Page 137 of 10 Days to Ruin

Kosti stares at me in disbelief. “Christ, Ariel.You’re in love with him.”

It’s not a question. I open my mouth to deny it—default to sarcasm, deflection,anything—but the lie curdles on my tongue. Instead, I think of Lamaze class giggles smothered against his shoulder. Of him fixing Mom’s broken clock and showing a little girl how to draw swing sets just so.

“Yes,” I say proudly. “I am.”

Kosti mutters something in Greek I haven’t heard since Jasmine’s empty casket funeral. Then he adds, “Love makes you stupid, Ariel.Stupid gets you dead.”

“So does fear.” My thumb finds the scar on my palm from the Met gala bathroom. “I spent fifteen years hiding. Look where that got me.”

My uncle turns to light a cigarillo. The flame trembles in his cupped hands. When he faces me again, the lit tip makes the bags under his eyes look stark and purple.

“Things that once seemed solid are breaking. If your father’s alliance with Sasha wobbles… “ He exhales smoke like a dragon. “Sasha will choose his men. His power.Not you.”

I grip the icy railing. Below us, taxis swarm like angry beetles. “You don’t know him.”

“Don’t I?” His laugh rasps. “I was there when Leander made the deal. Your man didn’t ask about your favorite color or whether you wanted kids. His first question was about shipping lanes.”

I clench my teeth to ward off that old, familiar siren song in my head. The paranoia that my father cursed me with. “Things have changed.”

“Nothing ever changes. Don’t you know that? Wake up! Before you get hurt! This can end only one of two ways, Ariel: You lose your life, or you lose your soul.”

Wind whips hair into my mouth. “Things change,” I say again. “He’s changed me. Let me change him, too.”

Kosti’s eyes glisten. He pulls me into a hug that feels, for the briefest moment, like old times. “Stubborn as your mother,” he mutters into my hair. “But so it goes. When it all goes to hell, though… call me. The tickets will be ready for you.”

45

ARIEL

I’m getting really sick of the on-the-nose metaphors.

As the stairwell door clicks shut behind me, I feel good about what I told Kosti.You’re wrong about him. He’s not a monster.But the first step down the stairs brings with it the first inkling of doubt.

Kosti’s voice echoes between my ears:You lose your life, or you lose your soul.

I squeeze my eyes shut and clutch the railing for balance. No. Sasha is a good man. For fuck’s sake, I’ve seen it! Bad men can’t kiss you like that. Bad man can’t cuddle you like that.

The next step down, though, comes with a question.

Why can’t they?

After all, Sasha started this ten-day trial run with very clear goals: Do what he needed to do to break me. Sure enough, he’s gotten what he wanted, didn’t he? I’m putty in his hands now. I’m choosing him over my own uncle, for crying out loud. A man who held me the day I was born! I’m spitting in the face of that relationship for someone I’ve known for ten days because—checks notes—he’s good in bed?!

Another step down. Another doubt. Another crumbling insistence that I chose the right path. By the time I hit the floor, I’m like what’s left of a flower after too many rounds ofhe loves me, he loves me not.I feel frayed at the root.

With all the negative thoughts occupying my head, it takes me a second to realize what’s strange down here. Then it clicks.

It’s quiet.

The printers are still, the bullpen empty. I don’t even hear the gurgle of the heaters pumping. Then someone clears their throat.

I turn to see John leaning against the hallway wall, arms folded over his chest. His tie is loose and his hair mussed, like he’s been running his hands through it again and again in the throes of stress. The mustard stain on his cuffed sleeve makes me want to laugh and cry at the same time. It’s the kind of thing you’d see on a sloppy child—but the expression on his face belongs to an executioner.

“My office, Ward. Now.”

I gulp and follow.

The door hisses shut. John rounds his desk, then slaps something down on its surface.The Patriot Pressmasthead stares up at me in garish bold font. Beneath it, words and pictures I’ve already memorized.

---