by Flite, Nora
Marina.
She was dressed in a jacket and plain jeans, but somehow managing to look better than any other woman in the city. Her hands clutched her purse tight, eyes squinting. She was surprised to see me.
Straightening my shoulders, my grin spread. “What are you doing out here?”
Marina darted her gaze side to side, from my feet back to my face. She was nervous, but then, she often got fidgety when I was close to her. “Just getting some air. Are you... working right now?”
Half turning, I looked back where the bar was down the street. “Kind of. We don't open for another hour. Did you want to get a drink?”
“At two in the afternoon?” she asked. The curve of her lips was tempting me more and more, especially when she smiled in disbelief. “It's early for alcohol. Cocoa would be good. Want to go do that?”
“Marina Fidel,” I gasped, covering my mouth. “Are you asking me on a date?” The flush that hit her cheeks had my heart thumping. She made it such a treat to rile her up. Reaching out, I adjusted the front of her jacket. The zipper had slid low, and another man might have peeled it open, but I did the opposite. Surprising her was a real treat. “Yeah. Let's go get something hot.”
That line just made her pinker.
Together, we slipped into one of the thousands of cafes filling the city. It was that magical hour where no one was free, busy at their jobs or classes. We had the place to ourselves.
I bought our drinks, not needing to ask what she wanted. In a small table in the corner, a view of the street through a large window, we sat and sipped and smiled.
It was oddly normal. Special and private. Pretending we were not who we were—a hitman and a woman on a murder mission—wasn't easy. But with her smiling at me, eyes alight and lips cherry red... I tried my best.
She slid her jacket off, revealing the creamy white shirt beneath. It clung to her chest, extra bright against her toffee skin. “Hey.” Her fingers snapped, drawing my attention briskly. Her smile was coy. “Eyes up here, buddy. I didn't take my coat off to distract you.”
I folded my hands under my chin. “You don't need to strip to distract me. That's the problem.”
Pursing her lips, she watched the outside world and acted like her ears weren't going red because of my compliment. “Is this weird for you?” she asked, gesturing with her paper cup.
“What, having coffee? Relaxing?”
Her attention swung back to me. The unfiltered realness of her question balanced between us. “Yeah. All of that.”
Toying with the lid of my cup, I smiled thoughtfully. “Not at all. If anything is weird, it's how natural this is. Spending time with you feels right, no matter how we do it.”
“Hunting, stalking, and coffee. They all go so well together,” she said.
I laughed helplessly. “I guess we've been doing a lot of intense stuff.”
Inquiring eyes roamed my face. “Well, what do you do besides clean your gun and flirt with innocent girls?”
“Innocent? You?” I teased.
“Wait, are you saying you are flirting with me?”
Narrowing my eyes, I ran my toe along her ankle under the table. Her parted lips were intoxicating. “You want to know what else I do?” The more I chased an answer, the more my smile faded.
I'd been pondering this right before Marina had bumped into me. Nameless girls and forgotten hours, whiskey for breakfast, polishing my Ruger every chance I got. That had been my life.
The closer I got to her, the less I thought about my old addictions.
Who was I without them?
“You okay?” she asked. Marina was staring at me, genuine worry carved into her features.
Reaching out, I placed a hand on hers and felt her fingers spasm. She hadn't been ready for me to touch her. Definitely not ready for me to squeeze my hold. “Everything that I used to do for fun in the past is just that. The past. It doesn't matter now.”
Marina's mouth went slack. Every line vanished from her pretty face. When she spoke, it was a hush so quiet I had to read her lips. “Then what does matter?”
The simple word was so close to spilling down my tongue.
You.
What a word. I couldn't do it. Admitting my feelings was unfair for both of us. I couldn't torture her, or me, with something that might never happen. Until I was sure that Marina would live—that she'd pass Jacob's test—I just couldn't say it. Even so, I knew the fucking truth.
Marina was what mattered to me now.
She held my hand for a long while. Under the table, her boot rubbed my calf. It was forward and comforting all combined. I wanted more of this side of her, but she had other ideas.
