This was obliteration.
Who’s next? The question crosses my mind just as I see him. A man lurks far back from the crowd, in an alley, his face partially covered by a hood and shadow. I can’t make out any definitive features from this distance, but I know that it’s him. The same way I know, deep down, he won’t wait for me to catch up.
I’m already shoving my way through the crowd anyway. Past police. Past civilians choking on the smoke-laced air.
He sees me. I know he does. A flashing siren illuminates his face in red for a split second. I see his eyes.
“Dante!”
He turns, disappearing into the alley before I can bolt across the street. By the time I pass an overflowing dumpster, he’s already gone.
I can’t even muster up the energy to feel pissed or angry. I don’t feel like hunting him down tonight, the way I have for months now, either.
I’m too damn tired.
I watch him go. I find Arno, and when he asks me what I found…
I tell him nothing.
Within minutes,Arno has the pub resembling Fort Knox. Men are patrolling every inch of the block, guns in hand. There isn’t a fucking beer in sight.
“You know what this means,” he tells me the moment I walk through the door. His jaw is clenched, his eyes searing; he’s still sober. “Youknowwhat this means.”
I don’t say a damn thing. It’s a packed house tonight, but one person is missing. One face. One Russian.
“I’ve got to go.”
It feels like déjà vu when I race out onto the street and head for my place. Turns out, there’s no point in running. The house is empty. She’s not here.
I tear it the fuck apart anyway, ripping through the cheap, mismatched furniture. Throwing everything out of my damn closet. Flipping the mattress over. With every hole I make in the wall with my fist, I don’t find her.
Or Dante.
Like always. Chasing after people is what I do best, after all.
I don’t even have a goddamn cigarette to chase theself-pity away. I wind up staring at a pool of my own blood as it drips from my fingers instead, desperate for relief. My kit might hold the answer. Half a vial. A full hit. One push of the syringe and I wouldn’t have to feel a damn thing anymore.
Maybe I’ll do it. Maybe I could.
I already have the needle in my hand when I smell her. Smoke, blood, death, and fire. A perfect mixture of fucking yellow. She strides through the chaos of the kitchen, her gaze hunting,searching. It finds me, and the next minute, she’s in my arms, holding me. Crushing me.
“Are you okay?”
I’m too fucking tiredto play nice; I kiss her. Hard. Brutal. She can slap me if she wants to. Maybe I’ll feel guilty tomorrow.
She kisses me back instead. Harder. More. I already have my hands down the front of her shirt when she pulls back.
“Wait—”
When I let her go, she’s halfway across the room before I can grit out a half-assed apology.
A part of me has to laugh. Go fucking figure, I have to go and repel her too. “I’m sorry…”
Tears run down her face. I try to catch one with my finger, and it winds up dripping wet. Her pain fuels me like nothing else. Nicotine in the purest goddamn form.
“What’s wrong?”
“I need to leave the city,” she says in a rush. “My sister… She’s alive.” Her eyes gleam gold at the thought, shining with hope and pain and fear. “But I have to get her out now. But…”
