sound of shrieking metal and licking flames to fill the silence.
In the distance, I hear the sound of sirens. If I don’t leave now, the police will be here. They’ll ask questions. They’ll dig deeper than just Brianne’s kidnapping. With my background and reputation, I’m a mortal lock for suspect number one. Best not to give them the chance to lock me up.
I force myself over to my motorcycle and throw my injured leg over it, gritting my teeth and hissing. For a moment, I stare at the crackling flames. My baby brother is gone. Dmitry and his wife, two lives taken just like that. Their child left alone, orphaned by a monster.
This vigilante isn’t the fucking hero that the media wants him to be.
He’s a savage.
The problem for him is, so am I.
2
Victoria
I stick out like a sore thumb every time I come into this bar.
Saint Booze isn’t exactly my scene. If it weren’t for the fact that I’m meeting my dad here, I’d give this dive the absolute widest berth imaginable. It’s the kind of bar you go to only when you’re a desperate alcoholic with nothing to lose. Asbestos-ridden ceiling tiles falling in, grime on the stools that haven’t been cleaned since the Reagan administration, and gross old men leering like zombies at anyone with two X chromosomes. I feel like just looking at the place might give me hepatitis.
I brush a strand of hair behind my ear as I step into the building, immediately overwhelmed with the stench of cheap tobacco and stale beer. It’s low-key embarrassing how much that smell reminds me of my dad.
Just as I predicted—the second I enter, nine or ten pairs of drunken male eyes all latch onto me like they’ve never seen a woman before. I’m wearing a cami, a flowy blouse, and a purse slung across my chest, and yet they still stare directly at my tits as if there’s not a person attached to them.
Blech.
Swallowing down my discomfort, I cross the room and head as far away from the rest of the patrons as possible. The last thing I want is one of these creepazoids here thinking I’m trying to socialize.
I take a seat at the end of the bar and pull my bag around, unzipping the front and shuffling around for my things. I arrived at 1:15 P.M. on the dot, like Dad and I had agreed on when he called, but I don’t have the faintest idea of how long it’ll be until he gets here. Fine by me—if I can squeeze in some time to get my life in order while I wait, I’ll take it. I may be punctual, borderline OCD, but heavens know my dad sure is not.
When the bartender eventually meanders over to me, I order a Diet Coke. He looks me up and down with amusement, but mercifully, he doesn’t make a comment. He doesn’t have to say anything; I know I don’t belong. Everyone else here knows it, too. Nothing about my five-two stature, mousy bookworm features, and petite frame screams ‘daytime drinker.’
The bartender places the can of Diet Coke in front of me, along with a straw. Part of me wants to ignore it, insulted that he’d make the assumption I’d be prissy enough to use a straw for a can. But instead, I swallow my pride, grudgingly grab the straw from the counter, and slide it into my drink. I do actually prefer straws.
With the sound of some eighties rock band playing through the speakers overhead, I flip through my agenda and triple-check all of my plans.
I have a compulsive need to keep my life ridiculously organized. Luckily for me, this planner I found spaces things out in fifteen-minute increments. Nothing is so calming to my budding pseudo-OCD as neat little color-coded boxes. At the very least, when I look at my calendar, I can pretend everything in my life is going to plan.
Even when that’s wildly far from reality.
While I go over my schedule, I notice a man out of the corner of my eye. He stands up from his seat at a table on the opposite side of the room and heads right for me.
I pray silently to any gods who might be listening that I’m not his intended target. He staggers towards me and then away, closer and farther, with my hopes bouncing up and down wildly like a ECG chart.
Please not me. Please not me. Please not…
Oh, goddammit.
Rather than taking any of the other