“The past,” she whispered. “I want to know more about it. About you, where you come from and who you are.”
Pulling my hand away, I gripped my cup so tight the edges crinkled. “Sorry, but no. It's not a tale worth telling.” It's one I want to forget, and never can.
There was no hiding the anger that danced through her eyes. Amazingly, she took a slow breath and sighed. “I think that's unfair. You know mine. Tell me something, a tiny something. Your first contract, what about that?”
Tapping my foot, I turned my cup in a circle. It was hard to stop fidgeting. “You already know one of my kills—”
“Two,” she said, waggling her fingers. “Culver and Frank.”
“Right, sorry.” Damn, Marina did know a lot. This was what had Jacob so worried.
Was it worse to give her more information?
No, I told myself. She has enough info already to put me and Jacob behind bars. More won't hurt.
She's either alive at the end of this, or she takes our secrets to her grave.
Pushing the cup from one hand to the next, I studied her. When I'd told her about the contract that had gone wrong, it had been a cautionary tale. I'd wanted to scare her, for her to grasp how fucked up what we did was.
She had been acting like this was a game, or a movie. Marina didn't understand.
This girl had never killed anyone.
“Daisy,” I said, wincing at the name. “She was our first employer, a stripper at the club we bounced for. I mean, she was more hooker than dancer but—it doesn't matter.”
I got her killed.
The cold ache of guilt I felt was familiar. I often thought of myself as a monster, but thinking of the girl who had done nothing wrong—a girl no different than Marina—my heart still skipped.
Marina was exposing me to some deeply buried shame.
“Jacob was the one that started everything.” I said. Eyeing Marina, I tried to read her face. “He went to Daisy, told her he could have the pimp that was beating up her and the other girls killed. He played it off, pretended he knew a guy.”
“That guy was you,” she said confidently.
“Yeah. Me.” Chuckling cynically, I lifted my coffee. It was empty, so I just held it. My hands needed to do something. Anything. “Jacob followed the pimp to his home, and I made sure no one followed us.”
The face of that man entered my brain. His name had been Emilio; an ugly guy with uglier habits. He was a bastard, always busting up the girls who worked for him when they dared to disobey him.
I shook myself and said, “The shithead lived alone. Cornering him was a cinch.” There was a tsunami rising in me that I fought to bury. At the time, Emilio's death had felt satisfying, but I didn't want Marina to see me relishing the memory. “We stuck a plastic bag over his head, suffocated him. Jacob held him down and I squeezed his neck. It wasn't pretty.”
Her eyes were bulging. It was eerily similar to how Emilio's had looked.
“Sorry,” I mumbled. “That was too much detail. You didn't need to know the method.”
“Yes, I did.” That time, she took my hand. It was electric, I sat straighter. “Kite, you murdered the man who was hurting those girls. I had no idea that your first kill was so... heroic.”
If I'd still had coffee in my cup, I would have watched it spi
ll everywhere. It was a wonder I caught the container after it bounced off the tabletop. “Heroic?”
There were so many things wrong with what she'd said.
I wasn't a hero.
And Emilio hadn't been my first kill.
Shaking my head, I studied her, checking for pity. Nothing glowed in Marina's eyes but warmth and appreciation.
“You're wrong,” I sighed. “I did it because Jacob said we should do it. The money was too good, we needed to get out of the slums. Besides... it wasn't like I saved Daisy.”
“What do you mean?”
Pinching my nose, I filled my lungs. This memory always haunted me. “She'd told one of the other dancer's that she was going to teach Emilio a lesson. He found out what she said. Before we stepped in that night, he'd called her over.” My brained flashed with bloody images. “He beat her to death in his bathroom. We found her body after we killed him.”
Marina had gone very pale. “That's not your fault.”
To this day, I didn't agree. It was very much our fault.
She whispered, “His death is even more fitting, then. You saved the other girls. You are a hero, both of you are.”
Grimacing, I said, “That man was trash, but not everyone we killed was.”
