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When a member of the Kings of Chaos and some silver haired woman showed up on our turf to talk to us a few weeks ago, I knew it was going to be something big. We don’t run in the same circles as the Kings do. They run their operations in a different part of Detroit than us, but we’ve worked together before. If they were coming to see us, I was sure it had to be about something serious. Something real. They wouldn’t go so far out of their way for nothing.
“I do remember her. It was just business.” “Business?” Malice demands, rage making him shake a little. “What the fuck is that supposed to mean? She was our mother.” “She was a loose end. She saw me doing… an assassination job, and I could not let her live after that. I killed her, yes. And I never thought about her again after. Do you shed tears for every piece of trash you throw away?”
Sometimes the people you love turn your love against you, and it’s the most brutal weapon in the world.”
I can’t stop the Voronin brothers from doing whatever they want—that much has become abundantly clear—but I need to get my head on straight. I need to force them out of my mind and put up higher walls around myself. Because no matter how hard I’ve been trying to keep them out, they keep worming their way into my thoughts. And that’s beyond dangerous.
A flush creeps up my cheeks. “No. It… it was my first time. Not just my first time getting paid, but my first time ever. Or it would’ve been if you all hadn’t come in and…” Ransom’s face darkens, his brows pulling together. “Well then, I’m even more glad we killed that son of a bitch. Your first time shouldn’t be with a man like that.”
I just want to be normal. I want to like normal things. I want safety and security and all the things that go along with that. None of those things are things the three brothers represent. It freaks me out that I’m drawn to them the way I am, like a moth pulled toward the flame that will end up destroying it.
“Because you’re our responsibility. And we don’t let people hurt what’s ours.” It reminds me of what Malice said last night as he touched the bruises and cuts on my skin. Our business. Our responsibility. Ours.
It’s better this way. The more she hates me, the easier it will be to keep telling myself I hate her too.
She radiates a sort of energy when she’s happy, as if she’s a tiny sun emitting rays of warm light. Selfishly, I want more of that.
“You know, you look so sweet and innocent on the outside,” I say, lowering my voice a bit as I step closer to where she’s perched on the bike. “But I still see that wild streak in you. Maybe you want to be a bad girl. Maybe that’s who you are at heart.”
Malice doesn’t hesitate to do bad things when they need to be done, and he does them fiercely and brutally. But at the same time, that’s not all there is to him.
She makes me want things I’ve never allowed myself to have, never even thought about having before. When I’m around her, I wonder what it would feel like to touch her hair, to feel the softness of it, like spun gold between my fingers. To touch her face, to kiss her. To have her lean into me with careless touches and easy affection the way she does with Ransom. It seems impossible, unobtainable. Laughable, even. But still, I want it.
“Yesli ty uydesh', ya naydu tebya,”
If you leave, I will find you
“Ya vyslezhu tebya i vernu tuda, gde ty dolzhna byt’.”
I will track you down and bring you back to where you belong
They were monsters who stalked me, who violated my privacy and ignored my personal space time and time again. They came into my life soaked in blood and bent on making sure I kept their secret, no matter what it took. Then they became monsters who protected me. Who stood against everyone who tried to hurt or use me. My mom, the guy from the bus stop, Colin. Even when it meant they lost out on work, like with the Donovans. After all of that, they’re under my skin now.
What do you say to a man who came into your life like a deadly shadow but treats you better than most of the people who were already in it?
it’s easy to settle back into Ransom’s arms and let the heat of the water keep soothing my aches. It probably shouldn’t be easy, considering who he is, but ‘shouldn’t’ stopped mattering a while ago. All of this is something I shouldn’t be doing. And yet, I feel so relaxed and happy in his embrace. For the first time in a long time, maybe in my whole life, I feel cared about. I just want to soak that up a little more.
