by Finn, Emilia
I hurt a man tonight. I almost choked him to death. Then I watched Jay finish what I started.
I so rarely get my hands dirty; I rarely leave my desk to get work done, but tonight I had to dance, to lure, and then to trap. But worst of all, worse than hurting another man, is the fact Jay found out who I am, and the whole walk home, his untrusting eyes kept creeping back over me as though to catalogue a brand-new person.
I deceived him, but I’m not sorry.
“Sophia?”
“Yeah.” I bring my eyes down and meet his all the way across the apartment. He’s covered in Trenton’s blood, his hands shaking, his eyes wild. “Yeah. I don’t wanna talk about it. I’m going to take a shower.” I pass by him and step a long way to the right when he reaches out. I don’t want to be touched. I don’t want to talk. I don’t want anything but an hour alone to grieve a little, then to breathe a little easier knowing one more man has been eliminated and won’t hurt girls like Ellie anymore.
“Babe?” Jay follows me into the bathroom and says nothing when I drop his coat to the floor and flip the taps on. Trenton’s blood covers my chest and stomach; it makes me itchy and anxious as I tug my stupid bejeweled bikini off and toss it in the trash. “Sophia?”
“I don’t wanna talk right now.”
“You said you weren’t a victim.” He tugs his shirt off and tosses it to the floor. “You said you’ve never been raped or hurt, so why are you hunting these men?”
I step under the hot shower and tip my head back until the water runs over my hair and face. I don’t tug the curtain shut, because he’s coming in whether I say he can or not.
“Sophia! Answer me, fuck!”
“I’ve never been hurt.” I glance down and watch Trenton’s blood wash from my skin and run down the drain. “I was seventeen when I was getting ready for my first ever dance where someone important would be watching. It was on a big stage, with big people. Lots of prestige,” I mumble. “I was supposed to be the next Anna Pavlova. I would tour the world, start a dance school, and live in infamy for my majesty.” Shaking my head when he drops his jeans and steps into the shower behind me, I pump soap into my hands and work it over my chest. “I was living in New York City and attending the most prestigious dance school the world knows, and Ellie, my baby sister, was visiting during spring break. She was fifteen, but she could dance too, so she wanted to come to see me, to see my school, to know what her future held.”
“Babe.”
“Don’t touch me.” I step forward and shake his hands from my hips. “She was fifteen, Jay. She wasn’t immature; she wasn’t partying; she wasn’t taking risks. She walked two doors down from my apartment to buy us ice cream, and poof, she was gone.”
I turn and meet his eyes. “She was stolen in the time it took me to take my slippers off and put my sneakers on. I was dancing in my apartment, just like I was dancing when you snuck in the other week. She wanted snacks, and the store was two fucking doors down, so I told her I’d catch up in just a moment.”
“You trusted her to be safe, Sophia. It was two doors. This wasn’t your fault.”
“I know it wasn’t my fault!” I thrust an arm toward the door. “It was theirs! Men like Trenton, like Cole, like Stan, and like whoever the fuck sits at the top and buys beautiful fifteen-year-old girls. That’s why I used you, and that’s why I’m not sorry. I won’t apologize to you, Jay. Fuck you if you think I owe you an apology. If you wanna leave, leave. If you want to rant about deceit or broken trust, do it. But do it in your own apartment away from me.”
“I don’t think you owe me an apology.” He grabs my wrist and pulls it forward to catch a glimpse of the vines sneaking along my arm. Your wings were ready, but my heart was not. “Your baby sister.”
“You’re here to make your brother safe. I’m here to take down each and every man who took part in Ellie’s death. I figured you could relate with the sibling worry.”
“I can relate.” He brings my arm up and presses his lips to my wrist. My forearm. The ball of my shoulder. “I’m not mad at you, baby. I was in shock; I was confused; I was… okay,” he chuckles. “I was a little mad. But I think I jumped on board pretty quick, no?”
“Until the tunnels.”
He pulls me in until our chests touch. “I was having a moment, but I’m back now. I’m here to make your world better. I’m so sorry, Sophia. So sorry about your baby sister.”
