Chapter 29
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
GHOST
The Code: Rule #2
Do not remove your mask. Do not allow another to remove your mask.
20 years ago…
Gravel crunches beneath my boots as I step into the center of the circle, my eyes trained on the terrified baby blues of my best friend. I shake my head ever so slightly, letting him know I have no intention of harming him, even now. In response, he lets out a breath, and a little bit of color returns to his cheeks.
“This match ends when one of you is dead—and not a moment sooner,” Master calls out, pinning me with his faceless mask. “Treat this as you would a mission. It is either your life or the other man’s. May the best Rook survive.”
Master claps his hands, and Brenden and I circle each other, nothing but our fists bared. I try to catch Brenden’s eye so I can communicate with him—tell him I’ll find a way out of this. There’s no way Master will kill us both—the Code prohibits such senseless killing this late in the training cycle—so if we just don’t fight, we will be fine.
I try to catch his eye, but Brenden refuses to look at me. His chest heaves like he just ran a marathon, and a thick bead of sweat breaks out along his hairline. I look down at his fists, noticing for the first time that Brenden has his dagger clenched tightly in his right fist.
I frown. I could have sworn we were both fighting with fists, but maybe Brenden wants to make it realistic. I grin, trying yet again to catch his eye to tell him I understand his plan. Shrugging, I pull my own dagger out, wielding it loosely with the blade held upward like in the movies. It’s useless when fighting in this close range, but it looks much cooler.
“Quit flirting with each other and fight!” Master bellows, shocking me so much I nearly fumble my dagger. Brenden uses my distraction to his advantage and charges forward, his dagger poised to strike my liver. At the last moment, I step out of the blade’s trajectory, using Brenden’s momentum against him as I swipe my leg under his feet, causing him to crash to the ground like a giant felled tree.
Before he can recover, I straddle his chest, pinning his arms to his sides with my calves like Master had done to me so many moons ago. Just like then, my dagger finds its home at the base of Brenden’s sternum, the tip of my blade pointed up toward his heart.
Brenden’s eyes go wide—like he thinks I may genuinely kill him—and he desperately bucks, trying to unseat me. I don’t move, and my muscles hold taut as I try to catch his eye to relay my intentions. When he still refuses to meet my eye, I speak out.
“Submit,” I say, pulling the blade back slightly when Brenden takes a heaving breath.
“That is NOT allowed!” Master screams, his voice cracking with rage. “Kill him now, Boy!”
I look down at Brenden. At that horrified sheen in his eyes. “I-I can’t,” I whisper, my arms shaking.
“How dare you!” Master screams, spit flying as his face purples from rage. “Do it! That’s an order, Boy. The match is over—end it!”
My hands shake on the handle, but I have no intention to move that blade. Brenden looks up with those wide, worried baby blues, and my eyes scream what I’ve been trying to say all along. That I will never, ever hurt him. Not if they hurt me, if they kill me. We’re getting out of here together. There is no other option.
“I can’t,” I say, louder this time. I toss the blade to the side, standing up from Brendan and offering him my hand. “I won’t.”
Master watches the situation, his body eerily still as he watches Brenden dust off. I give my friend a grin and a pat on the shoulder before turning away and walking to the edge of the circle. Just before my foot makes it past the line, my body crumples to the ground.
Utterly confused, I turn my head in time to see Brenden, a triumphant grin spreading his freckled cheeks as he rips the dagger from my spine. The dagger he thrust into me.
I look down at the tip of the blade, at the rubies pilling, falling to the soil with a weak thunk…thunk…thunk .
“You,” I whisper, a strange, cold numbness creeping into my mind. “You.”
“Sorry, brother. It was you or me.”
“I was… protecting you,” I choke, a coppery taste coating my mouth and tongue. “I’ve always… protected you.”
“Maybe you should have looked a little closer at what you thought you were protecting,” he sneers, brandishing that knife in a steady hand. So, so steady. Steadier than mine ever was.
“Brenden,” I whisper, pleading with him with my eyes. “Don’t… don’t do this. We can still make it out together, just like we promised.”
