I should have let Arno have his way with her. His men would have wet their appetites and Arno might have been able to sleep a little easier. Nothing mended a broken heart like a bit of sweet, twisted revenge.
In theory. But men like Vincent Stacatto didn’t play by the rules of normal men—or even the average asshole who liked to think of himself as a monster. They abided by the laws of their own twisted games, and the technicalities were all a mystery to outsiders. The only opponent with any chance of beating them was usually one of the victims they toyed with for fun.
Though she may have been wearing his ring, the girl harbored no love for Stacatto. It was all in the way she spoke about him.She came alive, for once. Her hazel eyes seared at the thought of hurting him, even at the cost of her own pain.
Not that I gave a damn. Her pain meant nothing to me. After all, the world was a bitch with plenty of agony and unfairness to dish out in spades. Nothing about it was fair. Though, hell, maybe I just liked the thought of putting her little drunken boast to the test?“If I willingly fucked another man...that would make himangry.”There were plenty of bastards who would pay to see something like that. Though something tells me that she wasn’t lying. Maybe it was that hard, desperate gleam in her eye. Some might call it insanity.
I know that look well, too. I face it every day in the mirror. I’ve even grown to appreciate it for what it is: a cold reminder to never be weak again. I’d bite and scratch and kill if I have to—no one would ever control me.
The thought shakes a dark memory loose, though I push it back to the recesses of my mind where it belongs.Shedid this. My fingers throb, trembling beneath the urge to punch something. Someone. Rage paints my vision red, but then a pathetic moan scratches my eardrums, and it fades to the dingy light of the hallway.
Goddamn, she’s drunk. I’ll be lucky if she doesn’t puke down my back. I can hear her moaning, the sound aimless—though, on second thought, she’s trying to form words. They trickle out of her, garbled and meaningless.
“Shut up,” I tell her while palming the door to my apartment with one hand. I’ll be lucky if Arno doesn’t kick me out for daring to interrupt his grand little scheme. A part of me wants to take her back to the basement and leave her there for whichever horny prick happens upon her first. I toy with the thought, prodding it with more conviction than I’d like. I turn...
And then I’m staring into a mirror. The other Dante stands at the mouth of the staircase. He’s wearing a hoodie that barely contains the dark hair spilling out from the hood—the first cluethat I drank too much of Arno’s shit and I’m hallucinating. He has my nose. My eyes. They even reflect the same hatred I reserve only for myself and a few other choice bastards.
“So, you really are out.” He doesn’t sound like me, at least. His voice is softer with a higher pitch.
Recognition hits me like a punch, and I stagger a step forward. “Es...Espi.”
The kid’s all grown up. It’s more jarring to see him in person than only in a picture. Espisido’s taller now. Give him a few extra inches and he’d tower over me. It’s a humbling, irritating realization. There used to be a time when I’d tuck him into bed. Fight his bullies on the playground. Kick his ass when he dared to get out of line.
Now, he runs around with men like Arno. His picture is in a police file with my name on it. So much has changed in only five damn years, but some shit never does. His eyes narrow when I take another step toward him. Then they flicker over the woman I have slung over my shoulder. The half-naked, drunk, groaning woman who can barely lift her head up.
“You’ve certainly wasted no time,” he says.
There’s a backpack hanging off his shoulder, stained with a million splotches of different colored paint. The zipper is partially undone, and I can make out metal cans filling the bag to the brim. He’s been out tagging, but his little hobby takes a back seat to the hostility lurking in his words.
“What is that supposed to mean?” I know what it fucking means. Fuck, I wonder if he knows—if Arno told him about his sick little revenge plot. If he knows about Parish. With a grunt, I set the woman upright and let her stumble against the door to my apartment.
She flinches, bracing both hands against the wooden surface. “The walls...” she mumbles, her accent strangling her words. “The walls arebleeding.”
“Quite the charmer, she is,” Espi says snidely, eyeing her bareback as she struggles to keep her balance. At least the theory that he knows is shot—the kid was never malicious enough to mock a dead woman.
From the back, at least, she looks like the average party girl who had too much to drink. I can only hope that he doesn’t get a good look at her mangled ear, her face, or the blood that speckles her skin in all the wrong places.
“I’ve been looking for you,” I say, changing the subject while I shift sideways just enough to block the woman from view. I scan the hallway with narrowed eyes. Which door belongs to his apartment? How long has he scuttled in and out of the pub, trying to avoid me?
Espi shrugs, adjusting his backpack. “I know. Apparently, you can’t take a fucking hint.”
“Hey.” I take a step forward and grit my teeth, cutting a violent remark off.Focus.“We need to talk,” I say instead, sounding somewhat calmer.
“Talk?” Espi meets my gaze and scoffs. “It’s about five years too late, Dante. I don’t—”
The sound of retching cuts him off. We both turn and find the girl slumped over on her hands and knees. She gags, but her stomach has nothing left to spit up.
“I think she needs you,” Espi says, nodding to her.
But she can wait. “Espi—”
He turns and races down the stairs before I can stop him. I start to follow, but the damn girl tries to gag again, making herself choke.
“Fuck...” I waver between the two of them for all of three seconds. Concern for Arno’s floor wins out. I’ll track Espisido down again, and next time, I’llmakehim talk. For now, I content myself with kicking the fucking door to my apartment open and dragging the woman inside by her arm.
I let her go the moment her feet are clear of the doorway, and she slumps over the placemat.
“Get up,” I tell her once I get the door shut and wrestle the locks into place.