Wrinkling her brows, she held my hand and didn't wrench away. I was thankful for that. “Unless you plan to list every contract for me right here, right now, so that I can judge, then all I can go by is what I know.” Turning my palm over, she traced the lines, tickled the invisible scar she couldn't see. “That man beat women, killed them, and Frank helped murder my family.”
I didn't know what to do. Was she really arguing that I was a good person?
“And Culver?” I asked. “You don't know what he did or didn't do.”
She held my gaze steadily. “You do, though. Was he a saint?”
My head moved, shaking side to side. I couldn't stop it. I wanted to deny everything she was reaching for, but it was impossible. “No, but that changes nothing.”
“For me, it changes a lot. Some people... they're better off dead.”
I swear, she was trying to pour her strength into me. She was as determined as Jacob to open my eyes. Marina believed what she was saying, just as Jacob had, so long ago.
I wanted to believed it, too.
Sliding my arm back, I tried to escape. Her other hand closed on my forearm, forcing me still. Confused, I let her lift my hand. Marina was peering at my knuckles. “Jacob wouldn't tell me what these tattoos meant. The whole 'swim' thing.”
“He's good at keeping secrets,” I said softly.
Her lashes were a fringe, but they didn't hide the determination in her black pupils. “The other day, I won the paintball contest. I'm supposed to get anything I ask for. Well, I want you to tell me what these mean.”
The edges of my frown couldn't have gone deeper. “That's what you want?” I'd expected her to ask for something... bigger. Bolder.
Something like her guaranteed survival.
My silence gave my thoughts away. Marina smiled, soft and tender. “You already told me, you can't promise what I want from you guys. Nothing has changed, asking for my life to be spared would be a waste.”
I was ready to grab her face and scream. I'd declare to Marina and the world that if we could only be certain she'd never be our downfall, then of course I'd promise her safety.
I was burning to promise her anything.
And I fucking couldn't.
“I'm right, aren't I?” she asked bluntly.
Looking to the side briefly, I nodded. My mouth was sour. “Yes.”
Until she proves herself... the answer is yes.
“Then tell me.” Holding my hand in hers, she curled my fingers into a fist. One by one, she gently tapped each of the letters on my knuckles. “What does this mean?”
I loathed thinking about this shit. Stick to the basics. “I got the tattoos when I was thirteen.”
“Thirteen?” she laughed, acting like she didn't believe me. I arched an eyebrow, watched her let my hand go. “Who would tattoo a thirteen-year old?”
“The wrong people will do anything for money. Anyway, you wanted to know what they meant, not how I got them.” Waiting for her to nod, I pressed on. “The phrase means... shit, how do I explain this?” So much of the meaning was tied to my history.
To what Jacob and I had done.
Shaking myself, I fought down the wave of sickness. My childhood memories could die in a sewer. I wished they would.
I said, “Think of life like—like land. Sturdy ground.” Marina titled her head, locks of hair tumbling down her shoulders. “Most people stand on this ground. Then there are... others. People who get pulled into the river.”
“The river?” Her doubt was strong. I didn't care. She wanted to understand but she could not understand. All Marina could do was listen, and my single option was to talk.
“This river is dark, and strong. It will drown you if you stay in it.” Breathing in sharply, I stared at my open palms. “It's a bad place for bad people. You're stuck in it, wondering if you'll make it to the other side or if you'll drop to the bottom and drown. And all you can do—the only option you'll ever have—is to swim.” In the pale light, my tattoos hurt my own eyes. “You swim, or you die. If you're lucky... you'll get to the other side.”
Freedom.
My eyes bounced up, finding her perplexed face.
Please don't let her be our anchor.
Marina leaned away, fiddling with the ends of her hair. “I don't understand. Why are you swimming? Why is that important to you?”
“Because it reminds me who I am, and what I am.” Those early days on the street were rough. Jacob and I did everything we could to stay alive. Stealing, fighting, struggling. Even then, that life had been better than what I'd abandoned.
I'd known the river way before we took our first contract.
