The building is an inferno.
Flames dance behind the shattered glass, orange and hungry. Figures appear in the windows, people thrashing, pounding,screaming for help that won’t come fast enough. The rain turns to steam as it hits the heat, rising in ghostly plumes.
My phone buzzes in my pocket.
The sound is absurdly small against the chaos, but I feel it anyway.
I pull it out and check the screen.
Lucian
Now we’re even.
My breath leaves me in a rough laugh that borders on a snarl. Around me, Santiago’s world is burning. Just like mine had that night.
Lucian gave me what I had wanted.
The sirens start in the distance, wailing closer by the second. Red and blue lights will be here soon. Fire trucks. Police. Questions. Blame.
A slow smile curves my mouth as I watch the flames for a moment longer, committing the sight to memory. This is what justice looks like in our world. Not courts or apologies or neat resolutions. Just death answering death.
Tucking my phone away, I turn from the burning building. The rain finally commits, pouring down hard enough to sting. Let Santiago’s men scramble. Let the authorities chase shadows. My only hope is that Santiago was inside to meet the same fate.
If not, I’m sure Lucian won’t let him get far.
I pull my hood back up and melt into the night, leaving the screams and smoke behind me.
Some debts are paid in blood.
Others burn.
Two Months Later
Vittoria
The city of Lyon sleeps like it’s pretending to be innocent. It stretches beneath me in muted golds and slate blues, roofs slick with recent rain, chimneys breathing smoke into the cold night air. Two rivers cut through it like old scars. It’s quiet now even though my skin prickles with awareness. Of so many slumbering human hearts beating in one central area.
I cling to the stone façade of a six-story flat in Croix-Rousse, fingers dug into mortar seams, heeled boots braced against narrow ledges. The building is old—eighteenth century, maybe earlier. Thick walls. High windows. The kind of place men like Santiago choose when they want to feel untouchable.
I smile to myself.
Untouchableis a lie men tell themselves right before they die.
It’s been two months since Sanguine’s Tenebris headquarters went up in flames and all of Santiago’s business holdings froze, international included, thanks to Elliot’s quick thinking.
For Lucian, that had been enough. He had called it finished.
“Santiago’s gone,” Lucian said, as though Santiago was an annoying mosquito rather than a centuries-old bastard who had been stealing our employees and secrets for years. “He wouldn’t be stupid enough to stay in this country, let alone Tenebris.”
Lucian had been right about that much.
Santiago fled like a coward, vanishing into Europe with whatever money and favors he could scrape together. Lucian hadn’t pursued him. He didn’t want to waste his time. He had VMR. He had Elliot. He had a shiny new eternity wrapped around domestic bliss and corporate dominance.
Disgusting.
Lucian might be content to let Santiago run, but I am not Lucian.
I don’t forgive, and I certainly don’t forget.
