Page 69 of Inked Athena

I’ve always preferred getting shitfaced on my own. There’s no need for anyone to see me miserable and self-destructive. No need for anyone to judge as I sit in the library and pour myself another glass of scotch, all alone in this empty, godforsaken castle.

Every time I blink, I see Myles’s face floating in front of me. Or Nova’s.

I can’t decide which one makes me feel worse.

Rather than blotting out the unwelcome thoughts, the first few drinks only made their faces clearer. It stabbed a hole in my cold façade and exposed the regret curdling just beneath the surface.

The next drink is supposed to drown it out altogether. My hands shake as I pour. Surely this’ll do it. This’ll be the one that fixes me.

But when I drain the last drops and still feel every bit as shitty as when I started, I abandon my glass and grip the crystal decanter by the throat.

If Leonid could see me now, he’d laugh in my face. He’d call me a sorry excuse for apakhan. A real leader doesn’t hesitate between duty and friendship. A real leader doesn’t lie awake wondering if protecting his empire is worth losing the only two people who’ve ever truly been loyal to him. How could I let something as insignificant as my conscience derail the justified sentence I passed down on Myles?

This is why you don’t make business personal,Leonid would say.This is why shit like “best friends” and “girlfriends” isn’t meant for men like us. They don’t fit.

“Fuck off,” I mutter back.

So much for being alone. Even my demons won’t allow me a moment of drunken peace.

But if I’m hearing voices, I might as well talk back.

The creak of the door has me gripping the crystal decanter a little tighter. I twist around in my seat as the silhouette approaching grows clearer.

“I thought I told you to leave,” I slur.

“Jesus, Sam.” Myles’s voice is pitched with concern. Ironic, considering it ought to be laced with anger. “How much have you had to drink?”

I take an extra-long chug. “S’not your fuckin’ business anymore.”

Myles steps into the dappled moonlight and all the phantoms haunting me race for cover. “We need to talk.”

I scoff and turn away. “You were supposed to say that before you went behind my back.” I attempt a careless laugh but, despite all that scotch I’ve downed, my throat is dry. It comes out like a hyena’s cough instead.

“You’re drunk.”

“And you’re a traitor,” I growl. “Since we’re stating the obvious, let’s start there.”

In his reflection in the dark window, Myles’s chin drops. “I know. I did betray you, and… Fuck, Sam, you have no idea how sorry I am.”

A crack of thunder peals across the sky beyond the window. The room is darker than it was a few minutes ago, the silver moonlight devoured by the clustering storm clouds. These damn things keep coming in, every evening without fail. Like nature intends to match my mood.

All this bullshit would be so much easier if Myles was defiant. His repentance makes everything more difficult.

I turn to face him. “It’s too late.”

Myles lifts his eyes to me. “It’s not. Not if you don’t want it to be. I’ve been with you from the very beginning, brother?—”

“Stop calling me that.” My grasp on the decanter tightens. I can practically sense the glass screaming beneath my fingertips.

“Iamyour brother, whether you like it or not,” he insists. “A truer brother than Ilya ever was—and you know what that means in our world. Blood might be blood, but loyalty…” He lets the words hang unfinished. “You know that as much as I do. I would take a bullet for you, Samuil.”

The scotch wants me to deny it. So do my demons. So does my father’s voice in my head—the same voice that taught me betrayal and family were synonymous. The same voice that showed me videos of my mother choosing drugs over her son.

But goddammit, Myles is right.

I give him the smallest of nods. “I know.”

“Then you know that I would do just as much for Nova and your baby. I would sacrifice myself for them in a heartbeat.”

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