Her body sways side to side slightly before she crawls up the wall like a spider monkey, boosts herself higher, using another ledge, and swings onto a high beam in some sort of acrobatic flip. She immediately flattens her body over the top of it and shimmies forward.
She’s going to give me a fucking heart attack.
I’m at a loss. Absolutely baffled as to how I should proceed. With her. And with the assholes who inspired her to escape up the side of a two-story wall.
But even those who harbor demons are met with heavenly gifts occasionally. This is one of those instances.
A group of about seven men brush by me, and I overhear an intriguing sentence.
“I swear to fuck she came in here.”
Since that alone isn’t proof enough to drag them out back and slaughter them, I shoulder past and swipe one of their wallets. I’ll retrieve Rena and worry about hunting the motherfuckers down later.
When I return my focus to the sexy cat burglar in question, our gazes crash. Her eyes aren’t exactly visible to me—only a glimmer from them—but I can feel them searing into mine. I don’t know what the hell that is, but she always seems to sense me. A warmth surges through my chest, siphoning the air from my lungs. Thethought of those eyes being anywhere else is suffocating. I hoped to save her from the fucked-up life she’d have with me, but that ship has sailed.
Rena Noire will never be free of me.
Mine.
She glances from me to an air duct on the outer wall and back with an exaggerated sweep of her head so that I register what she’s explaining. The sight makes me dizzy. As a sniper, I’m used to being perched high in the sky, but her up there is fucking reckless. I’m not thrilled with the idea of her climbing into duct work twenty-some feet off the ground, but there isn’t an abundance of options to get her down. Certainly not safe ones. At least it’s in the back corner of the room, so she’ll be primarily hidden from view when she reaches it. And clueing me in on her scheme means she’s grasped that running from me is unwise.
I’m not sure that’s accurate anymore with how enraged I feel at her antics, but I won’t be broadcasting that to her. She’ll figure that out for herself soon enough.
After I ensure that the cocksuckers looking for her are otherwise engaged, I motion toward the door so that she knows I’ll meet her outside. Which means I’m about to climb up the side of a nightclub to get my girl. Maybe I’m not the one who poses peril in this relationship.
When she begins to slither toward the outer wall, I know she comprehended my message.
On my way outside, I flip open the wallet I stole. The name on the ID has me seeing red. Maxim Sanford. No doubt a relation to Enzo and out for blood.
Well, I’m about to be Maxim’s fairy fucking godfather. If he wants to find Enzo, I know precisely where to send him.
TY
The sloped roof of Eternal Night vibrates beneath me. I’m perched here.
Seething. Distressed. Alarmed.
Exhausted after weeks of very little sleep.
My heart is thudding so vehemently to the cadence ofwhat if she fallsthat no other sound exists. Except perhaps the chorus ofthey’re all going to die. No breath remains in my lungs. No patience prevails in my bones.
My self-control and empathy feel like distant armor. Cracked and broken and left for some other misguided fool to don.
And every second beneath the post-midnight canopy of clouds intensifies those sentiments. Each taking root so deep inside my cells that I can’t see past them. I am them.
The embers of my fueled ire yearn to be stoked.
This is one of the more ridiculous predicaments I’ve found myself in. That’s unsurprising, considering the source who lured me here. I’m guessing mayhem is the shadow she can’t shake.
With the blade of my knife, I quickly remove the four screws from the outside vent and pry it off. Hopefully, Rena’s pops off easily, so she doesn’t need to maneuver much on the beam. Bile shoots up my esophagus with that imagery, but thirty seconds later, my Little Moon peeks her head out.
“Fancy meeting you here, sailor.”
“Don’t be fucking cute,” I hiss. “Get your ass out here.”
She giggles as though we’re out having a good time—gambling at a Vegas casino or taking in a show—not on the roof of a nightclub because she played me, fled the safe house, and is on the run from men who undoubtedly want to rape and kill her.
After tossing her backpack at my feet, she gracefully slithers out, dropping beside me and waggling her index finger in my face. “Don’t you glare at me with your irritated big-brother scowl.”
