Page 33 of Reaper & Ruin
“Okay,” I whispered.
The front doorknob rattled suddenly, and I froze, every muscle in my body locking up. It wasn’t the wind. No way. Someone was out there. Someone thoroughly dark and twisted and monstrous.
Gio’s hand was steady on the gun, his gaze never leaving the door. I swallowed hard, scanning the room for anything else we could use. The fireplace poker? A bigger knife from the kitchen? My mind scrambled, running through every possible option, but my body stayed rooted in place, heart pounding louder with each passing second.
The door rattled again, then stilled.
A sudden surge of light flickered across the room as the power briefly came back on. In that moment, I saw it—just for a split second—a shadowy figure standing outside the front window. My breath caught in my throat as the door creaked open wide, nothing but shadows waiting for us.
Then the lights cut out again. There was a sharp breeze on my back from the window behind me opening suddenly. Before I could so much as think of spinning around, the fire was doused, plunging us into complete darkness.
I opened my mouth to say something, maybe even to scream, but before I could, a hand wrapped around my throat from behind and a low, distorted voice crackled through the silence.
“Run.” The command was clear.
The fear bubbling up inside me twisted, morphing into something else entirely as realization dawned. A slow, wry smile crept across my lips, my pulse still racing but for an entirely different reason now.
“Atlas,” I whispered, shaking my head.
“I said run,malyshka. Before it’s too late and I devour you whole.” Atlas let go of my throat as Gio grabbed my hand, pulling me out of the door with a mild huff about idiot wraiths who could have got themselves shot by a jumpy gangster.
And me.
I would have shot him, too. Iwasa hitwoman now, after all.
Chapter Eleven, Chase
The woods wrapped around us as I gripped Heather’s hand tightly and we bolted through the undergrowth, the faint sound of Atlas’s pursuit the only noise aside from our panting.
If I hadn’t known him—his whims, wants, and his soul—I would have feared him. He had a way of making the night his mistress and ruling it with such ease. He didn’t trip in the dark. Didn’t stutter, or hit branches with his face, or crack twigs under his boots. He was the wraith that our girl called him, and he fit it so well. I was just lucky he was a friendly wraith to me.
Lucky that we’d spent the last few months dating and getting to know each other, and thatIwasn’t his victim.
He’d had plenty of victims in our mission to slowly crumble my father’s empire.
The scent of earth and crushed greenery filled my lungs with each ragged breath as I kept running. Early moonlightfiltered through the dense canopy above, creating patches of silver that danced on the forest floor. Honestly, for a tiny cabin in the middle of nowhere, it was almost pretty. The woods and quiet made it easy for me to forget who I was and where I came from.
Who myfatherwas.
I still felt like Giovanni out here. Not Reaper.NeverReaper.
Heather stumbled beside me, and I tightened my hold, keeping her upright. I was almost dragging her along, but it wasn’t my fault. She was clinging to me, and I was never going to let her go. It made it harder to run, but there were no complaints on my end.
“I swear, Gio,” she panted, her voice tinged with laughter despite her exertion, “if I trip and die, it’s on you.”
“You won’t die,amore mio,” I teased, though my chest burned from the effort of running for two. “Unless you keep flirting instead of focusing.” So far since leaving the cabin, and our pretty serial killer beau, she’d told me I had a nice ass twice. My dick looked good in my shorts at least four times. And that she would leave me to be murdered in a zombie apocalypse because she thought I would look hot cosplaying a dead guy. I wasn’t entirely sure how that made sense, and a tiny part of me was concerned she was into necrophilia, but still. She was a distraction, even if I loved her.
She shot me a wicked grin, her blue hair plastered to her forehead with sweat. “I can multitask. I’m not a man.” She laughed wickedly, and I knew she was about to be a menace even further.
Her foot hooked behind mine, and I barely caught myself before face-planting into the dirt. “Really?” I snorted.
Her laughter bubbled out, wild and unrestrained. “What? It’s not my fault you’re slow.” Her hair whipped around her face, the wind pulling it. “I had to sacrifice you to the trees so I couldsurvive. It’s every woman for themselves now, Reaper. I’m not dying for something as mediocre as a boy.”
I hurried back to my feet, grabbing her hand again when I easily caught up with her. “You’re going to regret that.” I breathed. “And it’sGio. Not Reaper. Stop being a brat.”
“I’ll stop being a brat when I’m dead.” She stuck her middle finger up at me as she tried to run faster and failed to get out of my grip.
I didn’t slow down or respond, but the smirk pulling at my lips promised retribution.
