A vault door slams shut within me. “Abso-fucking-lutely not,” I protest. “You’re not coming on a mission with me. Forget about it.”
I stare at her when she releases a stunned giggle. “Wait, what?”
“I mean it. That’s never happening.”
Every time she rolls her eyes at me, I’m certain she’s been spending too much time with me. “I’m talking aboutmybigger, worst distractions. Not yours.”
It takes me a handful of reeling, roiling seconds to catch up. When the realization does dawn on me—connecting so seamlessly with the way she won’t look right at me, and all her squirming all night—I’m speechless.
“Abso-fucking-lutely not,” I repeat.
Janella frowns, those insane eyes of hers exuding unhappiness.
When did my every feeling begin to be controlled by the look on her face? The answer is obvious and right there. I don’t reach for it.
I sigh and twist open my water bottle. Glaring at the ceiling, I say nothing until I’ve chugged the entire contents down. It leaves my throat cool and soothed.
I calm down enough to ask, “Why?”
Janella doesn’t even hesitate before answering.
“I’m tired of wondering. I’m sick of the night terrors. I am tired of running and feeling haunted. I want to face my fears. I’d feel a lot better—safer, steadier—doing it with you by my side.”
“What if we run into your father?”
“We won’t, if we go tomorrow night. It’s a Wednesday night. That’s poker night, every week,” she replies confidently.
She’s been thinking about this for a while, I can tell. With that bruised, sad look on her face, I can’t keep myself from tucking a loose blonde curl behind her warm little ear. “You didn’t tell me about the night terrors,” I say gently.
Again, she shrugs. “The weaker I feel, the weaker I feel. I don’t want to be that anymore, Iosif. Will you help me?”
If I were a man prone to fear, the things I am willing to do for her might scare me. But I’m not. And so, I tug on a curl until her gaze fuses with mine and let my mouth curl into a smirk.
“Sure. Sounds like fun.”
Chapter 16 - Janella
“Are you sure about this?” Iosif asks me for the fifth time today.
No, I’m not. But that’s the point.
I’m not sure, and I am still here. My nerves are fried, my stomach is cramping with an onslaught of anxiety, and I am walking around with my broken heart in my throat. And I am still here.
The Pit looks exactly like it always does in my nightmares. What a sleight of hand, since it isn’t. The ever-changing location is part of the operation’s appeal. Even still, a warehouse is a warehouse. Within the concrete underground and beneath the neon lights, it’s comparable.
Tonight, I’m not being hauled through the premises like a prize hog. I am cutting through the crowd, my every step matching Iosif’s, and my arm through his. Clutching at the firm swell of his bicep feels a lot like holding a weapon. Though, just in case, he watched me strap a dagger into a holster at my thigh earlier, too.
“The only way out is through,” I tell him.
“Ugh.” He gags, reminding me laughably of Nadya in this moment. “I fucking hate fortune cookie wisdom.”
There’s no real bite to his words. It’s impossible to miss the concern swimming in his torrential gaze. That this concern for me exists isn’t insignificant. Neither is it how countless heads turn our way and watch us long after we’ve passed by.
“Careful not to step on any cracks. You know what they say,” I joke halfheartedly.
Me, I expected they’d leer at. I almost forgot how scared they are of him. Hadn’t I been, too, once? It seems longer ago than it has been. They are two separate entities in my mind now—monstrous, bloodthirsty Yuri who’d bought me impulsively, and protective, kind Iosif who has turned his life upside down to alter my fate.
I’ve never understood more why only the first of those entities may remain widely known. The second is a privilege to uncover.
