Chapter 28
FELIX
Dove looks up at me with those gigantic, sad eyes of hers and nods.
Something in my world shifts. It’s like I’ve been spinning off-axis for my entire life and not known it until this very second.
Alex is my son.
Dove, pregnant with him and reeling from being attacked by Nico, fled to give him a safer, better life after fearing I had a hand in the slaughter of her family.
It’s a hell of a tough pill to swallow and far too many emotions to decipher collide in my chest at once, resulting in a squeeze of physical pain that drags a rough gasp past my lips.
Everything I knew has been a lie.
The man I once called brother was never deserving of such a title, and it sickens me to learn I’ve been at Caterina’s side all these years like some sick little puppy, blind to the truth.
It wouldn’t surprise me if she knows the whole truth either.
“Dove, I—.” No words come. How can anything I say make up for what she’s carried all these years, or what’s happened to her here in captivity? Those words claw deep into my throat, anchoring themselves and refusing to shift until I spill them out to her.
But what use is an apology without action?
She sinks to the ground before me, battered and bruised and bleeding, with nothing keeping her alive other than her unwavering conviction to keep Alex’s whereabouts safe and hidden from everyone else.
Including me.
“I’m so sorry,” I whisper hoarsely. “I-I had no idea. None!” It sounds like a weak excuse and my heart beats powerfully, sending tremors all the way down to my gut. “I will make this right. I will.”
“How?” Dove asks meekly. “You’re just as much a prisoner as I am. You have been for fifteen years.”
Countless deals I passed onto Caterina out of guilt and blind loyalty to Nico, millions of dollars right into her pocket, years of my loyalty and my power keeping her firmly on her throne of treachery.
How was I so blind to her?
Could I not see, or was I so desperate to feel something, anything, that I chose not to?
“I will fix this.” I nod quickly. “I will fix—.”
“Too long.” A bored voice rises up from the other side of the door and the burly guard I sent for water stalks in with irritation woven across his face. “Caterina ordered you to kill her so what the fuck are you standing around talking for so long for?”
Glancing at Dove, she doesn’t seem surprised by this revelation.
The steps that carried me here were laden with fury. I never intended to kill her.
If anything, I wanted to steal her away and punish her on my own terms until she’s thoroughly paid for her crimes, but in the wake of her revelations, a new goal warms my heart.
“I’m not killing her.”
“And why the fuck not?” Another set of heavy boots and Reese walks around the burly man’s shoulders. “You have your orders. Are you too chicken to commit, huh?”
White-hot anger floods through me at the sight of that traitor’s face.
Maybe I was an easy target for him and Toph.
If everyone else knew Nico was a cunt then I must have looked so pathetic mourning that monster of a man. No wonder two more rats made it into my life.
“Fuck you,” I snarl.
“I’ll pass,” Reese smirks coldly. “But Caterina was clear. If you can’t kill her then I get to.”
“Bullshit. She wants Alex; she wouldn’t kill Dove.”
“True,” Reese smirks. “God, you’re fucking thick, aren’t you? Do you need me to spell it out for you?”
With so much colliding in my mind, past lies and present truth make it very difficult to focus on Reese. “What?”
“She set you up,” Dove croaks from the corner. “This was a t-test.” When our eyes meet, there’s nothing but sadness in them as if she’s come to an understanding. She knows I couldn’t kill her and she knows that by doing that, I’ve signed my own death warrant.
“Even the cunt knows,” Reese smirks coldly. “So I get to have my fun while you get your balls cut off by—ugh!”
My fist collides against his jaw with as much strength as I can muster. He stumbles back and I use that movement to punch him with my next fist, then my next.
Again and again I smash his face until he trips over his own feet and falls to the floor.
Falling with him, I land over him and cut my knuckles on his teeth with the next swing.
I hate this.
I hate myself.
I’ve been so blind. So fucking blind for so many years.
Caught up in lies and grief and misplaced guilt while the woman I loved, the woman carrying my baby, was forced into a life of seclusion and secrecy just to keep herself alive.
I did this.
