The Sinners of Saint Amos - Logan Fox Page 0,162

everything we’ve tried so hard to conceal. No vote. No consensus. But I can’t let him take her. And I know that’s what he’s going to do after leaving her here like this. Probably had to go fetch some ropes, or a carpet to roll her up in like those old spy movies.

Life is more important than revenge. Trinity’s life especially.

I don’t care if she’s Gabriel’s daughter.

I don’t care if she was sent to spy on us.

I care too much about her for that shit to matter.

My brothers might never forgive me, and that’s fine. I can handle that. But I’ll never forgive myself if I didn’t do everything in my limited power to protect her.

“They? They who?” Gabriel says. It sounds like he’s trying not to laugh. Like he thinks I’ll say anything to drop his guard.

“My brothers. They’re coming up the stairs. You’re trapped.”

“Brothers? You don’t have any brothers.” He laughs outright now, so hard his chest shakes. That vibration goes through me. Fills me.

The Guardian wasn’t one of the sick fucks who took turns offloading their unrighteous perversions on us. He never touched us.

But he orchestrated everything.

The feel of him so close against me, it’s worse than cleaning out the fucking grease trap.

It turns my stomach, gives me the shakes, and just when I think I’m about to puke…

It flicks a switch.

I’m useless, a victim. Then suddenly I’m not. Because all that rage, all that horror, all that shame and humiliation and pain rises up in me like a motherfucking tsunami.

And wherever it goes, it leaves devastation in its wake.

I let go of the arm around my throat. It clamps tighter. Lights sparkle in the darkness that’s eating away ten times as fast at the edges of my sight.

I clasp my hands. Throw back my arm. Drive my elbow into Gabriel’s stomach.

He makes a soft sound that sends a puff of ashtray breath against my face. His grip relents, but not enough. So I do it again. Then I stamp on his toes.

Fighting like a fucking girl, but still fighting. That’s what counts.

He folds forward, and I push back, shoving him against the edge of the metal desk. It must catch him somewhere painful—his hip, his ass, his kidneys, I don’t fucking know—because he yells out and loses hold of me.

I swing around and throw a punch. It lands solidly on his nose.

Blood gushes.

I start floating away.

Gabriel comes at me, teeth shining red through the blood. And all I can do is stand there as he rams into me. Drives me over Trinity’s legs and into the wall.

She’s lying on her side now, and I can only hope I didn’t hurt her. Trample her pretty legs, or bruise her beautiful skin.

Gabriel takes hold of my hair, twists it, rams my head into the wall. And then steps back as if to check out his work. The darkness comes, and with it some flashing lights. Pain is there, but distant, because I’m already fading. I slide down, my legs refusing to keep me up.

He puts a hand to his nose, coating it with blood. Looks stunned that there’s so much of it. Then he’s crouching, poking a needle into Trinity’s arm.

I want to tell her it’s going to be okay. That we’ll find her, somehow. That we’ll make Gabriel pay for whatever he’s planning to do with her.

Somehow.

But he’s already scooping her up. Her head lolls back, and I know it’s not because he might have broken her earlier, but because he set her mind free and it’s flapping away like a bird.

That’s something at least.

Whatever he does, she won’t mind it one bit anymore. That’s how that shit works.

Maybe I’ll tell her now, when I leave my body.

Because there’s nothing else left for me to do now but float away.

Float away and never come back.

Chapter Five

Cass

That bloody handprint feels like an accusation the closer I get. A blatant stamp of the Universe’s disapproval. I slam into the metal door, and barely manage to catch hold of the handle to stop it flying inward.

Inside, Apollo’s phone rings a last time before going silent. I hope that means that I’m not too late. But that glaring smear of red says otherwise.

Need to calm down. Need to get control.

But as soon as I’m inside and I see Apollo crumpled up against the wall, fury obliterates what little control I had left.

My hand shakes as I lift my phone. It’s already locked again, and now it doesn’t recognize my fingerprint, beeping