by Dee Garcia
With an infuriated growl, I kicked his door wide open and took in the sight of his obscure office. It smelled of him and that vexed me, too, because why the hell could I so vividly remember how he smelled? Then it was like his scent flooded me with those unwanted memories, the ones where at our most savage points I’d felt that hellfire rip through my being as those icy orbs possessed me from the inside out.
I laughed softly at my inner-thoughts, shaking my head in only slight amusement. Who the fuck was I kidding? It wasn’t just those eyes that possessed me. It was every-fucking-thing about him.
Those eyes.
That grim smirk.
His unfazed laugh.
His feral growl.
His ability to corner me faster than I could blink.
How from one moment to the next he could subdue me to his liking.
How his hands on my skin stung gloriously like a million taser probes.
The way my body sang the loudest of Hallelujah’s while he impaled me without mercy.
How he made me fucking fall in love with him…
“Ahhh!” I growled again, dropping the canister of gasoline to the ground.
Each tick on the list had fueled my rage to capacity.
I bound toward his desk and swiped everything off its surface in one big huff. Pens rolled on the floor. Papers flew in the air. His so-called antique lamp split in two while the bulb bursted like a bomb. It wasn’t enough to calm me and with my chest heaving, I ripped his keyboard from the monitor and flung it across the room right into a wall. The monitor was next, crashing to the floor with a monstrously loud bang. All his art work on the walls came down, too, the glass of each frame shattering into hundreds of tiny pieces. By the time I’d sent his chair flying through one of the windows, his office was a complete war zone.
And I was about to turn it into ground zero.
I doused everything in gasoline. Every last thing from the curtains to electrical to the contents of the mess I’d made. When the last drop hit the ground, I catalogued this gruesome image to memory and took off down the stairs like a bat out of hell, laughing almost manically. Clearly all the fumes were getting to me, that or the extent of my depravity far exceeded what I thought possible.
In any case, the container held captive in my hand met its pair in the middle of the factory, and without so much as a glance back, I followed the trail I’d spilled upon first walking in to the front doors. Then I pulled a matchbook from the back pocket of my jeans and tore one free from it’s family, meeting the match head to the striker. Seconds later, the smallest flame came life, hypnotizing me with all its layers; golds, reds, oranges, and a small sliver of a blue, each one melding together seamlessly to create a singular powerful source. I glanced down at my converse-clad feet, zeroing in on the shiny path I’d so kindly laid out before them.
Do it. Drop it, the antagonizing demon on my shoulder whispered, In three… Two… One…
So I did.
I took a simple step back, dropped the match, and walked away as that little flame ignited the track that would set Rome’s world ablaze.
What was dark just ten minutes ago was suddenly brighter than the sun, the entire first floor of the building engulfed in wicked flames and smoke as I made it back to the G Class, and threw myself into the drivers seat.
It’d only be a matter of time before the fire spread and fire department was dispatched, and by then I’d be gone, waiting for peace to take me over.
Peace that unfortunately wouldn’t come any time soon…
♫ Venom - Eminem ♫
A month.
An entire excruciating month without Lux had gone by, and I was feeling it now more than ever, especially after she left Noir Coast in flames.
I knew it was her.
The fire department and everyone else working the case may have been baffled, left scratching their heads from lack of evidence or a determinable cause, but I knew.
And it hurt worse than any hell.
The building and everything inside its confines meant shit to me. It’s what the act itself proved.
She was battered.
Raging inside.
Self-destructing.
And there wasn’t anything I could do to help her.
The last thirty-days proved she wouldn’t let me.
I spent the first two weeks after our break-up calling her relentlessly, texting her dozens of times throughout the day. I even went as far as reaching out to her friends, who I’m sure you can imagine, had zero inclination to help me.
But nothing.
Radio silence mocked me every single time, from any and every angle.
All I wanted was to explain myself, to have my day in court. I wasn’t expecting forgiveness or even to win her back. I just wanted her to know why I’d done what I’d done.
The more time passed without the opportunity to do so, though, the more it began grating on my psyche.
Deranged, convoluted ideas of how I could force Lux to hear me out plagued me on the daily—from stalking to breaking and entering, and possibly everything else in between. I was so deep in my desperate state, I actually began considering seeing one through.
But one day, it all just clicked into place for me.
I don’t know how or what triggered it, but I stopped calling her, stopped texting.
I gave up and let her be.
Lux had been forced into too much throughout her life for me to go and the same, for me to be another disgraceful bloke on that list.
The problem with letting her go was that desperation quickly mutated into an enraged insanity, and my demons were all too pleased.
Viciously elated.
They fed off my weaknesses and whispered nefarious solutions, ones to paint the town red.
Ones of bloodshed.
Of death.
They taunted me with Lux’s father, with Vic, producing image after damnable image of such violent delights.
I turned to the drink for help, stupidly hoping to numb myself in entirety, but it only made it worse.
So I started hitting the gym instead.
Worked my anger out in a positive outlet.
I went every single day, harder and longer still after the blaze at the factory.