I will never be able to make up for it but I can damn well try.
“Fuck you!” I roar down at Reese. My next punch slips on the blood pouring from his broken nose and the burly guard hooks his hands under my arms, dragging me off.
Reese surges up with a yell, spraying blood and launching his fist at my face.
He lands two painful blows, then I kick him hard in the knee with enough force to twist his joint backward.
He screams in pain but it fuels his rage and he scrambles up just as I punch the guard and free myself.
With a roar, he tackles me against the door, and it immediately gives way from our combined weight.
Together, we crash out into the hall. He punches my gut.
I throw my elbow down hard on his back once, twice, three times, then grab a handful of his hair and wrench his head back.
He swings wildly and misses.
I slam my palm into his throat and he chokes, gagging as he rolls off me and gasps for air.
I’ll kill him.
I’ll kill him with my bare hands.
Fucking traitor!
He kicks at my ankle while scrambling away from him and I drip, but I let gravity drop me and slam my elbow down into his gut as I land.
He claws at my face, pulling my hair, punching me and twisting underneath him.
One nail catches on the edge of my eye and blinds me. I raise my fist. I’m mid-swing when the cold, cool barrel of a rifle thrusts painfully against my temple.
Everything freezes.
“Up!” barks the guard behind the rifle. “On your fucking feet!”
Panting harshly, I debate the satisfaction of punching this bastard once more and dying for it, but in the end I relent and lower my fist. Several hands grab at my arms and clothes, hauling me back up onto my feet.
The hallway is filled with guards on duty in case Dove escaped.
A very real threat given her talents.
They swarm us, and a handful drag Reese up from the ground while he spits out blood and a handful of teeth.
“I’ll kill you,” I snarl at him, earning the butt of a rifle sharp into my gut. Doubling over, air escapes me and refuses to come back but the angle gives me a glimpse of Dove through the broken door.
She’s still on the floor, staring after me with those big eyes.
I’ll come back for you.
Together, Reese and I are dragged from the cells, up the stairs, and down a familiar corridor until we’re both dumped unceremoniously on the floor before Caterina’s desk.
“I gave you one simple task, Felix.” She doesn’t even look up from whatever she’s doing on her computer. “Just one. The simplest of tasks in this line of work. You’ve taken a life before, haven’t you?”
I can’t answer. So much is compounding in my mind that despite hearing her words, I can’t find any desire to actually listen.
Suddenly, the barrel of a gun presses against my skull through my hair and the familiar click of safety removal rings in my ears.
“She doesn’t repeat herself,” growls the burly guard.
“Yes,” I reply after a few long seconds of silence.
“And yet you couldn’t kill a defenceless little woman.” Caterina purses her lips and finally looks down at me. “Why?”
Again, I have no answer.
“I would have killed her,” Reese pipes up, surging onto his knees like some kind of eager dog. “I told you to let me do it.”
“That’s not part of the test now, is it?” Caterina clasps her hands together. “I needed Felix to do it.”
“Why?” I squint, choosing to focus on her rather than the overwhelming mess of revelations in my mind. “I thought you wanted to punish her with her son.”
“I do.”
“Then why ask me to kill her?”
“Because I hoped you could be redeemed, Felix. I hoped that after learning the truth, you and I would be back on the same page.”
Reese snorts beside me. “Bullshit if you ask me.”
“No one’s asking you,” Caterina snaps.
“So if I had killed her?” I ask dryly.
“That’s why Reese was there. He would have stopped you from actually killing her, but Felix, like always, I wanted you to choose me. I hoped you’d finally seen the light and I’d freed you from her lies.”
“Her lies?” My eyes narrow. “Or yours? Did you really not know your son was a rapist?”
“Enough!” Caterina slams her hands down on the desk as she abruptly stands. “Don’t you utter that whore’s lies in here!”
“Lies? What reason does she have to lie now? You’ve defeated her, Caterina. You’ve won. She has nothing to gain from lying!”
“Doesn’t she? Trying to sully my son’s memory, trying to paint him as the villain!” She presses one hand to her abdomen as if trying to hold herself together, but the way she dabs at fake tears of distress makes my stomach flip.
