17. CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Back pressed against a bare concrete wall, I pop out the chamber of the revolver to make sure it’s full of bullets like an invisible man might have taken them out since I last checked.
For jobs like this, I really should have a pistol with a silencer.
Gun at the ready, I walk toward the stairs on the opposite side of the barren, cement ground level of the Millenium Mills building. Debris and remnants of its past life still scatter the floor, and the concrete skeleton is all that remains.
At the stairs, I look up into the void where the floor is missing on every level until the roof blocks out the sun. Then I hear something.
That’s where I’m meant to be.
My shoes aren’t built for this. But as the hole in the floor beside me gets deeper and deeper, I never make a sound.
There’s a scuff.
A muffled scream.
I want to strip off my suit.
I'm never this hot.
This will be my last job.
I climb higher.
My heart beats faster.
The groaning is louder.
One more flight to go.
There’s a thud, and heavy, tense breathing.
I step onto the top floor landing.
I creep to the side of the open hole where a door should be.
I press my back against it, and listen.
Silence.
Is this the right room?
Metal scratches across concrete in short, sharp scuffs.
Then a long, slow scrape.
A muffled scream.
A lamenting sigh.
“Try that again, and over you go.”
I smash my head back against the wall behind me as blood lust swells in my veins.
This was going to be my last job.
There’s another thud, but this time there’s no reaction.
I bang the fist holding the gun against my forehead.
The satchel falls to the ground.
I hold my breath until I can feel my skin pulsing.
This isn’t me.
I never hesitate.
With a scream that dredges up every last bit of hatred, denial, and self loathing within me, I pull the trigger.
The bullet flies down through the abyss between the floors, and the shot echoes around and around like a deafening punch to my stomach, my head, my heart.
With the last bit of indignation I have left, I throw the gun after the bullet and watch it smash into the concrete below.
With the next step, my life will change.
This is it.
Today could be the day I finally get my wish, and the irony is palpable.
One day—one fucking day.
I step into the doorway, gloved hands by my side, shoulders back, chin lowered.
There’s silence. From him. From me.
I’m still standing.
There’s a gun, but it’s not pointed at me.
Rage is all I feel. All I see.
Cocky, like this is just another ordinary day at the office, I saunter in, completely unphased.
“Good morning, Marius. If I’d known you’d be in town, we could have had breakfast together.”
For a split second, the same—so dark brown they’re almost black—eyes that looked back at me on my first day in juvie, brighten. Like he almost believes me. Like it’s everything he’s ever wanted to hear.
“Shut up, Curren.”
“Why?” I shrug, stepping further into the room. “Especially when I was about to tell you how good you look.”
I set my sights on the hole in the opposite wall where a window used to be, and start unbuttoning my jacket.
As I walk past Marius, I spin to face him and shrug off the blazer before continuing towards the window.
His body follows me, then just his head when he can’t turn anymore without moving his gun.
And credit to him, his hand never falters.
“You’ve changed so much in the past five years I barely recognized you,” I tell him as I lay my folded jacket over the window ledge.
Sliding my hands into the tight pockets of my trousers, I lean casually against the wall as I look him up and down.
“They must have some decent gyms in Bucharest. Or you used some of that money I made you to build your own.”
Even from as far away as I am, I can see pride written all over his face. He never was good at hiding his feelings.
“They did a decent job on your nose, and…” I raise my right hand to rub along my jaw. “Your chin too? Much less like an ugly motherfucker. Some might even say you’re handsome.”
Jet black hair that once grew in every direction now hangs long and straight down to his shoulder blades.
The top half is pulled up, and somehow, both perfectly neat and appealingly messy at the same time.
With a jerk of his head, he flicks away some wayward strands that have fallen across his face and he smiles.
There is some ego in it, but he’s also thankful.
His life hasn’t been strawberries and unicorn farts either.
Becoming just another number in the young offenders program was the best possible scenario for a trafficked tween who stabbed the babushka in charge of his brothel with a fork in each hand, while she slept.
He claimed asylum, ‘appeared’ to follow the rules, and applied for citizenship when he was released.
He is a bona fide cunt-fire of a person, but he’s also me.
And I’m him. And I can’t help but let him have his moment.
He stares at me for so long, so unyielding, that soon my eyes are stinging from matching his. I want to blink, to look down by his side, to know if I really do see red or if it’s just my overactive imagination.
“You look good, too,” Marius finally says when he believes he has control of the room.
“But that’s nothing new.”
“I still hate your confidence.”
“You know that’s not what it is.”
“All the same. Some emotion would be nice.”
”You never used to care.”
“That’s because—” He gulps, clearly frustrated that he let himself go back there. To our room. To the bunks. Both of us on the top one, my arms around him with my back to the door because it was the only way he could sleep.
That’s when my self indulgence started.
I wasn’t doing it for him.
“Why am I here?”
“You never want to talk.”
“Yet you insist on constantly calling me.”
“I’m your boss.”
“I have no boss.”
“I’m—“
“My sugar daddy?” Pushing off the wall, I slide my hands out of my pockets and rub them together. “I’ve been telling you since juvie, being a year older doesn’t mean you automatically get to tell me what to do.”
“What would you have without my help?”
“A life perhaps. At least a permanent residence.”
“How many times have I asked you to come—“
“Shhh,” I gently whisper, slowing my pace until I’m barely moving. “You know how much I hate Bucharest. It’s terribly dull.”
“You’re from London.”
“Now, now. Don’t pretend you didn’t know I hate it here as well.”
“Your money would go much further in Romania.”
With an exaggerated sigh, my head flops back like a toddler’s.
“Yes. But then I’d have to live in Romania.
” I can hear the wavelike sound of blood rushing through my ears.
“Do you ever pay actual attention to me?” I ask, once again meeting his gaze with the tiniest pout of my lips.
“Or do you just see me as dollars, pounds, and euros?”
“I wanted us to be partners. I still want us to be partners.”
I move half a step closer. “But where’s the adventure in that for me?”
“I could give you the home you’ve always wanted.”
My chin lowers, and I shake my head. “I guess I don’t really know what I want.”
“What about somewhere else, then? I have family in Serbia and Albania.”
“Is there any part of the eastern block your family hasn’t infested?”
A full, sincere smirk appears on his face. “I seriously will move. I’ll only be there half the year, anyway. That should give you plenty of time to adventure however you want.”
My lips purse and I push them from side to side, mulling it over. Then, with an apathetic shrug, I raise my eyebrows, let my head fall to the side, and look properly at Jude for the first time.
“Why don’t you tell me what that is all about, first?”