“We both knew that was a lie,” he murmurs, glancing at the weapon in his hand. “It always came down to this. You were just never ready. You never came to terms with it.” His eyes are hardened with hate as he glances back at me. “I did.”
“Brenden, please don’t—” But I never get to finish my plea because just as I do, Brenden swings that blade at me, aiming for the artery in my neck. My reflexes take over, and I grab the blade before it has a chance to connect with something vital. The edge digs so deep into my palm, and blood flows, slicking my grip and sending that awful deep red running down my arm .
But I don’t feel it. I don’t feel a thing. No pain, no sorrow. Just… nothing. I’m not quite sure how, but suddenly, I’m on top of him again, pinning his chest to the ground with that blade pressed into the center of his neck. My blood pools onto his chest, but still, I feel nothing. No remorse, no guilt. Nothing.
“Wait, Ghost,” he breathes. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking!”
I look down at the nameless face, expecting to feel something from the cries pouring from his mouth. But I don’t feel anything. I am nothing—a phantom—just like they wanted.
“Ghost!” he cries, tears streaming down those ruddy cheeks. “Please! I know you don’t want to kill me! I know you care about me?—”
“Care? About you?” My voice is foreign to my ears. Cold and robotic. “A worthless pile of garbage like you?”
My blade pierces his throat, stabbing straight through to the earth below. A horrible squelching sound emanates from the wound as he tries to suck in a breath, drowning in the blood filling his windpipe.
“It’s not personal, brother,” I whisper, my knuckles white on the handle of the dagger. “I had to take out the trash.”
I watch the light go out of Brenden’s eyes, waiting to feel something. Sadness, remorse, any of it. But I am numb as I look into the lifeless eyes of my best friend. So, so incredibly numb. I hang my head, glancing down at my palms.
Red. Awful, disgusting red—-covering my hands, seeping into the earth beneath my knees. Slippery, metallic, deep dark red seeping from the knife lodged in my friend’s carotid.
“Fucking finally! I was wondering when that bitch would finally die.”
It’s the voice of one of the remaining Rooks, though it sounds distorted to my ears. Like I’m underwater, and I can’t seem to raise my head above the waves.
I straighten, my eyes gazing around the clearing. Two targets on my right at three and two. One directly to my left and another at eleven o'clock.
My hand grips the dagger at my waist, and with my eyes trained on the Rooks to my right, I jam my blade into the side of the Rook at my left.
One one thousand.
Thick, wet gurgles replace his laughter, and I rip the blade from his throat, using my momentum to lunge toward the Rooks on my right. My blade swipes the carotid of the one closest to me, and as he falls, I jerk my knee between the other’s legs, jabbing my blade through his eye socket when his body curls forward on instinct.
Two one thousand.
The last Rook races toward me, his face curled in rage as he brandishes his weapon out toward me. I bend my knees slightly, flicking my blade toward him with a lazy smirk. The satisfying squelch of steel lodging into his windpipe tells me my weapon hit home.
His body hits the ground on three one thousand, and at the exact moment, I mime an explosion with my hands, never taking my eyes off Master, who watches, frozen in place. With a deep, unsettling laugh, I step toward the fallen Rook, pulling my knife from his throat and wiping it off on his shirt before straightening.
“This is what you wanted, right?” I ask, wondering if he’s aware of the piece of soul he’s permanently ripped from my body. If he’s aware of the monster he’s created. “THIS IS WHAT YOU WANTED! ”
Without a word, Master turns on his heel, gesturing for me to follow him. “Come, Boy. We have much work to do.”
And though I’m consumed by nothing but hatred, If I could see his face, I bet Master would be grinning from ear to ear.
I tell Brett everything. How I was taken by Reapers that fateful day more than thirty years ago, how I spent my life training to be the perfect assassin for the Sanctum. How I learned that to care for someone means destruction. How to sleep, eat, and breathe the job I’d been trained for. How I had no other option, no other choice.
