CHAPTER 52
Van
“She’ll be back, get your big ugly head out of your arse,” Mac says, irritated. I grunt but say nothing. It’s quiet work, gathering the remains of the worst-hit parts of the house. We’ll rebuild but it’s going to take a long ass time.
Mac stares at me, waiting for a reply. He doesn’t understand.
He knows enough to know I’m secretly one of the good guys.
I was allowed to tell him that when we were still teens.
He’s met some of my brothers and even been in on some high-level ops.
Never met Command though. Collin, his younger brother, isn’t stupid.
But he thinks we’re secretly feds and is fine with it, as long as he gets a plea deal.
I have a few foot soldiers that are more O’s men than mine, planted as Irish recruits.
None of them really know anything. Hell, I’m in the innermost circle and I rarely know shit. I do know this though.
Luna isn’t coming back.
She’ll pop onto the grid for a second, long enough for Command to stage some spectacle where she appears to die in a fiery accident or an ambush gone wrong. But she’s already past that little technicality. I’m sure she has a new name. She may have cut her hair already.
Fuck.
I loved her hair. I only got to feel it in my fingers a few times.
What a damn fool. I should have given in the moment I could see she wanted me too. I should have fell to my knees and begged her to let me have her any way, all the ways, until our time was up. We were never going to have much time. I knew that and still I wasted it.
Moron!
“Do you need to take a few more days? The men are eyeing you like you’ve grown three heads and I can’t blame them. You’re…”
“What?”
“Mopey.”
I straighten a bit and pick up a bigger piece of rubble. I grit out, “I am not mopey.”
“You are and it’s really damn weird. You can’t be all sad when we go for our revenge strike tonight. So maybe go run or fight someone or shoot something.”
“I’m...” I move a massive chunk of concrete into a wheelbarrow. It crashes down with a thud, “Fine!”
All the men around us look away.
Okay, so I’m mopey.
And I want to tell Mac everything.
You don’t get it, she’s in a place that doesn’t exist, using technology that is technically supposed to still be in an R&D bunker in Area 51, surrounded by geniuses almost as smart and sneaky as her, finally a leader, finally doing what she’s made for, which is changing the whole damn world!
She left! She left and she’s never fucking coming back to me!
“I’ll go punch someone,” I say instead. I leave the house to go around to the far side and reenter the gym.
It was hardly hit at all. As I stalk there, Tink comes up beside me.
But she’s not looking at me, she’s looking past me.
Looking for Luna. Missing her person. Don’t I fucking know the feeling.
I’m afraid I’ll feel it the rest of my life.