My breath catches in my throat and comes out on a sob. “Your brother is still alive.”
“Yes, he is. I’ll never let them get him.”
“Ellie will never come back.” Hot tears fall and mingle with the shower water until he pulls me in and allows me to cry against his chest. “She was just a baby, Jay. She was stolen, sold, abused, raped. It wasn’t an easy death for her. It wasn’t nearly as easy as Trenton’s, or even yours. It would have hurt her. She would have been so damn scared.”
“Stop now.” He crushes me against his chest and holds me together. We never saw her body in that casket. Never got to say goodbye properly. They nailed her coffin shut and warned my mom and dad not to look.
“They hurt her so bad, Jay, that we wouldn’t have recognized her even if we saw her.”
“Stop thinking about what they did to her, baby. She’s not in pain anymore. She can’t feel it anymore.”
“I can’t stop thinking about it!” I try to push him back, but he’s always going to be stronger than me. He’ll always be broader, bigger, in command. “I need to find who did that to her, then I need to look into his eyes while I hurt him. I won’t stop until he’s dead.”
“I’ll help you.” His lips travel over my temple, over the top of my head, and bury themselves behind my ear. “I’ll help you, I promise. This doesn’t end now that I know who you are. That same man who had me murdered has a contract on my brother’s head. I’m not walking away, I promise.”
“I just need to make it better,” I whisper against his tattooed chest. “I need to make it worth something. I need to make her proud.”
* * *
I sit on my bed in a bathrobe with wet hair dangling loose and one foot up as I work on the antiseptic cream and Band-Aids. I cut myself on something—rocks, glass, whatever. But it’s nothing I can’t fix at home.
My dancer’s feet will dance again tomorrow.
“You said they took her…” Jay laps my apartment in clean jeans and a long-sleeved shirt. His hair is wet, his sleeves rolled to his elbows, and his eyes wild. “How’d you know who took her, Soph? You were just a dancer waiting for her ice cream. How’d you know it was these people specifically?”
“Because they tried to grab me too.”
“They what?” He skids to a stop and spins. “When?”
“Three nights after she was taken, when she was still missing, I retraced her steps: my door to the store, my door to the store, my door to the store, a million times. My mom and dad were in the city looking for her. I was raised in BumFuck Albuquerque, but they came as soon as I called. I was told to stay inside, but obviously I was going to search for her too. I walked into that store during the day, but nothing. I walked there at dinnertime, but nothing. I walked it at two a.m…”
“Sophia! You were seventeen. You should’ve been in bed.”
I roll my eyes and go back to wiping a new layer of ointment on the bottom of my left foot. The skin is opened, and the frozen is wearing off. “I found them. They found me.” I shrug. “There were two of them, two just like Cole Fenney. Skinny, smelly, stupid. They grabbed me, and I guess I was partly in shock, but also kinda prepared for it, ya know? More prepared than Ellie was, anyway. She was mature, but innocent, you know what I mean? She was smart, but trusting, so they probably held a kitten for her to pet, and she would have let them close.” I meet his eyes. “She wasn’t stupid, Jay. But she was trusting. She refused to see the bad in people, even people with gold teeth and bad breath.”
“What did they do to you, Soph?” The way he digs his hands into his po
ckets, the way his shoulders hunch in and his big eyes sparkle… it’s like he’s a puppy, or a child, and this is a bedtime story. He makes me feel responsible for him, like, despite the fact he’s older, bigger, more experienced with the world, and lethal, he makes it so I have to tuck him in at night.
“They grabbed me from the back of that store. It was just a tiny convenience store, one of those twenty-four-hour places where all the prices are marked up and cockroaches skitter beneath the freezers. But ice cream is in a sealed tub, right? So we didn’t make much of a fuss about the bugs. I went in there, hung around right in the back near the freezers. Eventually, they came in. They carried this air of trouble with them, so it’s like I felt the change in the air. They split up and came down different aisles, like they were trying to trap me. I knew in my gut this is what happened to Ellie, so I kinda let it happen for a minute.”
