release. I roll, trying to break his weight off me. He punches the side of my jaw.
Something hot floods behind my eyes. He punches again.
My cheek hits the dock. The wood is slick with something wet. I taste blood.
He leans in close. His breath hits my temple.
I twist, hands clawing blindly. My nails find the inside of his wrist. I rake down. Skin tears under my fingers.
He snarls and lifts me by the front of my shirt, dragging me across the boards. My legs scrape splinters into raw flesh.
“You don’t get to rewrite the end,” he says.
The knife is gone. My hands are empty. I dig my heels into the wood, trying to slow him, but he’s stronger. He hauls me toward the edge.
The sea crashes against the supports below. He drops me just before the ledge. I roll once, coughing.
The toe of his boot smashes into my stomach. My body curls. I choke on the air I try to take in. My hand reaches out. He steps on it.
I scream—silently, mouth open, throat raw.
“You made this hard,” he mutters. “It could’ve ended easier. But you never learned when to quit.”
He grabs the collar of my shirt and lifts. The fabric tears under the strain. I slam against his chest, limbs too loose to hold form. Then he shoves.
My body breaks the surface with a crash.
The cold is immediate—ice knifing through muscle. I sink. Before I can rise, a weight drives down.
His boots hit the water above me.
Then his hands. They clamp over my shoulders, forcing me lower.
I thrash. Something presses into my spine as he pins me beneath the surface.
My fingers claw water. My lungs burn.
His hands shift—one pressing my chest down, the other locking around the back of my neck.
The current pulls at my legs, but I’m not moving.
My lungs squeeze. My legs jerk upward, searching for the surface.
Fingers lock in my hair. He holds me under.