Killian is unraveling fast, but he’s the kind of man who hides his pain behind destruction. In this chapter, we see how deeply Ivy has affected him, and how being without her is forcing him into darker places. He’s not just misbehaving, he’s grieving. And unlike Ivy, he doesn’t know how to sit still with it. He doesn’t know how to mourn quietly. Their paths are separate now, but their hearts are still tethered. What happens when heartbreak turns to recklessness, and the world is watching? Stay with me. Things are only getting more intense from here.
The rain had not stopped since dawn, a slow, deliberate drizzle that blurred the city skyline into gray smudges. Robert stood by his office window, one hand resting on the glass, the other cradling a tumbler of whiskey that he had not touched in over an hour. The fire in the hearth crackled behind him, but it did nothing to chase away the chill threading through his veins.The knock came softly,,too soft for anyone but Smoke.Robert turned his head slightly, his eyes catching the faint reflection of the man in the window. Smoke entered without waiting for permission, a shadow among shadows, his coat still damp from the rain. He shut the door behind him with a muted click.Robert studied him in the glass.“Your face tells me I’m not going to like what you’re about to say.”Smoke didn’t answer right away. He stepped further into the room, his boots soundless against the carpet, his hands buried in the pockets of his coat. The silence stretched, a careful thing, until Robert finally turn
I woke to the sound of my phone ringing. It took me a second to realize it wasn’t someone in the room, it was my phone, vibrating on the nightstand, Ezra’s name glowing in the dark. I groaned and dragged the phone toward me, the brightness stabbing at my eyes. My head still felt heavy from the kind of sleep you fall into when the night before had been all adrenaline and violence.I didn’t bother to clear my throat. “Yeah?”Ezra didn’t waste time.“Did you kill Silas?”No good morning. No warm up. Just that.I stared at the ceiling, the question sitting between us like a live wire. I could still picture Silas’s eyes when they lost focus. Still remember the sound of his body hitting the floor. And for a second, I thought about telling Ezra exactly how it happened, every detail, so it would stick in his head the way it stuck in mine.But that would be stupid.Instead, I let the silence drag just long enough for him to know I’d heard, but not long enough for him to think I was caught off
I drove home with the windows down, letting the night air cut through the stench of gunpowder and the faint copper of blood that still clung to me. My knuckles ached from the fight. My jaw was tight, teeth grinding with every mile. Silas’s voice still echoed in my head, the way he’d said Robert’s name, the way he’d talked about my father like he was nothing but dirt in the ground.I wanted to punch the steering wheel. I wanted to turn the car around and make him die all over again.By the time I reached my building, the world felt quieter. Not calm, never calm, but muted, like everything was underwater. I parked, took the service elevator straight up, and keyed in the security codes without thinking.Inside, I stripped down before the door had even shut behind me. My clothes went into a black trash bag. Not the laundry. Not ever again.The shower was hot enough to scald, but I needed it. Steam swallowed the bathroom, and I stood there with my head bowed, water pounding down over my s
His body was still warm when I stood over it.Silas Hayes lay sprawled on the floor, the pistol I’d ripped from him just minutes ago lying a few feet away. My own breathing was sharp and uneven, the air thick with the stench of gunpowder. My hands weren’t trembling, not exactly, they just hadn’t decided whether to stay clenched or open.I’d killed him.And now I had a problem.The clock had started the moment his eyes rolled back. Every second I stayed here, the odds got worse. But walking out now, leaving things as they were, would be suicide. I’d as good as written my name on the walls in my own blood.I forced my lungs to slow down. Focus.First rule: don’t think about the body. Not yet. Think about the room. Think about what they’ll see when they get here.I pulled a pair of thin leather gloves from my pocket, ones I’d kept in case the night turned dirty, and slipped them on. I crouched beside Silas. The smell of him was different now, sweat, gunpowder, that copper tang of blood
The neighborhood was quiet, the sun dipping low behind cracked rooftops and faded fences. The kind of place where hope came to die a slow, gray death. I parked the car a few blocks away and crept forward, eyes sharp, heart steady but burning with cold rage.Silas Hayes’ house sat at the end of a narrow street, a ramshackle relic squeezed between newer, better kept homes. The windows were dust covered and cracked. The paint peeled like dead skin. A rusted gate hung from one hinge. No flowers. No laughter. Just shadows.I studied it from the street. This was the kind of place where promises went to rot. Where secrets got buried under layers of neglect.I stepped closer, boots crunching on broken glass and dry leaves. The door was cracked, just a sliver open, like a wound waiting for me to enter.Inside, the air was thick with dust and stale smoke. The faintest scent of decay clung to the walls. I moved carefully, stepping over torn newspapers, broken chairs, and empty bottles. The silen
The car’s engine was a low hum beneath the quiet of the street, the soft dusk settling like a shroud over the neat houses lined with trimmed lawns and flowering shrubs. I sat behind the wheel, the leather cool under my fingers, eyes fixed on the modest house across the street, white picket fence, flower boxes under the windows, a small porch swing where a child’s jacket hung limp.Marisol Vega’s home.I had read everything I could find about her. The old files painted a stark, ruthless picture, a woman who once moved in the shadows of Robert’s empire, involved in whispers I couldn’t yet confirm, someone who might have played a part in the erasure of my father’s name. But here, under this softening light, the woman I saw was different.Through the large living room window, I watched her move with easy grace, carrying a toddler in one arm, laughing as she handed a plate of food to another child at the table. Her hair was pulled back in a loose bun, the wrinkles near her eyes softened b