Beyond Ruin

by Kit Rocha

  Gideon stared at the ink forever before meeting Mad's gaze. "But that's not all you're living for now."

  He was living for the three exhausted people still tangled together in a giant bed, no doubt holding each other a little closer just in case. Just in case guilt or obligation overcame him, and he turned Dylan's terrified words into prophecy and chose to be a living martyr instead of a man in love.

  "No," he agreed quietly. "There are different sorts of marks we use for that, ink I hope they'll accept from me. Because they're mine, Gideon. My responsibility. I'll protect them from anything."

  Understanding stood in his cousin's eyes. "Even yourself."

  "Even myself. And there's only one way to do that."

  "I know." Gideon extended his hand and clasped Mad's in a surprisingly strong grip. "Then go do it."

  A handshake wasn't enough. Mad leaned in and hugged his cousin. Then he left, nodding to the Rider guarding the door and the second stationed at the foot of the stairs. No one was taking chances anymore, which only spurred Mad on as he took the steps two and then three at a time.

  Scarlet, Jade, and Dylan were where he'd left them, talking sleepily. Their voices faded into silence as he slipped through the door and walked to the end of the bed.

  His whole damn life he'd fought against letting people need and depend on him. Maybe it all went back to that cold, dark little basement and the choices he'd made—and the ones he hadn't made.

  How much guilt had he carried for living when his mother hadn't, for giving in to her pleas and hurting her to save himself? Reliving it over and over, the refrain always the same—I should have died to spare her that pain.

  But he wouldn't have been sparing her pain. He would have been deciding what sort of pain she had to live with, deciding for her that her life would go on just fine if he wasn't a part of it.

  His parents had died to give him the life he had now. He owed them too fucking much to throw it away recklessly. Especially with three shining reasons to embrace life staring at him.

  They were nervous. Jade and Scarlet only a little, but Dylan was still bruised, still raw from baring his heart. So he was the one Mad smiled at, the one whose hand he reached out to squeeze. "Get dressed. We're going home."

  Dallas

  Their revolution was looking ragged around the damn edges.

  As what remained of the sector leaders settled into seats around his conference table, Dallas took a mental tally of the devastation.

  Colby and Scott were gone, taken down in the wave of assassinations. Dallas hadn't had much use for the leaders of Six and Seven while they were alive, but they were somehow even more annoying dead. Better the incompetent devils they knew than whatever mess those leaderless sectors would face now.

  Gideon looked like shit three days warmed over, and Dallas almost felt guilty dragging the bastard out of his home. But no one wanted another meeting in One until they were sure Gideon had straightened out the loyalty problems with his staff—even Gideon.

  Jade had taken the seat next to him. No, not Jade. Jade was gone, burned up in whatever trial by fire had gone down in Sector Two over the last few weeks. Only Jyoti remained, a woman who sat with the casual confidence of a billionaire and the chilly ruthlessness of a person deeply in love and willing to do whatever the fuck it took to protect her people.

  The look was plenty familiar. Dallas saw it in his mirror every day.

  But the scariest eyes in the room belonged to Ryder. On a practical level, freaking the shit out over Jim's loss was hard to avoid. He'd been the backbone of this rebellion, the driving force, the man who'd plotted it for dozens of years. They were in deep shit without him, and they all knew it.

  That was practical. Personally, Dallas had spent years cordially loathing the bastard and years more circling him warily, unsure if he was looking at a potential friend or a crafty enemy. Ryder's pain was grief, pure and simple. And grief was dangerous, because people fought hard and smart to protect the living.

  People got themselves—and everyone around them—killed trying to avenge the dead.

  Six sat on Ryder's other side, damn near vibrating with nervous excitement. She knew she'd been tapped to speak for Sector Three today. She didn't know they'd be making it official soon—if they were still around in a week to make anything official.

  Which was the point of the damn meeting. He gathered everyone's attention by rapping his knuckles on the table. "So. Eden tried to take us out."

  "Motherfuckers," Ryder muttered.

  "We knew they'd make a move eventually," Lex said flatly.

  "It was well-coordinated," Jade—Jyoti—added, tapping one fingernail on the table. "And well-informed, too, to target me so soon after my...promotion."

  Gideon barely managed to hide his flinch. "I'd like to think the contents of our meetings were confidential, but obviously I had a spy who saw everyone who was coming and going."

  "Doesn't mean that's how they knew about Jyoti." Six shrugged. "Street kids know everything about twenty minutes after it happens, and there's always a few willing to get bought off by the MPs."

  "Security, then." Ryder scrubbed his hands over his face. "It's time for all of us to get serious about it."

  "Security doesn't answer the real question," Dallas drawled as he exchanged a look with Lex. "They came after us with guns instead of bombs. What do they know that we don't?"

  "Everything," said an unfamiliar voice from the door.

  Even knowing that Cruz and Bren were holding down the hallway, Dallas went for his gun, and he wasn't the only one. Six already had hers drawn, and Ryder even made it out of his chair, his pistol pointed at the newcomer's forehead.

  Dallas had never met him, but he'd seen pictures of Ashwin Malhotra. The pictures showed a stone-faced, frozen-eyed man with medium-brown skin, dark-brown eyes, and black hair, coldly handsome even when he looked likely to murder you.

  Compared to the reality, the pictures were warm and fuzzy.

