Chapter 5
MILO
Ineeded a reset. My new obsession was itching under my skin, making me sloppy.
So when Enzo Delligatti called with a cleanup job, I took it.
This was my church. This was where I made sense.
I pulled on the tyvek suit. Snapped the gloves. Knelt in the blood. The motel room was a disaster. Whoever did this had seen too many Scorsese films and not enough training videos.
Scrub. Rinse. Repeat.
Usually, my mind went blank here. No names. No stories. Just stains and DNA to get rid of.
But today, the silence was loud.
Tap. Tap. Step. Step.
The sound of her cane echoed in my head.
I scrubbed harder, the bristles tearing at the carpet fibers.
I pictured her standing in the blood, her head tilted, listening. Most people, when they realize they're standing in gore, they dance away. They jump. They scream. Their brains reject the reality of violence.
Raven had just... paused. She'd assessed the texture under her shoe. She'd accepted it. But she knew it wasn't water she was standing in. She knew there was something else going on. She knew she wasn't alone in that alley.
Why are you so comfortable with darkness, little bird?
I poured a special cleaning mixture for carpets over the spot, the fumes rising in a toxic cloud. My eyes watered, even behind my goggles.
I wasn't thinking about the dead Cartel member I was cleaning up after. I was thinking about the living girl.
I was thinking about how she looked sitting at that piano. Alone. Vulnerable. Surrounded by wolves.
Beautiful.
I threw the bloody rags into the biohazard bag with more force than necessary. "Fuck."
I stood up, breathing hard behind my mask. My heart was racing. Sweat slicked my back.
This wasn't working. The work didn't numb me anymore. It just gave me more quiet time to think about her.
I stripped off the gloves, tossing them into the bag before I sealed it. The room was clean. Nothing would be detected no matter how hard the cops searched.
I needed to clear my head.
Ten minutes later, I was in my car, speeding back toward the city.
Toward her.
Day five.
It was raining again. A cold, miserable drizzle that turned the city streets into a slick mess of oil and neon.
I parked the sedan a block away from The Silver Table. But I didn't go inside tonight. I couldn't be near Geoffrey, or Viktor, or the noise. Or her. I needed a little separation between us.
But I couldn't stay away completely.
Standing on the sidewalk across the street, I turned up the collar of my light jacket, rain dripping from the brim of a baseball cap I wore low over my eyes. I looked like any other pedestrian waiting for a light that wouldn't change.
The light from inside the restaurant was glowing warm and gold against the rainy night. From here, it looked like a fishbowl.
And I watched her through the plate glass window.
She was playing. I couldn't hear the music, but I could see the movement. Her body swayed with the rhythm of the song. Her face was serene, her eyes closed.
I imagined the notes. Something heavy. Something with teeth.
People walked past me, bumping into me as they crossed to the other sidewalk. But I didn't move.
I was mesmerized.
The door opened as a couple exited the restaurant, and for a split second, the sound of the piano drifted out into the wet street.
Deep chords crashed down in a slow, relentless pattern.
One note kept repeating in the background, stubborn and insistent, like it refused to let the rest of the music breathe.
It felt stormy. Dramatic. Like something building toward a breaking point.
I checked my watch. 10:45 PM. Her shift ended in fifteen minutes.
I had her routine memorized now. She'd finish the set. She'd close the piano lid softly, reverently. She'd take her cane from where it leaned against the bench. She'd navigate through the tables, declining offers of help from the staff. She'd exit through the side door to avoid the main crush.
She'd walk two blocks to the bus stop.
And I'd follow her.
I'd make sure no one touched her.
And I'd tell myself it was because Viktor ordered it.
Inside the fishbowl, the song ended. I saw her hands lift from the keys, suspended in the air for a moment of dramatic silence.
Then, she lowered them.
But she didn't reach for her cane immediately as I expected.
Instead, she stayed on the bench. She turned her head.
Not toward the audience. Not toward the bar.
She turned toward the window.
My breath hitched as I straightened.
She couldn't see me. She was blind. And even if she had 20/20 vision, she wouldn't be able to see me. It was dark out here, and I was standing in the shadows of an awning, hidden by the rain and distance. To a blind woman, the world where I stood didn't exist.
But she didn't waver. Her face was angled perfectly toward where I stood, across the street, thirty yards away.
Her chin lifted in challenge as she sat there, frozen, staring sightlessly into the dark.
My skin prickled. A wave of gooseflesh ran down my arms, chasing away the cold of the rain.
She knows.
It was impossible. Logic dictated it was coincidence. She was only stretching her neck. Or listening to the sound of the rain reflecting off the glass.
But I knew better. I knew the feeling of being seen.
And she was looking right at me. Through the glass, through the rain, through the carefully constructed facade I wore like armor. Through her own blindness.
A slow smile spread across her lips.
It wasn't the vapid, polite smile she gave Viktor. It wasn't the fearful grimace she gave Geoffrey.
It was sharp. Knowing.
It was a greeting.
My hands curled into fists in my pockets. My pulse thundered in my ears, louder than the traffic. I cocked my head.
Hello, little bird.
She stood up, grabbed her cane, and turned away, disappearing into the bustle of the restaurant.
Go home, Milo.
The voice was my father's. But the warning was my own.
"Fuck off," I told his ghost.
I stayed on the sidewalk, rain soaking through my jacket, staring at the empty piano bench. I didn't even feel it. I hadn't felt cold in days. Hadn't felt much of anything except…this.
She emerged ten minutes later, cane in hand, and walked toward the bus stop. I followed at a distance. Watched her board. Watched the bus pull away.
Then I drove to her building and sat outside until three in the morning, watching her dark window, wondering what the fuck was happening to me.
Day five became day ten.
Day ten bled into two weeks.
And I still couldn't stop.