Chapter Fifteen

The night sky swam with the incandescent lights of the city. The heat of the day remained trapped in the concrete and steel. Keres linked her arm through Abigail’s, laughing as they made their way home. Unaware of the snakes emerging from the shadows. They hadn’t been aware of the danger until they’d already walked into the trap.

Hands grabbed her, ripping her away from Abigail. Her screams were abruptly cut off when they threw her onto the ground. Terror filled her as her clothes were sliced off. She tried fighting, tried escaping, but there were three of them. All larger. Stronger.

She and Abigail never had a chance.

Keres couldn’t stop screaming. She fell out of bed, painfully landing on her front. Crawling away when the dream morphed into reality and hands reached for her. Not again. Dear God, not again! A door was thrown open and she saw men rush inside. Too many. She found a corner and curled into herself, throwing her arms over her head. Maybe if she couldn’t see them, they wouldn’t be able to see her.

“Keres,” a gentle voice said. +

She whimpered and tried to make herself even smaller. Someone touched her arm, and she screamed once more.

“Keres, it’s me,” the gentle voice continued. “It’s Ronin. And I can’t help you, baby, unless you talk to me.”

“No! No more! Please don’t hurt me.” The words became a mantra, repeated over and over. “Please don’t hurt me. Please don’t hurt me.”

“Ronin, why don’t you step out into the hallway. Maybe if we give her some space, she’ll snap out of it.”

She didn’t know who talked. It didn’t matter. It was male, and therefore a predator. The presence left her side, and she was alone. Unfolding from the corner, she looked around to find someplace to hide and spotted the closet. She scrambled for safety inside the darkness, pushing into the small space, and tried to wedge a shoe under the door. Sitting down, she rocked herself as tears streamed down her face.

No one could find her there. No one could hurt her.

“Montgomery. Juneau. Phoenix. Little Rock.”

Keres repeated the capitals over and over, all fifty of them. How long she stayed in the dark she didn’t know, but the horror in the dream began to fade. Sanity slowly returned, along with embarrassment and dread. There wasn’t any chance in hell Ronin would let this episode slide. Footsteps outside the closet door came and paused, and a light knock rapped on the wood.

“Keres?” Ronin asked. “I’m going to open the door. Okay? It’s just me and I promise I won’t hurt you.”

She didn’t bother responding. The handle turned, and the shoe she had shoved under it did absolutely nothing to prevent him from entering. Ronin looked at her, and he immediately crouched down. She watched him, wondering if he was going to tell her to get the fuck out. She wasn’t normal. She’d never be normal again.

“Oh, baby, I wish I could take away your pain,” he whispered. He held out his hand. “Can you please come out?”

She wanted to take his hand so badly, but fear had paralyzed her. He was male. If she’d learned anything, it was that men could inflict unimaginable pain. Their strength. Their size. One man had held her down while the other violated her body. She had been helpless. Hopeless.

Ronin sang a soft tune under his breath that settled her nerves like a balm. Tenderness softened his eyes. The warmth in that green gaze drew her in, folding her into their jade depths. The complete opposite from that night and those men.

“It’s okay,” he said, lowering his hand. He sat down and drew his knees up, wrapping his arms around them. They sat there for several minutes, and then he spoke. “My father taught me to kill.”

Keres blinked, not expecting to hear that statement.

“He was a hitman for the Reznikov Bratva,” he said. “He was white, my mother black. He hid his affair with her but when the Pakhan found out, he made my father choos e— her or m e— and obviously, he chose me. Then, to prove his regret and reaffirm his loyalty, he was ordered to kill her.”

Shock filled her. She couldn’t even imagine.

“Because I’m of mixed race,” he continued, “I wasn’t allowed to grow up in the Bratva, but that didn’t stop my father from training me. Had me take my first kill when I was sixteen. For my protection, he told me. Because my skin color wasn’t white, I needed to be smarter, better, fiercer than all the other assholes out there.”

Ronin’s story made her temporarily forget the demon resting on her shoulders.

“As I grew up, I made a name for myself in the underground. Became known as someone who got the job done. I didn’t give a shit about anyone or anything. Eventually, the Bratva didn’t like me taking business away from them and decided to eliminate the competition.”

“What happened?”

His gaze snapped to her and he smiled. “There you are.” He stared at her for a long minute, until she started to squirm under the scrutiny. Ronin cleared his throat. “Brimstone Jandreau happened. Saved my ass when I walked into an ambush. Risked his life for mine. When he offered a place in his club, The Death Riders, I accepted. I proposed to bring in revenue by putting my skills to use. A hired gun. Brim agreed, as long as nothing came back on the club. The loft downtown is where I go before and after a hit. I research my potential client and target to make sure it’s not a setup.”

She studied him. “Do you ever feel guilt or remorse?”

“I don’t allow myself to feel those emotions. Did you feel that when you killed those Deathmen?”

“No,” she replied without hesitation. “But I was their victim.”

“You? I thought you said your friend.”

Unable to meet his searching gaze, she shied away from his intense scrutiny. Should she tell him? It was probably too late to act like she hadn’t said that. Would it affect how he thought of her? Ronin said she was courageous, but she wasn’t. Not really.

“My friend, Abigail,” she started, her voice thick with unshed tears. The memories came at her hard and fast, forcing her to fall into that night. “We, uh, Abigail and myself, we were walking home from the movies, something we’d done dozens of times before. It was a brightly lit street, we’d passed a few people. We weren’t in a dangerous part of the city. At least, we didn’t think so.”

“What happened, Keres?”

This was it. The part that continued to give her nightmares.

“T-three men forced us into an alley,” she mumbled with a shudder. Her mind tried to shy away, but she forced away the retreat. “They were monsters. H-held us down. Stabbed us after they were done violating us. I don’t remember clearly after that. I dissociated from what was happening.”

Tears streamed down her face.

Why did she survive? Why couldn’t it be me that died?

“Keres, look at me. Please.” She blinked, turning her attention to him. Slowly, he reached out his hand to take hers, and that little bit of contact grounded her. “Do you know who hired me to kill those three particular Deathmen?”

She shook her head.

“Abigail’s father.” She gasped and he nodded. “I recognized the name you mentioned, so it wasn’t hard to figure out who had hired me. I returned the fee and showed him pictures of your aftermath. He was relieved those men couldn’t hurt anyone ever again. A good, upstanding, law-abiding person hired an assassin to get the job done that the law couldn’t touch. Those men were monsters, and you slayed them. Don’t let them take root in your thoughts anymore. Don’t give them any more of your power.”

“But why me?” The wobble in her voice broke under the strain of her anguish. “Why me, and not her?”

Slowly he scooted closer, exaggerating his movements. Giving her the choice to stay or retreat. Sympathy radiated from his eyes.

“Because you are fierce,” he said. “And you are strong. Far stronger than you realize.”

“I’m a killer,” she muttered.

“So am I. But we are also survivors. Life made us this way for a reason. There will always be that voice in your head that asks ‘why me,’ but you have to ask back, ‘why not me.’”

His words wrapped around her, bringing her back from the bleak depths of darkness. Memories of Abigail streamed through her head on autoplay. She had been caring, and kind, and good. And she wouldn’t want her to drown in guilt. Neither would have Darby. When Ronin held out his hand, she slid hers into it. Letting him pull her up from hell.