Ava
The fluorescent lights of the diner buzz overhead like angry wasps as I wipe down the last table of my shift. My feet throb in my cheap sneakers, and there's ketchup dried on my forearm that I'm too tired to care about. Eleven PM on a Tuesday, and the place is finally empty except for Maurice counting the register and shooting me sympathetic looks.
"You good to walk home, Ava?" he calls out.
I force a smile. "Yeah, it's only six blocks."
Six blocks I'll spend looking over my shoulder. Six blocks of checking reflections in store windows and listening for footsteps behind me. Six blocks of wondering if tonight's the night they finally come.
"Be safe out there," Maurice says, like he knows. Like everyone in this city can smell the fear on me.
The Las Vegas heat hits me the moment I push through the door. Hot and dry, even at night. The Strip glows in the distance, all neon promises and broken dreams, but this neighborhood is just cracked concrete and flickering streetlights. I hitch my backpack higher on my shoulder, feeling the weight of my anatomy textbook inside.
Three more semesters. That's all I need. Three more semesters of night school and I can take the exam to become a dentalhygienist. A steady job. Benefits. A life that isn't this precarious tightrope I'm walking.
I hope.
I pull out my phone as I walk, checking for messages. Nothing from Mom. She's been calling less since I snapped at her last week, told her I couldn't keep pretending everything was fine. That Dad destroyed us all when he decided to sell out the Bratva for whatever blood money someone offered him. When he took it and ran. Leaving us behind to face consequences none of us could imagine.
My throat tightens. Four weeks. It's been four weeks since he disappeared, since men with guns showed up at Mom's house in Phoenix asking questions. Four weeks since I learned what he'd done; he’d sold the locations of safe houses, addresses where families were hiding.
People died because of him.
And now we're all just waiting for the reckoning.
I turn onto my street, and my heart rate kicks up like it does every single time. My apartment building is a squat, ugly thing with bars on the ground-floor windows and a broken security door that never latches. I scan the shadows near the entrance, looking for shapes that don't belong, cars that are too nice for this neighborhood.
Nothing.
But that doesn't mean anything. They could be watching from anywhere.
I fumble with my keys at the outer door, glancing back over my shoulder. A homeless man pushes a shopping cart down the sidewalk. A car alarm wails two blocks over. Normal Vegas night sounds, but my hands still shake as I finally get inside.
The stairwell smells like urine and cigarettes. I take the steps two at a time to the third floor, key already out, ready to get inside and lock every deadbolt I installed myself. My apartment is at the end of the hall, 3F, next to the fire escape I've practiced escaping through several times already, timing myself, just in case.
I'm three steps from my door when I see it.
It’s open. Just a crack, maybe an inch, but I know I locked it. I always lock it.
My blood turns to ice.
I want to run. Head straight for the fire door and bolt, but my feet are frozen to the stained carpet. Part of me, the part that's been wound so tight for four weeks that I can barely breathe, feels relief.
It's here. Whatever's been coming, it's finally here.
I don't run, because I want to face it. I want to claim my life back or die trying.
I’ve always been the one who copes. The one who fixes things. The one who keeps going even when I know nobody is coming to save me. But it’s time to accept I can’t fix this. The only way out, is through.
Dad taught me that without meaning to. He was always somewhere else, chasing schemes and shadows while Mom worked two jobs to keep the roof over our heads. I learned early that if I needed anything, I had to be the one to get it. Only dad has been slipping for a while. It was always going to catch up with him in the end.
I push the door open slowly, my heart hammering so hard I can feel it in my skull. The lights are off, but there's enough glow from the streetlight outside to see the silhouette sitting in my only chair.
A man. Tall even sitting down. Broad shoulders. Perfectly still, like he's been carved from stone.
"Hello, Ava." His voice is deep, with the barest hint of an accent that makes my stomach drop. Russian. Which makes sense, since the men my dad fucked over were Bratva.Obviously.
I reach for the light switch with a trembling hand. The overhead bulb flickers on, and I get my first real look at him.
