Lamps are knocked over, sofa cushions are strewn about and torn-up clothes are scattered about like the debris left behind after a tornado. Silas steps in front of me, his expression now looking like an attack dog seeking a target. He places the groceries down, walks over and picks up a few tattered pieces of clothing to examine them. “These are all mine,” he remarks. I look at him in surprise. I begin to wander around, checking every place in my apartment where I keep a weapon stashed, to find them all untouched. Silas follows the trail of tattered clothes to his room while I make my way to mine, a sinking feeling settling in my stomach. As I walk to my bedroom, I notice the whiteboard where I had organised all our research on Sathariel, has been knocked over with the papers tossed around without a care. I enter my room and immediately feel bile travelling up my throat. My bedroom looks even worse than the rest of my apartment. My bedsheets have been torn to shreds, my clothes thro
“Hold your fire!” I order them, each one glancing between me and the fight behind me, confused as to how to proceed. My father rises to his feet, but I can’t bring myself to look at him. The shame I’m now feeling won’t allow me to. “ENOUGH!” my father bellows. “Tell them!” Silas snarls as I hear the sound of a fist meeting flesh. “Tell them what you did, you sick perverted fuck!” I glance up just as my father signals for his men to intervene. They put their guns away, pull Silas off Castor and help Castor to his feet, but he's quick to shake them off. He glares daggers at Silas, spitting a wad of blood at Silas’s feet. The amount of contempt and disgust in the action has me now wanting to go and throw in a few punches myself. “Someone better tell me what the fuck is going on right this minute,” my father orders, his posture tall and imposing, his voice full of authority and his eyes burning with anger and curiosity. “This is the son of a bitch who shot Dasha in Russia,” Castor sp
“How did this happen, Dasha? I’m not a fool to see you as some innocent angel who could do no wrong. You are mine and your mother’s daughter after all, but this, I can’t wrap my head around,” he says, sombrely shaking his head. I walk over and pull out the chair beside him, taking my seat as I take his hand in mine. “Father I’m so, so sorry to have disappointed you. It was wrong and I was selfish, I never should have pursued him. I wish to God I could take it back. I’ve caused such a mess and I have no one to blame but myself,” I say, looking down shamefully. Gently he squeezes my hand and reaches out to lift my chin, his eyes looking at me with calm fatherly warmth, offering me a safe harbour from the emotions causing turmoil inside me. “When did this start?” he asks. I take in a calm breath and centre myself. “Two years ago. It was after one of the big mafia gatherings. There was drinking and flirting, and…I made my move,” I admit with unease. “And there was never anything befor
A few days have passed since Castor’s excommunication. Silas continues to give me my space, which is for the best. The few times we have spoken, my responses have been curt and laced with hostility. I can’t help it. I’m not upset that Silas wanted to harm someone he viewed as a threat to me – even if I didn’t know it myself – it’s just the way he went about it that I can’t get over. Castor violated my trust and my home, but Silas violated my confidence and my privacy. He told my fucking father about a guy I’d been fucking for two years. How would he like it if I dropped by his parents house to talk about his sexual past? Based on what he’s told me about his mother, she sounds like a lovely woman, so I imagine it’s not something she’d enjoy hearing. Can’t be sure about his father. What really grinds my gears is that I’m left processing a lot of information, and if the circumstances were different, I’d want to turn to Silas. I don’t want to turn to my parents because I can’t handle th
The moment is interrupted when we both hear a firm knock at the door. Silas is on his feet in an instant, his body rigid and alert leading me to roll my eyes at his attack dog stance. “If someone came all this way to kill me or us, I doubt they’d bother knocking on the door.” I walk over, look through the peephole and sigh when I see the calm face of my mother waiting patiently on the other side. This is likely to go about as well as a seal sunbathing on a block of ice with a hungry orca approaching. I unlock the door, brace myself and open it, gracing my mother with a warm smile. “Ciao, Mamma,” I greet her. "Ciao, Stellina,” she replies, stepping into the apartment and kissing my cheek. I close the door behind her as I observe her assessing the state of my place, her brows furrowing in consternation. While it may be cleaned up, it still looks like the aftermath of a hurricane. As she scans the room, her eyes fall on Silas, creasing at the corners in that familiar way they do whe
“Sathariel? Are you sure?” “So, you have heard of him,” Silas says with interest as he comes to stand beside me. Oh, so now he’s Team Dasha. Kiss ass. “Of course, I have. We competed in The Tournament together a couple of times. He won each time. He was the one who set you two up?” Shock and confusion are clear in her voice. We nod in unison. “Set us and many others up as well. We are just fortunate to still be breathing. What can you tell us about him? Maybe you can help us build a composite sketch of him, so we know what he looks like,” I say hopefully, but my hopes are dashed when Mother shakes her head. “I wish I could. But I never saw his face,” she says regrettably. “How is that possible?” Silas says dubiously, folding his arms over his chest. “You can direct that tone elsewhere. Unlike the other competitors, Sathariel never showed his face. I know it’s customary during the meet and greet, and moments between rounds where all competitors are confined together, but he refus
My body slips into a state of pure bliss as Silas’ fingers lightly travel up and down my bare back, his heart still racing beneath my ear as I lay against his chest drawing senseless patterns on his pectorals, leaving little goosebumps in their wake. “I’ve never had sex in my bed,” I spontaneously blurt out. Silas shifts to get a better look at me, surprise filling his features. “Never?” “This just always felt like my private space away from everything. I never wanted to share it with anyone.” “No one at all?” he asks suggestively. I roll my eyes. “If that was your not-so-subtle way of asking if Castor has been in my bed, the answer is no.” “Does this mean you trust me again?” “That would imply I trusted you at all,” I say lazily. “I suppose that’s fair,” he concedes, surprisingly satisfied by my response. His fingers resume moving up and down my spine, his touch feeling no lighter than a feather. It still astounds me that such deadly hands can be so gentle. “Do you trust me
I lower the mask from my face, breathing in – somewhat – fresh air as I lift my goggles onto my head. Carefully I pick up one of the capsules from the tray in front of me, holding it up, admiring it with the pride and joy a mother would have for their child. Over a year of failure after failure has led to this moment, and I couldn’t be more thrilled. One of the things I love about chemistry is that it teaches you how much good can come from failure. Failure isn’t the absence of success, but merely a stepping stone on the path to it. Through my many failed experiments I discovered so many new ways to mix and bind proteins that have now become useful with many of my other poisons. I learned even more about the plants I was working with on a molecular level, and while week after week things may not have gone my way, I never gave up and I’m glad I didn’t because if I had I wouldn’t be holding the future of science between my fingers now. I place the capsule down, remove my gloves and th