The loud buzzing of my phone startled me. Marina flinched, too. Her eyes locked on my phone as I yanked it out. I saw Jacob's name a second before I heard him speak. “Hey,” he said, cheerful and smooth. “Where are you?”
Glancing at the girl across from me, I turned in my chair. “Just getting some coffee, what's up?”
“Is she with you?”
My heart stalled. “Yes.”
He breathed out, the sound crackling in my ear. “Kite, I need you to listen very carefully.”
Shutting my eyes, I showed my back to Marina and nodded to the air. Jacob was talking, a low rumble of a thundercloud. Tension built between my shoulder blades.
True to my word, I listened carefully to every word that slid into my skull. It was good that I was looking away from Marina. The last thing I wanted was for her to see my expression. She must have noticed the tightness in my body, though. I was imitating a cinder block.
Hidden from the world, my heart was a roiling sea.
- Chapter 33 -
Marina
Kite was hunched away from me, everything in his body language said this conversation was important.
Secret.
Lifting his head, he made a tiny sound of surprise. “The Calloway Club? Seriously?” Twisting, he stared at me from the corner of an eye. His lips moved, mouthing the words, 'I'll be right back.'
Not taking his coat, he slid out the front door with the bell jingling after him. The cafe window showed me what he was doing; pacing, talking intensely on his phone. I was positive it was Jacob who'd called.
My neck hairs were prickling already. What the hell was going on?
I'd wanted to ask more about his tattoos. His explanation had been too intricate, a little poetic, if you asked me. Poetic and Kite didn't go together in my brain. One of these things is not like the other...
The door swung open. Kite power-walked back to me, shoving his phone into his jeans. He was positively sexy in his haphazard outfit, the guy could have worn a garbage bag and looked amazing, somehow.
Currently, the tight line of his mout
h and frantic movements of his eyes wasn't super appealing. “What happened?” I asked, the instant he was within reach.
“I need you to stay here.” Grabbing his coat, he slid it on quickly. “Actually, go back home. Just stay there, okay?”
He towered over me, doing that thing where he tried to will me with his stare. Pushing my chair back so violently it screeched, I faced him down. “I'm not going anywhere. Tell me what that was all about. It was Jacob, wasn't it?”
Kite took a tiny inhale. I saw his brain working. “Marina, please. I'll tell you what's going on, but only if you promise me you will just go home.”
Home. I loved that he called it that.
It hurt, too, a needle in my gut.
“But if I can help—”
“No, Marina.” Kite was quicksilver, gripping my shoulders and bending so we were eye to eye. Nothing but severe darkness coiled in his stare. “I'm not joking. I will tell you, but you have to promise me you'll leave. Okay? Is that clear?”
Holy shit, he wasn't playing. I thought of Kite as lighthearted, but right then, he was as frightening and unmoving as Jacob had ever been.
The gravity of the situation made me lower my voice. Nerves forced my eyes to resist blinking. “Okay. Yeah, I promise I'll go back to the apartment. Tell me what's happening.”
He didn't let go of me. It was like he thought I'd just dissipate into the sweet-smelling air. “We found him.”
My knees buckled.
Kite scooped under my arms to keep me on my feet. My head was too light, a crunching, crumpling whine growing in my ears. Was my brain collapsing?
“Shit, you need to sit down,” he said.
“No. I'm alright.” Commanding my spine to stop buckling, I rolled my shoulders back and impersonated all the powerful people I knew of. I had to be strong. This was it. “You guys really found him?” I asked.
His head jostled, brief and brisk. “It's real. Jacob is there, and I need to go meet him. Go back home, Marina.”
All of my skin had turned clammy. “I have to come.”
“You promised,” he growled. The severity of his reaction startled me. But didn't he understand? How could I just turn and walk away? “Marina. You. Can. Not. Come. I need to leave, now, before Jacob gets in any danger. You have to listen to me. This is for your benefit.” Tipping my chin up, the fire became feathers and his tone was almost... sad. “Please, go home. I need you to do this for me. For us.”
