DANGEROUS LOVE
For a long moment there was only the snow, the dying wail of the sirens somewhere behind them, and the small orange ember of the cigarette burning down between Elison's fingers.
"I have nothing to say," Heinz said finally, sighing the words out like smoke of his own.
They stood there in the alley a while longer, two brothers who understood each other too well and said far too little, until footsteps broke the silence behind them.
"Need my help?" Mateo Stellar's voice drifted through the falling snow, unhurried, amused — the voice of someone who already suspected the answer before he'd finished asking the question.
Neither brother turned around right away. In this family, help always came wit