I explain why I killed that FBI agent all those weeks ago. That he was secretly taking bribes from the Sanctum and using the money to fulfill his sick desires. How he ended up taking too much one time, and how I was tasked with disposing of him. The only thing I don’t explain is why I left him in such a similar fashion to her foster father.
I tell her about Orion and the day I found him, scared and alone at just five years old in some crack house, crying over the body of his mom, the needle still sticking out of her arm from her overdose. I tell her how I decided to take him in, and how I’ve hidden him from the Sanctum all these years, secretly training him to infiltrate the organization. I tell her about Madam and her terrifying twin tigers. I talk of her malevolence, the wickedness that lives inside her, infecting everything and everyone around her.
I tell her everything—all the horrifying things I’ve witnessed and done, down to the smallest detail. The people I’ve killed, hurt, or maimed. The people I’ve let down. The children—oh God, the poor children—who have fallen prey to her rule while I’ve been biding my time. By the end, she’s shaking and pale, refusing to look me in the face. For a moment, I think I’ve lost her. That I’ve gone too far this time, and she won’t be able to unsee the monster I’ve become.
But then she lifts her head, and my heart stops at the pain swirling in her beautiful blue eyes. Every thought leaves my mind—every want, feeling, and need—until it’s just us. Brett and me, two fucked-up peas in a pod. And she’s looking at me like she finally understands. This pain I’m witnessing is not because of the things I’ve done but rather the things that have been done to me.
She steps toward me, stopping when we’re barely a breath apart. Her hands reach up to my face—to my mask—and I jerk back before her fingers can so much as brush the cool metal. Hurt flashes in her eyes, and her mouth twists up in a wry, all-knowing smile.
“You can’t hide behind it forever, Ghost.”
I jerk, holding a hand to my chest as my heart threatens to beat out of its cage. Lord, how she can burn down my walls with a single sentence. And I’m the fool who’s willingly dousing himself in kerosene to feel her fire. Relishing the burn.
“Brett, I think I’m falling in l?—”
I don’t get to finish that statement because as soon as that last word falls from my lips, Brett’s hands curl around the edges of my mask, attempting to pry it from my face. My chest seizes, and this time, I can’t remember how to take oxygen into my lungs. She’s… she’s…
I don’t fight. I don’t so much as protest when she pulls the awful black metal from my face. All that training, all that dedication, all those years of torture down the drain because of Brett. The only problem is… it’s the most freeing thing in all thirty-five years of my worthless existence.
Goddamn Brett motherfucking Evangeline.
A soft gasp pours from her lips as my mask is fully removed, and I take her wrist in my hand, looking down at the futuristic contraption that’s been plastered to my face for the past two decades. I can’t believe I let her take off my ? —
My line of thought is cut off as Brett’s hands find my face, and my eyes close in bliss as warm tingles spread throughout my body. Her fingertips are so gentle as they explore the planes of my face. The sharp angles of my cheekbones and jaw. The little scar on my lower lip I got from my first fight. The crooked twist of my nose bridge from too many devastating blows. The arch of my thick yet pale brows that perfectly match the color of my snow-white hair. Brett takes her time, her brows pinched as she discovers every dip, crest, and bubble of the minuscule scars lining my face like constellations. Like imperfections.
My eyes fly open as her fingertips prod around my eye sockets, and for the first time, I see Brett’s eyes with my own. They’re more dazzling than I could have imagined. All of her is. I stare into her ocean-colored eyes, mesmerized by the thin green circle around her pupil that I hadn’t noticed with the mask.
“They’re purple…” she whispers, her eyes locked in on the strange violet hue of my irises. “They’re… beautiful.”
Her mouth is slightly parted as she holds my gaze, and before I know what I’m doing, I dip down and press my lips to hers. Lightning passes between us as she deepens the kiss, throwing her arms around my neck and parting her lips. My tongue sweeps across her bottom lip, delving inside her briefly and moaning as the taste of her floods every sense I have. And this is just from a fucking kiss.