The regimen seemed to be working, but I suspected that was only because I was exhausting myself to the point I’d go home, shower, refuel, and pass the hell out.
Today, though, I made the sudden decision to stop somewhere on the way home. I hadn’t been to the Panorama since the night Lux and I broke up, but something was calling to me, urging me to visit the roof top.
To deal with my strife head-on.
It was painful to say the least, leaving me no other choice but to relive what took place up here. I stood near the ledge for quite some time, time traveling through them all; the volatile ones while we were enemies, the tense ones during our transition phase, the tender ones after I claimed her as mine…
All of them.
When it was all said done, when there was nothing left to look back on, I felt more hollow than before, yet sobered from the fog I’d been living in for weeks.
Folding in on myself, I sunk to the ground in poignant distress, regretting every decision that had led me to this point in my life.
Except Lux.
I missed her—with every fiber of my goddamn being, and for the first time since she left me up here, I wondered if packing my bags would be the best solution for me.
If yet another move would be what helped me heal.
A fresh start—far away from the memories this city now held.
And that’s when my phone rang, a call that, unbeknownst to me, was fate catching up to me.
On autopilot, I fished it out of my pocket.
I didn’t recognize the number, and yet I answered it anyway. A small part of me—as stupid as it sounds—had me believing it could be Lux. “Hello?”
“Hey, stranger.”
I. Fucking. Froze.
We
nt more rigid than the concrete settled for years beneath me.
That voice.
“Liza…” I growled, balling my fists in my lap.
“Miss me, baby?” she asked, using her most sultry voice.
A voice I once loved.
Cringing, I shot onto my feet and surveyed everything around me. She could’ve been anywhere. “Quite the opposite, actually,” I snapped, repulsed.
“Ouch—such hostility. Why?”
“Ask yourself that question. You’re the reason why we’re here.”
“You led me here,” she countered viciously.
“And you led me on,” I tossed back. “Guess we’re even.”
“I don’t want to be even. I just want you.”
I cringed again. I’d rather be dead than give my ex another chance. “Might as well give it up, Liza, because I can assure you, that’s never going to happen.”
“Oh, but it is,” she stressed.
“It’s most definitely not. You wanna chase me down for the rest of our days because I killed your precious Leo, then go right ahead—be my fucking guest. You’ll never have me, though.”
“I don’t give a fuck about Leo!” She laughed cynically, manically almost. “I’ve been after you for you. Sure, it may have started out in Leo’s honor, but I had a change of heart recently.”
I rolled my eyes, continuing my sweep of the perimeter. “I’m sure you did.”
“It’s true. Seeing you with Lux made me realize how much I missed you. Seems like you subconsciously missed me, too.”
Disgust etched itself all over my face, my head rearing back. “What the hell are you talking about?”
“Lux, Roman. She looks an awful lot like me, don’t you think?”
The satisfaction coloring her stone knocked me stock-still a second time.
Knocked me sick.
“At first, yes, there was a resemblance—but it faded over time. She’s different, better than you,” I sneered with purpose, intending to wound her.
Not that it wasn’t true, though. Lux was better, and after the initial shock of their similarities, the more I got to know her, the more they became uniquely her own.
But Liza wasn’t fazed, a scoffed laughed bursting through the line. “Whatever helps you sleep at night, baby.”
I cringed a third time, the abhorrent feeling now settling deep within my gut, churning it in revolt. “Fucks sake, stop calling me that!” I barked.
“Get used it, baby. We’ll be together real soon. As a matter of fact, your bags are already packed and ready to go. You should probably run home and fetch them. Your flight leaves soon.”
I’d heard every bit of that.
Every single part.
But the severity of what it meant didn’t sink in for several moments.
“What?!” I snarled in disbelief. “You’re bloody-fucking-insane if you think I’m going anywhere with you, much less getting on flight to God knows where.”
Liza hummed in earnest. “I’m afraid you don’t really have a choice, Rome. You see, either you come willingly, or in about sixty seconds, an expert sniper has been instructed to pull the trigger.”
Eyes bulging, my heart-rate skyrocketed.
With my chest heaving, I pivoted around slowly, scanning every roof top at my level. I couldn’t see shit, or rather, anyone. Everything was clear, bathed by warm rays of the Miami sun.
“How do I know you’re not lying?” I questioned, spinning around faster and faster.
“You don’t, and you won’t either. Just get on the plane,” she ordered.
“Goddamit, Liza!” I roared, feeling a sense of hysteria consuming me.
How could I have been so fucking foolish?
She’d caught up to me. She’d made it clear as day.
And when nothing else happened, when all resumed to normalcy, I dismissed all thoughts of her to the recesses of my mind.
I lived my life without borders, like she hadn’t been chasing me for almost two years straight.
“Plane. 2 p.m. Will I be seeing you there?” she pressed, as everything around me spun out rapidly.
“I’m going to kill you!”
“Tick, tock, baby.” She chuckled. “Thirty seconds.”
“I’m going to make sure you—”
“Fifteen.”
