“I know. I already dispatched a team.”
“I’ll head there after the port.”
“Good.”
Then Nik said softly, “You scare them, you know.”
I smirked. “They should be scared.”
He exhaled again, tired, older somehow. “Just, don’t let her see that version of you and think it’s all there is.”
That version. Like I could separate the parts of me anymore. I said nothing.
“Call me after Bastion. I need to hear your voice.” He added then ended the call.
I stood there for a moment, the phone still in my hand.
The noise of the world blurred around it — Luca’s low whistle. All I could think of was Madeline’s face. Her eyes fixed on a screen somewhere, seeing me the way everyone else did — a monster. That I wasn’t the kind of man you fell asleep next to. The thought was acid. It wouldn’t stop replaying in my fucking head.
That I was the kind of man the cityfeared.Maybe that was the cost of being what I was. But it didn’t feel like power right now.
It felt like loss.
“Nik good?”
I looked at Luca, repeating his question in my head again before I answered.
“He’s fine.”
“He’s worried about you.”
“He always is.”
Luca nodded once, glancing at closed bar behind us. “So, port first?”
“Yeah. Bastion’s waiting. And then Rome with the bricks that don’t look right.”
Luca smirked. “You think he’s finally seeing double?”
“Maybe.”
I moved toward the car. My hands were still sticky from the fight. “You hungry?”
He looked at me sideways. “You’re offering?”
“Yeah.”
“You never offer.”
“Fighting burns adrenaline.”
Luca’s grin flickered. “Then yeah. Let’s eat. We’ll need it for the port.”
12
Madeline
I was halfway through a glass of something sparkling and overpriced when Isla tilted her phone toward me.