Brett moans softly as I take her lip between my teeth, careful not to bite too hard like before. It’s just so hard when all I want to do is sink my teeth deep into her flesh. She’s so fucking delectable, so soft and smooth and lovely and warm and— fuck. I’m ruined for her, putty in her perfect little hands, and she doesn’t even realize it. But she will.
“ Brett,” I growl, pulling her into another deep kiss. “ Brett, I’m obsessed with you.”
“I know,” she whispers, a devilish grin breaking our kiss. I bring my palm down hard on her ass, and she has to bite her lip from letting out a scream. When I look at her face, her eyes are slightly hooded, and she drags her chest achingly slowly down my abdomen.
“What are you-you doing?” I groan, throwing my head back as her fingers start working my belt. “Fuck, Brett.”
“You talk way too much, you know that?” she grumbles, pulling my pants down to my knees. My cock springs to attention, and she attempts to wrap her hand around the length, frowning when her fingers can’t quite touch. I groan as her hand slides down my length, my entire body lighting on fire from the slight movement.
“Jesus, you’re huge,” she murmurs, shifting it side to side slightly. My ego swells to the size of the house as her mouth widens. I refuse to move, to blink as she pushes her pretty pink tongue out, licking the precum off the tip of my cock. I nearly come undone when she moans at the taste.
My legs shudder as she wraps her lips around me, taking my cock to the back of her throat. Her eyes widen at the third she still has to fit inside, and I chuckle, resting my hand on top of her head and shoving her forward. Brett gags and attempts to pull back, but I shove forward with my palm, pushing my cock past the tight ring at the back of her throat.
Tears form in Brett’s eyes as her lips brush the skin at the base of my cock, and a spark of glee lights my chest at the sight of her purpling face.
“You pushed too far, darling. Now look at you—sobbing on my cock.” I let go of her head, and she reels back, coughing and gasping in precious lungfuls of oxygen. Before she has time to recover, I grab the back of her hair and haul her back up, positioning her mouth at the height of my cock. I suppose it’s stupid. She could easily bite my fucking cock off if she wanted to, but something tells me she won’t. That she wants to be treated this way—gets off on it, even.
“Open,” I command, gripping her jaw and squeezing hard until she complies. Her eyes shoot blue fire as her mouth wraps around my cock, but she doesn’t fight. I push on the back of her head gently, coaxing her to take me deeper and deeper on her own. Ropes of saliva drip from my cock to the floor, accompanied by wet sucking sounds from Brett that send me over the edge.
Fisting her raven hair, I push her head all the way onto my cock, deaf to her gurgles of struggle, or her hands pressing against my hips. Adding the other hand to her head, I hold her in place as I throw my head back, a wave of ecstasy flowing through my veins as my cock pulses thick ropes of cum down her throat. A few seconds later, I pull my cock from Brett’s mouth, and she falls to the side, her eyes hooded and face purple.
“Shit. Brett!” I rush forward, pulling her into my chest and turning her face side to side, checking for any sign of injury. “Fuck. What did I do?” To my surprise, a coy little smile pulls at her lips. Something like satisfaction.
But no, that can’t be. She would never… would she?
“Brett, fucking talk to me,” I murmur, my tone more an order than a request. “Are you okay?”
“Mmm,” she murmurs, rolling her head to the side and pressing her lips to my chest. “You smell really good, by the way.”
A chuckle rumbles in my chest as I press my lips to her head. I’m pulling away when it occurs that I’m not wearing my mask, and panic grips my chest. Careful not to jostle Brett, I swoop to the floor and grab my mask, holding it up to my face to fit it back in place.
“Please don’t.”
I freeze, looking down at Brett with wide eyes. “You… don’t want me to wear the mask?”
She shakes her head slightly, raking her fingers down my chest. “Not really. At least, not for a while.” She bites her lip, and it occurs to me what she means.
I lean down, nipping her ear lightly and sending shivers down her neck. “As you wish, my darling.” With her giggle echoing in my mind, I race toward my bike, suddenly starving for a taste of Brett.
After all, it’s only polite to return the favor.