“Odd,” Anteros said, keeping his face still. Everything inside him wanted to tear into it and find the purpose for it being left. Instead he acted as if it meant nothing. “Have you informed anyone else of this?”
“Just you,” Nikolai answered and Anteros nodded, walking over to the mirror he’d had brought in.
“Good,” Anteros responded. “Keep it that way.”
“Should I destroy it, just in case?” Nikolai asked. Anteros paused, fingers at the bottom of his tank, and stared into Nikolai’s questioning celery eyes through the mirror.
“No.” Anteros ripped the tank off, throwing it to the ground. The F Frankie had carved had healed, but a scar remained, raised and rippled on his left pectoral, near the center of his chest, right where his heart would be.
Nikolai was the only one who knew the secret beating beneath his shirt. It was Nikolai who’d found Anteros on New Years, and to this day Anteros was thankful. He couldn’t imagine what would have happened had anyone else found him tied up, fucking branded by Frankie. He never would have been able to rein in Crazy A. Things would have been irreparably damaged with his Wolves, his reputation tarnished.
Nikolai had untied him, got him a tank, and spoke nothing of what had happened. They’d concocted the lie that Frankie drugged him and escaped, and that was all that was said. Anteros paused, touching the raised edges of the F. If he could go shirtless, he would. He opted for undershirts and muscle shirts because it was the closest to being shirtless.
“Where was it found?” Anteros asked, throwing on a new shirt and heading back toward the couch.
“It was left in front of the door.”
Anteros nodded then said over his shoulder, “Leave.” Without another word, Nikolai withdrew. Anteros heard the door open and, he thought, close. Then, he picked up the book.
Paradise Lost.
It was the first book he’d caught Frankie reading. That was not a coincidence. The leather was worn, cracking, but still soft. He could still envision her reading it. Curled up on the wingback, face scrunched in concentration, wearing the ugliest clothes she could find but that did nothing to hide her beauty. The day was tattooed in his blood, because that day he’d given her rules.
Rules she would break.
Always fucking break.
He opened the book farther, finding one page had been dog-eared and some words underlined. Next to the underlined sentence, she’d written a message. As Anteros was reading, the floorboards groaned. He snapped the book shut and turned around.
Crazy A leaned against the wall, watching him with interest.
“What’s that?” He nodded his chin at the book.
“A book,” Anteros replied easily. “Come to take a reading break?”
Crazy A clenched his jaw but only said, “The substance found inside the needle in the hotel Bible is proving difficult to analyze. It’s unfortunate the slave wasn’t killed on time, then none of this would be happening.”
This was the game they’d played since Anteros had punished him. Crazy A didn’t question him outright, but he made sure Anteros knew his intent. A month ago, Anteros wouldn’t have thought twice about killing him over his fucking attitude, but now Frankie was fucking with his head.
There were two stories to how Crazy A became “crazy”: the truth and the lie. For years the lie hadn’t bothered Anteros, but now when Anteros looked into Crazy A’s eyes, he saw a craziness that matched his own. A madness at being without his other half.
With a deep exhale, Anteros walked over to Crazy A, calmly lifted him, and threw him against the wall.
“Keep questioning me and I’ll take a tongue instead of some fucking fingers.” His eyes shifted to the nubs on the end of Crazy A’s hand where a thumb and pointer used to be. Crazy A tried to respond and Anteros pushed his elbow into his neck until he sputtered breaths.
“I didn’t catch that.” Anteros pressed deeper until Crazy A’s face purpled, then all at once stepped off. “Get the fuck out.”
Crazy A coughed, gasping for air. His face was crimson, eyes taut in a fierce glare, but he wordlessly walked back the way he’d come. Anteros waited until he was down the hall to lock the door and open the book.
The message Frankie had written set fire to his blood. Before Anteros knew it, he’d thrown on a leather jacket and slipped out of the club.
He’d started driving his own cars and bikes again—no more fucking town cars. So, after hopping on his Ducati, Anteros was in the heart of Manhattan in no time. One foot on the street, engine still running, he stared at a nameless beige building made of perfectly symmetrical stone bricks.
Lucia Pavoni’s club.
Although so much other shit went down inside you could hardly just call it a club. It was more like all the circles of hell shoved into one tight dress.
“We know where she is,” Little O had pressed right after his twin’s death. “Let me go. Let me fucking take her out.” Anteros had ignored him because “taking Lucia out” was easier said than done; he realized that now. He’d grown up being told Lucia was a frail old woman stuck in Venice with nothing better to do than gossip. He would be swallowing that mistake for a while.