I open my eyes, my hands fisting at my side.
“Or perhaps just have a quick taste,” he finishes. It’s when I feel his tongue slide across the curve of my neck that I steel my spine. I fix my gaze on the dirty mirror in the distance where I can see our reflection. This aging man at my back. This disgusting piece of human filth. And I think of Angelique. Of all the little girls he’s hurt. Of all the ones he’ll keep hurting.
And it’s that that has me standing taller.
Has me focusing my hate. My rage.
I have to keep it together now.
Because Jericho St. James is right. This man will die tonight. And it will be my hands that are soaked in his blood.
49
Dante
“What is it?” Matthaeus asks. It’s been twenty minutes and it’s almost midnight. Twenty minutes to make sense of what Charlie is saying. Of who is in that box. Of the one thing that makes sense.
But before I can answer his phone buzzes with a text. “She’s here. In the box,” he says, and we both get to our feet. If what Charlie thinks is true, it changes things. Changes everything. But I push that all aside. First thing’s first. Kill Felix Pérez.
I walk ahead of Matthaeus, stepping into the hallway where I instantly see more men outside Box Four’s door. Felix’s soldiers. I’d smell them a mile away.
Four men flank us as I take my weapon in my hand. I will shoot up this place if I have to. I will do whatever I need to do to get her back. To kill that mother fucker.
One of the soldiers steps toward us. The way he’s grinning makes me think of a hyena. I glance at the bystanders who will witness murder tonight. The hyena draws his weapon.
I wonder if he knows who I am. If he’s been warned to look out for me.
I cock the gun. Even silenced it will draw attention and surely when he drops there will be chaos. I prefer to get into the box without commotion, but I’ll do what I need to do.
Before I have a chance to fire, another man walks quickly toward the first from behind and at first glance, he looks familiar. I don’t know from where, but I’ve seen him before. He gives me a grin, his face hardening as he focuses on his target. A moment later, he’s got his hand on the hyena’s shoulder and I see the man grunt, his body jerking.
The face of the one I recognize grows more tense, and I know what he’s doing. I did it myself recently. He’s twisting the blade he just shoved into the soldier’s kidney. I know the moment he draws the knife out because the soldier falls forward. Matthaeus catches him and the man who just stabbed him walks past me, slapping his hand against my chest.
“Even,” he says and walks away, disappearing before anyone is the wiser. Then, I realize where I know him from. The night I killed Petrov. The night St. James and one of his men walked me out of Red’s. He’s that man. A glance down at the bloody card that drops from where he slapped his hand against my chest confirms it.
Jericho St. James sent a man. And he thinks it makes us even.
He’s mistaken.
But when the second soldier sees the hyena leaning against Matthaeus, the cocky grin on his face morphs into something else. As he looks up at me, fumbling for his weapon, he’s too late to grab it. I push my gun into his stomach and pull the trigger, using him as a shield as I open the door to Box Four. We push our way inside. I see her and for a moment, everything stops because she’s here and she’s alive and I’ll get another chance to save her. To keep my promise to her.
But that moment costs me because I hear the cocking of six different guns over the soprano’s aria. Faust comes to an end to a standing ovation. But before it settles, the butt of a pistol slams against my temple dropping me to the floor as Mara, eyes wide with terror, opens her mouth to scream.
50
Mara
“Let’s go,” the man who Felix called Gray says. “Pick him up. You,” he points to Matthaeus. “Lose your weapon.”
Gray is casually giving the orders. His soldiers have Matthaeus disarmed in a second.
“My man is dead,” Felix says after toeing the one Dante had been using as a shield. “What the fuck?”
“They’re both dead,” Matthaeus casually adds as he raises his arms in surrender to the one pointing his pistol at him. I can see the faint signs of a smile on his face. He appears so calm. Like he’s not fazed at all.
“Let’s go. Someone pick Grigori up.” A soldier hoists Dante over his shoulder with a grunt.