“The girl I once knew is dead. All that’s left is the Reaper,” I admit, my voice a whisper against the wreckage of the moment.
No one argues with my observation, especially Konstantin. He just watches me with eyes full of storms and the vengeance he promises to deliver.
fourteen
Konstantin
Blooddrieslikeleatheron skin if you let it sit for too long.
The faucet hammers heat into the ache in my knuckles until the water runs clear. I dry my hands and then tuck my chin to my chest as I try to step out of the Bogeyman skin and go back to just being a man again.
With a sigh, I shake my head and make my way back into the office where Misha decided to stay once we got back to my house.
The charm sits on top of my desk, a wicked taunt with teeth.
Misha leans against the window, chewing on a cigar that isn’t lit. “She enjoyed herself,” he says in Russian, nodding to the charm.
“She enjoyed the part where she wasn’t around for me to put my fist through her throat,” I answer, making sure my blade is still secured at my side. “That will eventually be corrected.”
I pocket my phone and pause at the door, looking back at the one thing in here that she touched—the photograph Cressida handed me before I left.
I tuck it into my inner jacket pocket without thinking.
“Ready?” Misha asks, watching the movement, but not saying anything.
“Da. Let’s go.”
The war room below my compound purrs with quiet violence. Dragomir, Yuri, Zavid, and Sasha take their places along the far wall. Stasia waits with a slim tablet, her dark eyes sliding to the charm in my hand. She doesn’t flinch when I flip it to her.
“Metallurgy?”
Stasia studies it intently. “Composite. Definitely not cheap. CNC etched, not hand cut.” She smirks, amused by the Reaper’s theatrics. “She wants you to know she can spend money to taunt you.”
“How decadent.” I sit and flick my wrist in her direction. “The compound breakdown on the drug.”
Stasia’s mouth tightens. “Whatever this ‘Reaper’ serum is, it’s not just one thing. It’s layered. The base looks like a synthetic stimulant, but something in it binds it at the genetic level. It’s why our tox screens keep coming up inconclusive. The binder degrades fast.”
“Is it old bloodline?” Misha asks, his voice flat.
She shakes her head. “It mimics, but it isn’t powerful. It’s more like it’s a . . . parasite. It hitchhikes the way a bad rumor does.”
“Have you tested it?” I ask.
“Yes. Two hours of manic strength in both. Forty-seven minutes of psychosis. Then cardiac arrest.” Stasia’s tone doesn’tchange. She knows I don’t like cruelty for sport, but I like it for truth, for knowledge. “I wouldn’t put this on my worst enemy.”
“I would,” I say.
Stasia almost smiles at that.
“Supply lines?”
“Your Philly address from Kron Vass checks,” Misha cuts in, pushing a map across the table. “It’s not a safehouse. It is a meet point. Broker comes in Tuesdays and Fridays at midnight. Cash in, product out. They move through the port as ‘frozen pollock’.”
“Which carrier are they stamped with?”
“Blue Harrow,” Stasia says, swiping to a manifest. “They’re clean on paper, but not after tonight.”
I tap the dock coordinates. “We hit both. The meet and the cold storage. If she is as arrogant as she reads, she’ll test us again as soon as she knows we’ve found her little charm.”
