I brushed past him into the house, and the first thing I saw was Clementine’s petite body in pink pajama bottoms and a blue tank top soaked with blood, her stomach riddled with bullet holes, like the person who did this emptied an entire magazine on her, with the intention of ensuring the newborn’s death.
Second thing I saw was Chad kneeling beside Clementine, the upper half of her lifeless body propped up in his arms, while he rocked to and fro, to and fro.
The expression he wore, remorse and anguish, told me Clementine meant more to him than I’d imagined. Her death had a shattering impact on him, because I’d never seen him so enfeebled before. Either that, or he was breaking. Breaking under his father’s cruelty, of eliminating all the women he loved from his life.
Third thing I saw was Ricardo. Mouth duct taped, body tied to a chair just a few feet away from his wife’s body. Helpless. Unmanly tears streaming down his face. I didn’t even have to guess that he was subdued and bound first, then forced to watch his wife and unborn child get murdered.
I slid my eyes from Ricardo, only to have them land onhim.
The Voice.
Rafail Niiveux.
He came himself, after all.
Ensconced in my brother’s lavish, exaggeratedly large sofa. Completely relaxed. Looking like any normal, clean-hearted human being. No evil arched brows, no smarmy smirk, no threatening eyes. Just…normal.
In a slick, three-piece suit, dark blond hair gelled back from his face, black eyes watching me, he coolly greeted, “Hello, little Byrd.
Goose bumps raised all over from his voice alone. That voice… Had ruled me and ruined me. That voice was chilling. Creeping with claws down my spine.
I took a breath and counted to ten. I refused to fear him. I.refused. To fear. Him.
Rafail was somewhere in his sixties, but could easily pass for someone in their early forties, he was so fit and ageless. Lean and tall like his son, with eyes as black as their incorporeal souls.
I noticed there were two stiff pairs of legs sticking out from behind the couch he was sitting in. Another dead body. But of who? No one else was in the room. At least no one deliberately visible.
My heart ran around dizzily inside my chest, my mind advising me to hotfoot it out of there. But instead I gripped my gun tighter and dipped in a curtsy. “Rafail. I see you’ve grown some balls.”
Rafail’s soul-shivering laughter rang out. “Well, I suppose someone had to get the job done.” He tsked. “You have turned out to be such a failure for me, Jhay. You were my next-best, but you have let your heart choose your path.” His accent had his words all curled and twisty, like he was having a hard time speaking straight English. He could speak to me in Russian, but I guess Sambo would be left out of the loop.
“Chew a bullet, Rafail,” I spat like venom from a snake. “You were planning to kill me the minute I killed your son.”
“Lies.” Lips compressed, he shook his head. “So many lies. But it does not matter now. You must know, my son will not kill me. He has had plenty of opportunities, but he has not. He will kill anyone. Even the ones he loves, yes? But he will not kill his Rafail. He is the best assassin The Organization has ever known. Think, Jhay, if he wanted me dead, he would have killed me a long, long time ago. I am his father. He is me. So he will not kill me. Even now when he knows I am here to kill him, he will not. He is ready to die. Look, see for yourself.”
I didn’t need to look. I’d already deduced that much the second Chad exited the car.
I raised my gun at him. “I’ll gladly pick up the slack where he falters.”
Yet somehow, I couldn’t pull the trigger without Chad’s consent. If he was unwilling to kill the man who ruined his life, what if I killed him and then he ended up resenting me. I was barely forgiven for killing his aunt. What would it do to us if I pulled the trigger on his father?
My love for him had me putting revenge on the back burner, even if it meant my death. I couldn’t do it.
Rafail waved a hand in the direction of the doorway. “Sambo, come get your Byrd in its cage before I end up breaking my promise.”
Lowering the gun, I looked over at Sambo who had pushed away from the door jamb and was moving toward me. “Promise? What promise?”
“Oh, you did not know?” Rafail said, bringing my attention back to him. “Sambo and I made a deal. He leads me to my son, I do not kill you, and he gets to keep you for himself.”
“What?” I swung my gaze back to Sambo, who was right beside me now. “Does Org know you’re double-crossing him?”
Stupid question. Of course he didn’t! Neither did that dead man behind the couch who I was now realizing was Sambo’s partner. Org didn’t know, so he wouldn’t be coming to ‘save’ me.
Fuck.
“He is in love with you,” Rafail informed me. “So like you, lovely Byrd, he has allowed his heart to choose his path—albeit the right path this time, yes?”
“I thought I told you to stay in the car, Jhay.” This was from Chad.