She couldn’t be serious. There’s no way. “I regret every single moment we—”
“Five, four, three—”
“Yes, okay, yes!” I interjected, defeated, clamping my eyes shut. “You’ll fucking see me there!”
“Stand down,” she instructed, her voice further away from the phone.
The line scratched out for a split-second before a man’s voice, fuzzy and distant, sounded off.
“Secured?” he asked.
“He’ll be there,” Liza agreed.
Walkie talkies… She wasn’t lying.
Had I not agreed, I’d be…
“You made the right choice, Roman, but I think you already figured that out. Am I right?” Amused, satisfied, her voice was like that of a toxin.
Infecting me.
Debasing me with lunacy.
I loathed her all the more. “I’m done talking, Liza. Just tell me how to get to you.”
“Just get to the airport. I’m not having anyone personally escort you there because I trust you value your life. Don’t think I won’t have eyes on you, though,” she explained surely. “When you get to Miami International, you’ll find a man entrusted with a sign that says Ryzhkov. Go with him.”
That name.
I remembered it instantly from that night at the gala with Vic.
“How the hell do you know Ryzhkov?” I questioned.
Liza giggled wickedly. “I thought you were done talking?”
“Tell me how you know him!” I demanded furiously.
“Goodbye, Roman. I’ll see you soon, my love.”
Click.
♫ Sarcasm - Get Scared ♫
I could hardly wait to see Roman’s face when his appointed escort threw him in the backseat and he saw me behind the wheel.
We hadn’t seen or spoken to one another since the night he beat me to a pulp, and I was more than ready to seek my retribution. A little banged up still with healing bones, but ready as I’d ever been nonetheless.
Liza promised I could bring him an inch of life as long as she got to finish him off. So I agreed, had a plan all set in my head. Before a single drop of blood was shed, I’d wear down his psyche to the bone.
To nothing.
A shell of the man he once was, he’d be so numb and broken afterward, he’d beg for mercy.
Unfortunately for him, there’d be no mercy to come.
No absolution.
And the glistening cherry on top would be the sight of me toying with his precious Lux, as Liza ended him and sent him straight to the fiery depths of hell once and for all.
Speaking of Lux…
It was time to fill her in and hook her into the plan.
Minutes before Benji emerged from arrivals with Roman in tow, I scrolled through my contacts and selected the little bitch’s name. It rang several times, so many I was sure she’d let me ring through to voicemail, but then suddenly, her voice erupted through the speakers of my rental SUV.
“What the hell do you want now, Vic? Don’t you think you’ve caused enough—”
“If you have any hope of keeping your man alive, you’ll shut up and listen very carefully to the words that are about to come out of my mouth,” I said—calm, cool, collected.
“What do you mean keep my man alive?” Unmistakable panic rang out in her tone.
“I have him. Well, I will. His flight just landed.”
Lux gasped, the horrified sound filling the cabin of the SUV. “What have you done?”
“Everything Liza asked me to do,” I cooed, grinning, my eyes glued to the doors of the airport.
“You’re working with Liza?!” she squeaked.
“Correction—
I’ve been working with her for quite some time now.”
“You slimy ass backstabbing motherfucker! So help me God, when I get my hands on you, you’re going to regret every single choice you’ve made.” It was all an outraged growl, and while I knew what Lux was capable of, I wasn’t at all concerned.
In fact, I found her to be quite amusing.
Liza had a million times more crazy on her.
“Somehow, I doubt that. Unlike you, Liza and I are partners.”
“And somehow, I doubt that, and I don’t even know the chick. Where is Rome?” she questioned.
“About to get tossed in my rental.”
“Rental? Where are you?”
“Heathrow,” I explained, checking the time on the dash.
“You’re across the pond?! Are you bloody kidding me right now?!”
Regardless of the fact she couldn’t see me, I shook my head. “Cross my heart.”
“Let him go.” The softest snarl left her.
“Can’t do that, Lux.”
“Let. Him. Go, Vic,” she gritted out.
“I told you, I can’t do that. If you make it here in time, you may be able to save him, though.”
And there he was, only half-struggling, pushed along the way by Benji towards the SUV. We’d zip tie his wrists together once he was inside to avoid any sudden outbursts.
“’Cause you’re gonna tell me how to get to him, right? Do you think I’m—”
“It’s not a secret, sweetheart. Liza wants me to tell you.” It was the complete and honest truth. “Now, here’s the deal. Rome’s about to get in the car. Either you stay quiet or—”
The rear passenger door flew open.
“Get the fuck off me, mate!” Roman roared, resisting Benji’s attempts to toss him in the back. “I can get in the damned car myself!”
As he slid inside, I slung an arm over the passenger seat and waited for him to notice me. When our stares locked and his expression morphed into that of confusion, I flashed him a subtle grin.
“Top of the mornin’ to ya, ol’ chap.”
“Vic? What the actual fuck is going on?” he asked incredulously, completely oblivious of Benji securing his wrists behind his back until the door slammed shut.
