Shedidn’tknowhowto close the curtains all the way.
I sat on the rooftop across the street, one boot planted on the ledge, rifle untouched beside me. Tonight, I didn’t need it. The binoculars were enough, since I was just watching. I didn’t think Matteo’s men were bold enough – or stupid enough – to come to Eden’s apartment.
It had been twenty-seven minutes since she got home.
She moved through her apartment like it belonged to her again, barefoot and tired. She dropped her bag by the door, reheated food, opened a soda. I thought she acted like she felt safer tonight, and I took some satisfaction in telling myself it was because she knew I was watching.
And then she went to her bedroom, lights on, curtains still open.
I adjusted the focus.
She pulled off her shirt slowly, her back to me, the pale stretch of skin between her shoulder blades smooth and exposed. Jeans slid down next, and she stepped out of them casually, like she was alone. Like she didn’t know I was watching… but she did.
She turned, and I held my breath as she reached behind her back to unfasten her bra. I looked away. What the hell was she doing? I knew I shouldn’t look… but Iwantedto. Did she want me to? Why would she? Hesitantly I peered back into the binoculars just in time to see her drop the bra to the floor before she stopped and looked at herself in the mirror. She was looking at her wounds, the ones on her arms, her legs, her back. She had gotten away easily, considering she’d bounced across the pavement like a rubber ball.
Her fingers hooked the sides of her underwear, and I caught myself leaning forward. She paused, looked up at the window. She walked over, eyes scanning the rooftops until she saw me.
Fuck.
She smiled, used just her fingers to make the smallest wave, and then she pulled the curtains closed.
I finally exhaled, jaw clenched tight.
I hated how that made me feel: ashamed because I had watched her, restless because of the fucking tent in my pants, and conflicted about the fact that she had… let me. Maybe she wasn’t as good as I thought she was. I couldn’t stop my thoughts from wandering to the possibilities. What would she do if I went to her door right now?
I set the binoculars on the ledge and pressed my hands into my face. She was getting under my skin, and I had to stop it.
Headlights swept the street, and I looked down.
Black sedan, tinted windows, no plates. Matteo’s men, the same ones from outside her cafe. So theywerestupid. I watched as they put the car in park across from her apartment and sat there. If they’d arrived any earlier, they would have caught her little show, and I couldn’t stand the thought of it. Maybe theyhadseen.
The passenger window rolled down and the man inside aimed something at Eden’s window. A camera? A gun? A scope? I couldhave taken the time to look – pick up my binoculars and make a better assessment, but I needed to let off some steam, and although this wasn’t exactly the way my body wanted to do it, it would have to do.
I left the rifle and Glock on the roof and took my knife. I descended the fire escape slowly, careful to remain unseen and as quiet as possible. I didn’t expect these two idiots to require much finesse or precision.
I crossed behind their car, crouching as I came up with my plan of action. The passenger was on his phone, talking loudly. Judging by the sound of the driver’s voice when he interjected in conversation, he was eating something.
Just the knife would do. I gripped the handle tighter, and then I stood, walking to the passenger window like I was approaching a friend.
I punched the man on the phone, my fist clashing with his ear. The phone fell onto the floor, and I grabbed the back of his head and slammed it into the dash – once, twice, three times – as hard as I could. Blood and teeth splattered across the dash and windshield. He slumped forward but was likely just unconscious.
The driver was shouting, coughing as he fumbled for a weapon. I lunged through the window, over the back of the passenger, shoving the knife under his ribcage. It sliced through his belly easily, and I shoved upwards, twisting. I think the blade was just long enough to lacerate his liver. I hoped.
He choked and sputtered, trying to push me away. I pulled the knife out, blood gushing into the man’s lap. Then I stabbed him under his chin, up through his tongue and the roof of his mouth. His eyes were wide, jaw trying to work but sliding roughly up and down the blade.
I wrenched the blade, cranking it until it made a full circle, twisting his tongue free inside his mouth. Partially chewed foodand blood poured down the sides of his face and through the bottom of his jaw.
When I was satisfied that he was dead, I clambered back out the window and walked over to the driver’s side of the car. I popped the trunk and put both men inside, wadding them up in a mass of blood and limbs. The passenger’s face was fucked up beyond recognition, I had dented the dash with the force of his head smashing into it, and the front of his skull had collapsed. He was moaning, beyond recovery, but not dead. The noise was going to attract attention. I reached in to pull his head up by his detaching scalp and slit his throat. The sound of blood splattering across the carpet was satisfying, like rain on a tent.
I shut the trunk, looking up and down both ends of the road around me. Not a single person was on the street – not a car, not a pedestrian. It was dead. I wiped the blade of my knife off on the seat and smashed the phone that had fallen, depositing the remains on the floorboard.
As I climbed up the fire escape and resumed my position on the building, I accepted the fact that I had now crossed the line. There was no turning back. War had been declared. I pulled the burner out of my pocket and called the cleaner. Everyone in that line of business was weird, but Kade wasextraweird.
He answered with: “Yellow.”
I wasn’t even going to pretend I understood why that was the greeting he had chosen.
“Got a car and two passengers that need to go to the pier. You free?”
