Crowed (Team Zero #2) - Rina Kent Page 0,35

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“Pack. One bag. Nothing more.” He places the rifle on the table and moves to a gun – still not looking at me.

I lean against the table to get a better view of his face. “Why?”

“We’re leaving,” he says casually while filling the magazine of his gun.

“This is my house, I’m not going anywhere.” I fold my arms and tap my foot. He’s delusional if he thinks I’d ever leave my family’s home. Especially now that I decided to renovate it.

Crow releases a frustrated breath through his mouth and meets my glare. A deep frown settles between his brows. “This isn’t the time for your stubbornness, Nurse Betty. We need to go.”

“Why?”

“Because you’re a fucking target!” He points a finger at the joker card he plucked from my pocket this morning, now lying beside the knives. “That’s a target card. For Team Zero, that’s an invitation to come out and play with your fucking life.”

The information pours over me like freezing water. My entire body stiffens, and I gulp. “But... but I haven’t done anything, why would I become a target?”

“Your father did. You’re paying for his sins.”

“W-what?” What does he know about my father? How does he even know my father?

Crow abandons the gun on the table and runs a hand over his face, before staring into my eyes. The harshness in his causes my skin to crawl. “The Pit had an experiment to form as many loyal assassins as possible. That’s why they came out with Omega. A drug which injects bloodlust into our veins. It made us hyper-focused to the point that killing becomes robotic. Fifty of us started Team Zero.

“We were in our early teens when they began injecting us with that poison. Countless side effects arose like vomiting uncontrollably, suffering from retrograde amnesia, or going rampant like crazed animals. Until eventual death. From fifty subjects, only eleven have made it to adulthood. But even those of us who survived could face an early death because the fucking drug destroys us from within.”

My heart breaks, and I find myself instinctively going to his side, wanting to console him. “Is the drug the reason why you have seizures?”

He nods. “Withdrawal.”

“And...” I trail off, not wanting to ask the question, but needing the answer like I have never needed anything. “What does my father have to do with this?”

His lips twitch in pure disgust. “Dr fucking Johnson is the godfather of Omega. We were his lab rats.”

I gasp, staggering backwards as if someone punched me in the gut. My hands cover my mouth as I shake my head. Maman told me that Dad was in the drug world, but I thought he was a dealer or something, not that he used them on children.

Mon Dieu.

My father is the one who made Crow suffer. My own father is a cold-blooded killer. Nausea fills the back of my throat.

“You better stop waiting for him.” Crow shoves a hand in his trousers’ pocket, his muscles flexing with tension. “He’s been dead for five years. A few of The Pit’s assassins killed him so he wouldn’t make anything like Omega again.”

I close my eyes, a tear rolling down my cheek. The father I thought would one day return is a monster. I always knew he was shady, but now I completely understand why Maman kept him at a distance from our lives. She loved him. I know she did. It was obvious with how happy she was when he came around. She never looked at another man after him, either. But she was smart. She must’ve known something was off with him, that’s why she told me to never get close so I wouldn’t be burnt like she was.

“He doesn’t deserve your tears,” Crow murmurs.

I open my eyes, staring into his darkened ones. “I’m not crying for him. I’m crying for you.”

The pad of his thumb touches my cheek, wiping the moisture away. Crow’s expression softens. A profound pain swirls in the depth of his eyes. I feel the wretchedness inside him instead of seeing it. “I don’t deserve your tears, either.”

Why is he saying things like this? He’s been put through hell since he was a child.

I clutch his arm and lean into his touch. “You deserve everything, Crow.”

“People like me only reap what we sow. I’m no saint. I kill to have a purpose in life. To feel alive. And sometimes, that doesn’t fucking work either.”

I’m about to argue, to tell him that if he weren’t kidnapped as a child,