“Sophia!” His roar echoes from the walls of my apartment and makes me jump. “Are you insane? You were seventeen, and you were letting them take you?”
“I did what I had to do!” I snap back. “How else would I find her? How else could I know what happened?” I drop my foot down and lift the other to repeat the process. “I’m not sorry, Jay. And I’m not going to sit here eight years later and question my actions. They grabbed me from the store, and when my eyes met the clerk’s behind the counter, I realized he was my first step. He knew what they were doing, and he made it so the emergency doors in the back wouldn’t alert anyone when they were opened.” I draw in a long breath and let it out on a hiss when my aching foot throbs. “They got me outside into a van, you know, one of those seven-seaters but without the seats. They tossed me in and tried to tie me down, but I kicked and kicked and kicked until my dancer feet were ruined. I got away, but I got license plates and IDs from their pockets on the way.”
“You pickpocketed them?”
I shrug. “It’s funny the things a desperate girl can do. I needed to find my sister, so I turned from small town good girl into who I am now.”
“Who are you now, Soph?”
I give a humorless chuckle. “I’m a murderer. A hacker. A thief. I’m a vigilante, because instead of calling the cops, I find muscle to help me take care of things when I can’t do them myself.”
“I’m your muscle.”
“Yep. I followed their trail. Once I got away that night, I went home, cleaned up, passed my suspicions on to the police, but I never told a soul what happened to me, then I started my search. I was good. I was great, even, for my age. But I’m better now. I had an affinity for puzzles, and I had the motivation to dig in deep. Nothing happened overnight, but it was happening. Ellie’s body was found twenty-nine days after she went missing. On the thirtieth day, I went back to the store and smiled when the clerk recognized me.” I smile now, and remember the way he squealed like a pig. “I was just a skinny dancer, no reason for him to be afraid. But he thought I was dead, so when I came in and smiled, I swear, he crapped his pants.”
“He was seeing a ghost.”
I chuckle. “Yup. I was a ghost, and I took pleasure in hurting him.” I meet Jay’s eyes. “How do those people sleep at night? How could he stand in that store day after day, allowing girls to be snatched, and he did nothing about it?”
“Those people…” Sighing, he walks forward until he crouches in front of my bed and takes my injured foot in his warm hands. “I don’t know, Soph. I don’t know how they sleep. Money is a powerful motivator, but still… I dunno.”
“Well…” I shrug. “Whatever. I haunted him, followed him, drove him crazy. I actually didn’t touch him, not a single hair on his head, but I haunted him. And when he ran out into the street to escape… I probably had time to warn him of the truck that was coming.”
Jay’s lips quirk up. It’s almost like my murderous ways impress him. “Savage. I don’t know if I’m scared or turned on right now. I think it’s a little bit of both.”
“You’re sick,” I laugh. “You should be freaking out. This isn’t a game, Jay. I’m as bad as them; I kill people, even if I never touch them. I forced him into that street, and I put you on that hilltop for the drop. I might not be the one who pulls the trigger, but I orchestrate it all.”
“They’re not innocents, babe. That’s why I pull the trigger. We’re not living a…” He considers his words. Frowns. Considers some more. “We’re not living a regular, suburban, mom and pop in the burbs life here, Soph. We don’t have the luxury of normalcy. But what we’re doing isn’t wrong either.”
“Well, technically, the law would disagree.”
“Yeah, but your sister was still hurt, and I was still killed. Kane is still a target. And those women were still in the valley. Sometimes the law can’t take care of the things we can. So we do it for them, and we rid the world of scum. I’m not sorry.”
Standing in front of me, he tugs his shirt off, then shucks his jeans down. It’s not a seduction, just the necessary actions before he tugs my blankets back and helps me in. “I’m sorry for scaring you when I snuck in and watched you dance.”
I lay my head on his chest and slide my finger over the scar on his stomach. “That was the first time I’ve danced in eight years,” I admit. “I just up and quit when Ellie was taken, then my new mission took over my world. Before I knew it, it had been a month of no dancing, then six months. I used to dance every single day, so hitting those monthly milestones were huge. A year passed, then two. My dancing career was over, but my mission to avenge Ellie was just beginning. Then… I dunno. You talked to me in the diner. You weren’t supposed to talk to me, Jay. You’re here for work, and you started talking to the pretty ballerina.”