“You knew… didn’t you?”
“I did not!”
“Yes you fucking did! You knew! How many times had he done that to other women? Were you covering for him?”
“Felix—.”
“You were, weren’t you? You fucking cunt! You’re just as twisted as he was! How many other lives did he ruin before Dove finally put him in the ground?!” The rifle behind me suddenly crashes into my skull, blinding me briefly with pain and I slump down to the floor.
“Those lies,” Caterina says, her words tight and clipped, “will be the death of you.”
“Don’t kill him,” Reese pipes up suddenly. “You can use him against Dove.”
“How, exactly?”
“She claims she was pregnant and that Felix was the father.”
A cold silence follows Reese’s words, then Caterina shifts around her desk. “Felix… you knew her before? Before she killed Nico?”
Still blinded by the fresh blow to the head, I can only grunt.
“I never…” Her voice softens. “All this time I thought your connection to the Healy family was because you were friends with the Captain. I never dreamed that you were fucking his daughter. Did he know? No, of course not. He would have killed you, wouldn’t he? So this brat… he is your kid?”
Bracing my hands underneath me, I slowly pick myself up. “Apparently.”
“And you had no idea?”
I meet her cold gaze and nod, unable to hide anything since Reese apparently heard it all.
Her eyes slide to Reese and narrow. “You’re telling me now?”
“I didn’t know at first,” Reese replies. “I thought he was just obsessed with her but I wasn’t with him back then. Toph will know, though.”
Caterina’s gaze flicks to someone behind me. “Find Toph. I think I assigned him to the premiter.”
“Yes Ma’am.” That voice immediately retreats and Caterina’s eyes drop back to me.
“You’re a man of mystery, Felix. Just how many secrets have you been keeping from me?”
“Were the Healys going to make a deal with me?” I ask her outright, needing to hear it from her. “Is that the real reason they cancelled the deal with you?”
Caterina slides her tongue over her upper teeth and sighs.
“I suppose there’s nothing to gain from keeping that from you, so yes.
They were going to bring the deal to you.
Back then, you were enchanting quite a few families with how you handled yourself.
I certainly wasn’t going to let that happen. ”
“So you always planned to kill them. You just used Nico’s death as an excuse.”
“An addition,” she snaps. “Not an excuse.”
“You really are the fucking devil, aren’t you?”
“Me?” Her eyes widen in shock. “Have you not seen how all of this mess has been created by a Healy? Back then and even now, that family is fucking—!”
She’s cut off by a sudden explosion outside that rips through the night air like a crack of thunder.
A second later, the aftershock hits the Manor, rattling the windows and causing the chandelier above to creak and swing all while a ball of orange fire rises up behind Caterina.
She spins on the spot and snaps her fingers.
“Take him back to his cell!”
I’m hauled up by painful grips to my shoulders and dragged out of Caterina’s office, with my last glance being Reese pulling himself up and moving to her side.
I’m going to kill him.
I’m going to kill all of them.
Somehow.
The three men escorting me barely give me time to maintain my balance as I’m dragged back through the Manor and toward the stairs leading down to the cell block.
Whatever is going on outside is enough to momentarily flood the hallway with armed men and they all sprint outside, leaving me along with just those three.
One releases me and steps forward to open the door, but as he pulls it open, a blast echoes from the stairwell, and both the door and the guard fly backward.
They collide with the opposite wall and crumple to the floor just as gunshots fly.
Wrenching my arms out of the grips of my captors, I immediately duck and throw myself against the wall.
The last thing I want to do is get caught in the crossfire between Caterina’s men and whoever’s dumb enough to launch an assault on her Manor.
A handful of gunshots pop above me as I cover my head with my arms, then two solid thumps echo as bodies land. Then… silence.
Someone clears their throat next to me so I slowly lower my arms and look up.
Toph’s face floats above me with a lopsided grin, but just as dread coils in my gut, he spins the gun in his hand and offers me the grip side.
“Hey boss, you mad at me?”