“I need to shower,” Eleanor abruptly climbs from the bed, the shirt still hanging from her frame, covering all the parts my eyes wish to devour. She walks with a limp thanks to the injury to her foot, but she doesn’t look back as she exits, pulling the door to as she goes. I hear the bathroom door click closed and then lock before the sound of the shower running fills the apartment.
The sun has barely risen above the horizon, bathing the city in a dull orange glow.
I couldn’t say fucking Eleanor, sleeping with her like we just did was a mistake, but it wasn’t the norm for me. Having her there, taking the comfort she offered, the tests and temptations, it was something I avoided.
Weaknesses were a death sentence. Not for you. But for them.
They were used and abused, manipulated and tricked. They could be your downfall
And that’s what she was becoming.
I couldn’t get my head around it.
I’d seen men more powerful than me get taken down because of the women they loved. I didn’t love Eleanor, but it could get there. And then she would be taken, like all good things in this life.
They get ripped from you as punishment for all the misdeeds. Why should a sinner get a saint after all?
It was some fucked up divine justice that it was always the light that was snuffed out rather than the darkness. That it was always the good that died so the evil could suffer the consequences.
It seemed odd to me that someone who I had known for such a little time could become so important. It was something I’d never admit for fear of the retribution, but I was sure I’d rip the world apart just to have her in my bed.
Sleeping with her again, especially like this, intimate in this way, where it was just the two of us, breathing the same air, reveling in each other’s bodies until the only thing we knew was the other person, until we couldn’t figure out where one ended and the other began, it was something I never should have done.
I knew it when I arrived here early this morning, when the city still slept, I knew it when I climbed into her bed chasing her comfort, and the way she chased away the impending darkness.
But that was what she was. The good to the evil, the light to the dark. This sweet, innocent girl, who had been thrown into a world of corruption and ruin because of me. Her friend may have been taken, and it was likely she’d never be seen again, but I had given her a hope that didn’t exist.
My soul was tainted, but this seemed to stain it black.
I had no hope that Tate was still alive, no hope of ever finding her, instead I used my selfish greed to get her where I wanted her. I used her weaknesses to my advantage.
I laugh to myself in the quiet of the bedroom. How the tables have turned now that she was becoming a weakness that would likely destroy me.
It had to be a punishment, to give me something this good.
I knew Eleanor could fall in love with me, even after all is said and done, even with her fear and hatred of me, she would love me.
And I would kill her.
I throw the duvet off and pull on my clothes, the shower still running.
At least she was smart enough to know that what she was doing would be her ruin. At least she understood that I was the bad guy, not pretending that I was anything other than that, despite my promise to help her bring back her friend.
She tried, she really did, to push me away, but the body wants what it wants, and hers wants me. The opposite to her in every single way.
I needed to not care. She wasn’t part of the plan, but she could get the information I needed, and I had to focus on that. For my sister. For this family and crew.
I already had a weakness that was used against me, what made me the man I was today, and I couldn’t afford to have another, no matter how much I craved her touch, and smell, and presence.
I don’t say goodbye as I slip from her apartment, I only leave a note that will surely have her hackles rising after what we did this morning.
Let her think I was using her body to get what I needed, let her think that the only thing important to me was this task. It was better this way.
And just like that, only a few blocks away, and the knowledge that I was destroying what could have been sends me right back over the edge.
Soon I would hit an abyss so deep there was no going back.
The mind can only take so much. Habits become ritual, rules become religion.
Some day, I’d become the very thing I hated, I’d become the monster my uncle was, and I hoped that when that day came, the people around me would do the right thing and put a bullet between my eyes.
Love was a weakness and a salvation.
But life was no fairy-tale and there would be no happily ever after.
So, I’ll continue to wreck and ruin because it’s the only thing I know how to do. It’s the only thing I am good at. Chaos was my foundation and revenge my path. Tobias and his shithead son were only the start, the two other heads as well, and then once they’re gone it’ll be a steady sweep to rid the world of the disease that is the Syndicate.
I had built this city and my crew with violence and no mercy, when people hear my name it’s not a threat but a promise. They fear me, they fear my reach, and they know I will not hesitate to cross those lines others are not so willing to do.
It’s probably why the Syndicate have never even so much as tried to take me down. They may be big, but I was bigger and meaner. They had no idea who they were fucking with when they had my sister, when they tortured and abused her for their own sick pleasure. I had used my rage to fuel my rise to the top, allowed it to fester and spill over, making me the man I was today.
With me was no place for a woman like Eleanor.
But it didn’t stop me yearning for it. The further I get away from her apartment and her, the more I feel a cold hand squeezing my chest, it’s claws in deep. This anger, this hatred, it had been my friend for as long as I can remember but with her, it was only warmth that I knew.
I slam my fists against the steering wheel, “Fuck!”
How was I to stay away when I craved her this fucking badly? How was I to let her go when everything inside my body screamed to be at her side. To have her at my side, in my house, my bed, protected and safe.
I’ve tried hard not to think about what would happen to Eleanor if Tobias were to ever find out she was working for me. She wouldn’t last a second if him or the Syndicate grabbed her and forced her into the depraved world of sex and violence.
I somehow manage to get through half my day without thinking too hard on it, but now I’m back at the compound, my IT guys working to fix the bugs. I just needed eyes on her. At least, if I had eyes on her and Tobias or his son found out what she was doing, I’d have a heads-up. I’d be able to do something. I think back to the note I left her this morning, the lies I spilled to ensure she never wanted another thing to do with me, other than get her friend back.
I’d let her believe those lies, even if those very lies would eat me alive.
Isobel sits on the couch in the compound working on the laptop, filtering through articles and reports on the Syndicate. I knew what she was doing, what she had done countless times since we got that drive from Silver.
I don’t know how many times she has to do it in order to convince herself that the man she was looking for is no more than a ghost.
I was sure she didn’t care what happened to the Syndicate, I think she was more interested in getting her hands on this guy. The man that both saved and shattered her all the same.
But there was a reason he was known as the Ghost, he wouldn’t be found unless he wanted you to find him. And if he wants you to find him, it would be for two reasons only, payment or death.
He would be a strong ally, but he’s deep within the Syndicate, and loyal to the men that pay him a handsome wage. Blood money was still money, and at the end of the day, money made the world go round.
Her eyes jump up to meet mine. A soulless stare. She was getting increasingly more on edge every day we didn’t end this, and I didn’t blame her.
Revenge is all she’s known since she was freed, it’s the only thing that has motivated her enough to keep going. Maybe that’s another reason I’ve let it go on for this long because once it’s said and done, what will happen to her?