Page 53 of Boy of Ruin
I snatch the phone up from the receiver, lean back in my chair, my eyes on Nicolas as I hold the phone to my ear.
“Rain,” I answer with.
There’s a pause on the line, and I clench my jaw.
Finally, Elijah Van Damme speaks. “Did Nicolas get you up to speed?”
I ball my left hand into a fist on my thigh. “Tell me what the fuck you’re doing around my property before you start asking me questions, Elijah.” Fuck their titles. Fuck him. My pulse pounds in my head, knowing he’s on the other line. Knowing he knows something about me and her that I don’t know.
He laughs, a deep rumble, and I dig my nails into my palms as I stare past Nicolas, keeping those memories from the cage back. “My understanding is you are obsessed with Sid Malikov—”
“That’s not her name,” I warn him.
He laughs again. “Court records would prove otherwise.” I grit my teeth, but don’t say anything, think instead of all the ways I can mark my sister to prove to her—to me—that she’s mine. “Regardless, this isn’t a pissing match. I informed Nicolas someone has been on your property because whoever murdered my guard,” his voice takes on an edge of anger with those words, “left photos of Sid running in a forest?” That’s a question, but I know he knows about the forest surrounding this house. “Alone.” He flings that word out as an accusation. “Someone is watching her.”
My blood runs cold and I try to breathe normally. “Where?” I ask. “Where did your fucking guard die?”
“Behind the governor’s mansion,” Elijah answers evenly, but I hear that edge of anger in his words. “Now, you would be my prime suspect, save for the photos. But maybe you’re fucking with me.” He laughs, no humor in it. “Trust me, Rain, you don’t want to do that.”
The fucking governor’s mansion. Phil Cooper. I should’ve known. I know the 6 do a lot of business with the governor. I know how security works there. Heavy in the public eye, lax where it counts. No doubt the fucking guard was likely parked behind the mansion.
Dumb fucks.
I guess they’ve got to keep their own dirty deeds hidden from view somehow.
But pictures of my sister? No fucking way. I’ve watched her run. Nicolas has watched her. We’ve been there. I wouldn’t have let her otherwise.
I would’ve seen…not to mention the property is fenced in. Guarded.
“Whoever it is,” I force myself to say, “is sending a warning to you. Not to me.” I rap my knuckles on the table as I sit up straighter. I’m glad we’re leaving today. We’ll stay in the mountains longer than I intended to get away from here and I’ll bring in more guards to monitor my property. “Your dirty little secret might get out, Elijah.” My voice drops, barely more than a whisper as I think of the things that happened to us. The shit he allowed to happen. “But this sounds like a you problem. Not me.”
A pause, and I bite the inside of my cheek to keep from snapping. Finally, he speaks again. “I know you have many men crawling in this city, Rain.” His tone is deceptively soft. “But it only takes one of mine to kill her. Put you both down. It would make my life so much easier.”
My blood boils and I stand, the cord of the phone flexing as I do. “We both know I’m coming for you, Elijah.” My mouth feels dry, thinking of all the ways they fucked us, but I keep talking. “We both know I’m going to pay you back for everything you did to me.” I smile at the truth in those words. “To her. To everyone you thought was disposable, every child you thought you could break apart.” I laugh, biting my lip as I close my eyes, imagining their blood. “But children grow up, Elijah. And when they do, they don’t forget. And that poison you put in our veins? That rage you grew? You’re going to wish you didn’t forget that the child that survives always becomes the adult that will fucking rip you apart.”
I slam the phone against the cradle, cursing under my breath as I turn away from Nicolas, staring at the ceiling, trying to calm my pulse. My mind.
For a long moment, he doesn’t speak.
I reach into my pocket, finger the bobby pin in there, holding onto that.
Then Nicolas speaks, and I’m pissed all over again. “What do you want to do about Ria?”
I don’t have time for this shit. But I know why he’s asking. He’s thinking of her as a child, too. Or someone to protect.
He forgets I don’t have fucking morals. That pain to Elijah? That’s from me. From my sister. I’m not trying to save anyone else.
I’m trying to pay them back for what they took from me.
“What do you think I should do?” I counter as I turn to face him.
He’s in the red leather chair across from my desk, his elbows on his knees, hands dangling between his lap as he looks down at the polished hardwood. I glance at those cigarette burns.
I wonder what it would be like if that’s all we had to endure.
A momentary blip of pain, gone when he ran from his piece of shit mother.
Me and Sid didn’t even get to run. I was eight and she was five when they took us. When they took her from me.
