“Oh, god.” I ran to him, heart racing. His head lolled and his eyes were unfocused, and he frowned as I took off the gag then untied his hands.
“Fiona?” He sounded drugged or drunk. “I’m having another hallucination. Did I hear gunshots?”
“You’re okay, Connor. It’s me, I’ve got you now.”
“Fiona.” He laughed and groaned. “This is a good dream. I’ve only been having nightmares lately. I didn’t know I could have so many nightmares.”
I got him untied. Juan helped him get to his feet.
“This is real, kid,” Juan said. “I hope you’re worth it. You’ve got one hell of a sister here.”
“Let’s get out of here before someone comes back.” I touched Connor’s face and clamped down my jaw. “You’re okay. I’ve got you now.”
Connor smiled at me through his haze. “I knew you’d show up. You always showed up when I got hurt.”
I bit back the tears and turned away.
Juan helped Connor up the stairs. We backtracked through the house, but realized Connor would never get up over the fence, so we went to the front door. I unlocked it and pushed it open.
The neighborhood was quiet. It was a nice day out.
“This is real, isn’t it?” Connor sounded a little stronger as we got him down the stoop and began to limp fast to the end of the block. “I’m really getting away?”
“It’s real, kid, and this would go a lot easier if you took more of your own weight.” Juan grimaced with each step, but he didn’t slow down.
We reached the car without any problems. Juan pushed Connor into the back seat then got behind the wheel. I climbed into the passenger side and half turned to look back at my brother.
He grinned at me, eyes swollen and puffy and red.
But he was alive.
“You always showed up.” He rolled onto his back and laughed.
A stupid smile spread across my face as Juan pulled into traffic.
I killed a man tonight. I finally stepped up and did something to help my brother after so many years of staying hidden away. I pulled that trigger, and now I finally felt like I’d broken free.
And none of this would’ve happened if it weren’t for Mack.
I owed him everything.
I only had to hope that he’d come back to me.
23
Mack
Evgeni stared murder at me and took a step forward.
I rolled down the window.
“Get out of the way.”
I tried to keep my voice steady and calm, the way he taught me. So much of my life was wrapped up in his voice, his mannerisms.
I hated myself for it.
He didn’t move. Only stared at me with those rage-filled eyes.
Those eyes I knew so damn well.
“You did all this for me, didn’t you?” He came forward slowly, never taking his eyes from mine. “You killed for me again, didn’t you, Mack? You want to come back into the family, don’t you, son? I always knew you were amazing, but I didn’t know how incredible you could be. Two families wiped out by a single, determined man.”
I gripped the steering wheel, my lips pulled back over my teeth in half a grimace and half a snarl.
So much of my life was spent in thrall to this bastard. My childhood was obliterated in a mess of beatings and hours spent training as he molded me into the type of emotionless killer he needed to help build his empire. I was his tool from the start, a finely crafted tool, but nothing more than an object to be used and discarded once I was no longer of use.
Without me, he would be nothing. And still I didn’t matter.
I could still hear him on the other side of a locked door as I lay curled up in an empty bathtub when I was fourteen years old. For three days, I was left there alone, covered in my own filth. You need to be stronger, boy.
He didn’t call me son back then.
“Move.” I spoke the word like a commandment, like an intonation.
Like a prayer.
He stopped, but he didn’t step aside. “Why have you broken all my trust? After I gave you so much?”
“Move.”
“I made you what you are. I gave you everything, Mack. I brought you into my life, into my family, and made you like my child. I molded you and loved you, and together we built so much, and now you want to leave me? You want to walk away from me?”
“Move, Evgeni.” The words snapped from my tongue like knives. “Moved or get run down.”
“You’d never hurt me. I know you better than you know yourself, Mack. Do you remember what I said to you when I first took you in? I said I’d give you another chance. I said I’d give you a new life.”
I remembered that all too well. I remembered the smile, the extended hand. I needed that so badly right then—my mother was dead and still hanging in my mind and my father was a puddle of brains and blood on the floor.