  Cruz slipped in after him and nodded to Dallas, so Six relaxed back into her chair. But Ryder stayed where he was, his arm and his aim steady. "Who's this?" he asked.

  Ashwin studied Ryder for a moment and then dismissed him, turning back to Dallas as if having a gun pointed at his head was such a common damn occurrence that he didn't even give a shit. Considering how much Dallas's fingers still itched for his pistol, he'd wager having guns pointed at him was a normal day for Ashwin.

  "This is an informant," Dallas said carefully. "One with access to high-level information within Eden."

  "And outside of Eden," Ashwin corrected. "Which is the relevant detail in this case."

  Lex sighed. "What the fuck does that mean, Malhotra?"

  "It means Eden didn't bomb you because they can't." He said it casually, like he was issuing a weather report. "They've lost the support of the Base."

  The words might as well have been a bomb themselves. They crashed into the silence with an audible boom, and Dallas was so fucking stunned he didn't realize he was hearing a literal boom until the power flickered.

  And went out.

  That got people moving. Chairs squeaked and people cursed. Dallas reached instinctively for Lex and found her hand reaching for him. A heartbeat later, light flared as Cruz cut on the flashlight from his belt. "Blackout?"

  "No," Ashwin replied, and that one word kicked Dallas into action.

  Other people were heading for the roof, too—it was the best place to assess the extent of a power outage. But a hushed murmur of confusion greeted Dallas when he stepped out the access door, Lex's hand still gripped tightly in his.

  As far as the eye could see, the sectors were dark—even Five, which never lost power. Bits of light that looked like fires flared here and there, but a dark stillness had settled.

  Only the city still glowed.

  "What the fuck?" Jasper muttered beside him. "What the actual—?"

  A loud buzz that seemed to vibrate through Dallas's bones cut off the words, and h
e watched as the tall wall surrounding Eden came alive with hundreds of tiny lights.

  "Holy shit." Rachel shook free of Ace's restraining hand and stepped forward. "Is that—?"

  "They turned on the juice," Bren confirmed. "The wall's hot."

  "Lockdown," Dallas murmured. It was urban fucking legend to everyone but the old-timers. With the wall electrified, anyone who got too close to it would get slammed with enough voltage to fry their brains. Useful in sieges.

  Or when the sectors turned against you.

  Eden was going to war. Not from the sky with drones and bombs, but from behind their precious wall. A knock-down, drag-out war of attrition with their population growing more restless by the day and their every supply route leading straight through the sectors.

  Dallas would have laughed if it hadn't been for one tiny detail.

  With Jim dead, Eden was going to war with him.

  Before You Leave Sector Four

  If you'd like to receive notification of future Kit Rocha titles, you can subscribe to our announcement list.

  Interested in more books in the BEYOND series?

  The Beyond novels: #1: Beyond Shame, #2: Beyond Control, #3: Beyond Pain, , #4: Beyond Jealousy, #5: Beyond Addiction, #6: Beyond Innocence, #7: Beyond Ruin, #8: Beyond Ecstasy, #9: Beyond Surrender While each novel focuses on one relationship & happy ending, each book in the series builds on the previous one, making them best read in order.

  The Beyond Novellas: #3.5: Beyond Temptation, #4.5: Beyond Solitude, #5.5: Beyond Possession Each novella focuses more closely on a single couple, and is meant to be accessible to new readers. You can read a novella without knowing the series well.

  Learn more about the characters and the world by checking out the Beyond Series Guide.

  The Beyond series is available in several bundles:

  Volume One: Beyond Shame, Beyond Control, Beyond Pain

  Volume Two: Beyond Jealousy, Beyond Addiction, Beyond Innocence

  The Novellas: Beyond Temptation, Beyond Solitude, Beyond Possession

  Want more frequent updates? Keep up with news, contests & chatter on Facebook at The Broken Circle Page or in the The Broken Circle VIP Lounge Group by following the authors on twitter: @kitrocha, @mostlybree & @donnajherren. Or visit the author's website at kitrocha.com

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  About the Author

  Kit Rocha is the pseudonym for co-writing team Donna Herren and Bree Bridges. After penning dozens of paranormal novels, novellas and stories as Moira Rogers, they branched out into gritty, sexy dystopian romance. The Beyond series has appeared on the New York Times and USA Today bestseller lists, and was honored with a 2013 RT Reviewer's Choice award. Get updates about their new books by subscribing to their announcement list, or visit their website at kitrocha.com

  Acknowledgements

  Not a single word of this book could have been produced without the enthusiastic participation and support of an expansively large group of people: our editor, Sasha Knight; our proofreader, Sharon Muha; Lillie Applegarth, queen of timelines and bibles; our assistant, Angie Ramey; Jay and Tracy, the best mods in the entire world—no, make that the universe; and our friends and family, all the people who’ve been with us through the course of this crazy journey. Thank you all so much.

  Special thanks to Alisha Rai and Suleikha Snyder for the help with Jyoti’s name and Jeanne for the endless chats about the evolution of tattoos. Your patient answers to our questions shaped this book—and the future of the series—more than even we realized at the time. Because names, like tattoos, can mean everything.

  And, finally, we’d like to thank all the O’Kanes out there. We may not live in Sector Four, but our hearts are always there, and that’s what counts.

  O’Kane for life.

  Copyright Information

  Beyond Ruin

  Copyright © 2016 by Kit Rocha

  This novella is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer's imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the author except in the case of brief quotation embodied in critical articles and reviews.