“You stabbed Ava!” Oliver’s face goes pale.
I was expecting him to deny it, derive some ridiculous excuses, or brush it off, but instead, he looks deeply into my eyes, scoffing with the most cynical grin curling up his lips. “I stabbed her. Too bad it didn’t kill her.”
“What?” My eyes widen as I stare at him incredulously.
Oliver grits his teeth, his facial expression suddenly changes, and inhuman darkness emanates from him as he approaches me. “You see,brother,” he rasps, sending chills down my body, not because of his omniscient tone but because he knows the truth. He knows we’re brothers. “I’m going to take everything from you, and you know why?”
I clench my fists, barely combating my increasing rage, my desire to kill him with my bare hands right here and now for what he did to Ava. Instead, I tilt my head to the side, watching him with a straight poker face. I need to hear what he has to say. I need to know what’s hidden behind the mask of the good boy he’s been playing this whole time. I need this so I can protect my woman.
Oliver continues the speech that he thinks is a threat to me as he revels in his own words. “Because I’m the rightful heir to Black Venom and I’ll claim what’s mine.”
My blood runs cold. How come he knows? How long has he known? I learned this just a couple of hours ago. Despite a hundred different questions running through my mind, the only thing I manage to think of is Firefly. “What does Avalyne have to do with this?”
“She wouldn't have anything to do with this.” Oliver takes a step closer to me and spits, looming over me like a dark cloud about to bring the most calamitous storm of my life. “But now that you’ve fallen for her, she’s the key to your destruction.”
I can’t take his shit any longer. He can do whatever he wants to me, threaten me or even kill me if he manages to, but I won’t let him involve Ava in any of this. “This is between you and me, Oliver.”
“Yes, indeed,” he sneers. “I can’t help that you dragged her into all of this, bro. She was only supposed to be a bet, but I know you love her—and that, Damien, changes everything.”
I could just kill him now. I know I’m a lot faster than him and I would manage to shoot before he reaches for his gun. His reflex has never been good. All I’d have to do is just pull the trigger. My hand is already on my gun. Then why don’t I do it? He’s my fucking brother, I can’t kill him. He’s my blood. My father’s blood. Something fucked up in me tells me to give him a chance. But then he says something that shatters all the humanity left in me and I no longer care about the bond we have. Or the bond we are supposed to share as brothers.
“I will ruin you, Damien. I will deprive you of everything you have: Black Venom, your life,your love. Like I’ve been deprived of my father my whole life. His surname and the right to be an heir tomyfather’s mafia.”
Keeping my composure, I silently nod, staring at Oliver with pestilent hatred, and I walk away.
DAMIEN
“I
t’s so good to be home.” I watch Ava look around and recognize I’ve swapped out the carpet that was covered in her blood.
I check my phone and of course there is a text from Oliver that rubs me the wrong way. Since he confessed to me the truth that he was the one responsible for stabbing Ava, Oliver has disappeared into thin air. I have my men looking for him 24/7, but he’s nowhere to be found. Neither is his mother. Ever since that day, he’s kept blackmailing me. I was hoping to find him and kill him. I should’ve done that when I had the chance, but the humanity in me that was awoken by Ava kicked in and I wanted to respect our blood bond. The truth is there’s no bond between us. No brotherhood. Not after he stabbed the love of my life. Not after he keeps threatening me.
There is nothing more precious in this world to me than Ava. Her life. Her safety. That is why I’m going to break her heart now. Fuck, break my own heart. Nonetheless, I know this is the only way to push her away and I have to do this to keep her safe until I find this fucking bastard, aka my brother, and kill him. Until then I have to live without Avalyne DeLuca. “Doll, we need to talk,” I say dryly, trying to keep a poker face. I know Ava can read right through me, so I have to make sure to be as ruthless as it gets to convince her that she and I … never meant anything.
Ava gives me a confused look and I find uncertainty in her eyes. “Tell me what’s going on, Damien.” I take a few deep breaths and my demeanor turns cold. I’m Scorpion now. A cold-hearted and ruthless bastard. “What the hell? Just out with it already,” she bites.
I’m sorry, Firefly. “I need you to know that the only reason I ever came up to you at the club that night…” Breathe, asshole. Break this girl's heart. It was your plan all along. “Oliver bet me that I couldn’t get you to fall for me.”
She starts laughing and I think I’m scared. Scared of a small blonde woman who is maniacally giggling. “Oh, Damien. I knew it had to be something like that that brought you to me. But then you allowed yourself to be vulnerable and open up to me.” She grabs my hands and brings them to her chest. “I’m just happy we didn’t let your stupid bet get in the way of us falling for each other. I mean I got stabbed, for fuck’s sake. I’m not letting this get in the way of what we can be. It doesn’t change the way I feel for you, my love.”
Has she lost her mind? Maybe she is high on painkillers. That has to be it. But I was in the hospital room when she denied them. She rolled her head towards the nurse and said, “Advil is enough for me.” This isn’t a doped-up version of my woman. She is being serious.
“Does that change the way you feel for me, Damien?” Her eyes darken as they penetrate what’s left of my soul.
“In fact, it does.” She is eerily still, watching my every facial expression. Seeing if I’m going to show her my hand.Here it goes.“I just didn’t want to lose my Ducati,” I continue as she still hasn’t moved a muscle. “And, to be honest, I just wanted to see if you were a good lay.” I feel a tightness in my throat and I’m finding it hard to breathe. I’ve killed many men and kept it together. But this woman has unraveled the devil I once was.My angel.
Her eyes widen without blinking. “What are you saying, Damien? Are you telling me that this is it?Thisis the story you want to stick with?” She rolls her sweater sleeves up to her elbows, rocking back and forth from heel to heel like my face is about to meet her fist.
“Yes, Avalyne. So, why don’t you go pack your bags so I can take you back to your dad?”I’m sorry.My poker face must be impeccable because inside my soul is shattering. I watch as one single tear rolls down her cheek. Mistake number one, never take your eyes off your enemy, even to watch a tear. Her clenched fist forcefully lands directly on my cheekbone. And man can my baby pack a punch. “Feel better?”
“No.” She winds up her arm, and when I go to stop a second punch from her by grabbing her small but lethal fist, she knees me in my balls. “Now I feel better.”Shit, this hurts.
“So much for helpingburn down the world,” she says, mocking our words. “Asshole.” Her bottom lip trembles as she speaks and her eyes well up with tears she desperately tries to hold back. She succeeds. She shakes her head before taking a deep breath. “I have nothing here I need. I’ll call an Uber.” Ava makes her way to the front porch and my heart breaks. This is 100 times worse than the heartbreak I felt with Mallory. Hell, this is incomparable. Before she closes the door, she looks over her shoulder. Not to me but to the floor. “Don’t call me. Don’t text me. Don’t eventhinkabout me. Just stay the fuck out of my life, Damien.”
And just like that, she is gone.
AVALYNE