Chuckling, he presses his lips to the top of my hair. “You have no clue how conflicted I felt. I figured Ace would kick my ass for going off script. More fool me, huh? You are Ace, and now I know why you took to calling me Jay so easily. It was so natural, Soph. Like you knew the real me.”
“I’ve been with you for two years. I knew the real you; I knew the Bishop brothers; I knew the cocaine-addicted you, then the healing you.”
“Sophia?”
“Mmm?”
“How do you make money?”
I snort. “I learned fast how to… Let’s say I play the stock market in my spare time.”
“Okay, you can say that. But what’s the truth?”
“Umm… I hack the accounts of people like Cole Fenney, Trenton Neal, Peter Aguilar, and the rest of those goonies, and I take whatever the hell I want. They don’t deserve their money, and they would be dying soon anyway. They had no use for it.”
“So fuckin’ savage.” He laughs and crushes me close to his side. “I’ve never been more attracted to you, Soph. My Tiny Dancer is a psycho, and she doesn’t cry when we she sees blood.”
“Shut up.”
“We’re gonna live a long, happy life together, babe. There’s no one else on this planet who could get on board with this crazy.”
“Shut up!” I try to turn away, only to come back with an oomph when he tugs me back again. “We’re not together, Jay. We’re just two people who are sexually attracted to each other. We have similar needs in bed, with the same libidos, and the same appetite outside of bed. It’s a relationship of convenience.”
“It’s a relationship that’ll go down in infamy. I’ve got you now, and I already asked you to marry me that one time.”
Instead of hitting him like I want to, I snuggle in and hide my laugh. “I’m not marrying you because of convenience. Or take-out. Or heat. You can go back to town and find your blonde for that.”
And that thought alone makes my chest ache.
Fuck him for making me want to keep him.
11
Plans
Jay
“Get up, Soph.” I smack her thigh the very moment the sun rises between the multistory buildings surrounding the Benson warehouse. I slept my two hours, ate seven protein bars, sat at her computer for hours trying all the T-I-T-I-E-S passwords,
and tried my best to hack the hacker’s computer.
All I got was her screensaver, which was actually security feed… of my apartment.
“Sophia! Wake up.” I tug the blankets away and reconsider my plans when her naked ass lay right there.
“Go away. Sleepy.”
“Not sleepy.” I kneel on the bed and run a hand along her leg. Inching her thighs apart, I grin when she fights me and squeezes them shut again. She’s playing. Kneeling on the bed between her legs, I yank them apart and press a kiss to her back when she giggles, then I slide my fingers into her wet heat and bite her shoulder when she groans.
“I’m starving, Soph. For food, for you.” I slide my fingers in, then out. Slowly, torturously, and grin when she lifts her ass higher to give me room to work. “I’m gonna eat you. I’m gonna make you come on my face, then again on my cock. After that, we’ll eat real food.”
“Okay.” Sighing, she gives up the pretense of sleep, lifts to her knees, and presents her ass. “Be quick.”
I’m wearing sweats, which makes it easier to slide them down and free my cock. Sliding my fingers inside her pussy, I fist my cock with my other hand and time each pull so they’re in tandem. I lean forward, so my tip touches her asshole and her moans turn to desperate whimpers. “Today’s the start of something special, Tiny Dancer. We gotta start it right.”
“Okay.” She lifts to her elbows and buries her face in her pillow. Nodding, she pushes back onto my hand as though to spear herself. “Okay. Hurry.”
“So impatient.” Chuckling, I pull my fingers from her pussy and thrill in the way she cries out at the loss. Before she can complain, I slam my cock deep inside and push her forward until her head slams against the wall. “You can take me rough, can’t you, Soph? You like it when I hurt you in bed.” I slam in hard and grin when she grips the end to brace against my attack. “You like it when I spank, and you love it when I make you scream.” I grip her hips and ride her like a mongrel dog.
