I lean against the railing and look down. I spot Zita standing outside of the office, staring up at me with a strange grimace on her face. She’s pale, and her lips are pulled back in a strange snarl, like she’s afraid of something. I get an ugly feeling, and turn back to tell Guido to stop—but it’s too late.
The door’s open and he’s half inside. “What the hell is this?” he says, rage in his voice.
I reach for my gun and push forward. I draw it, prepared to deal with whatever’s coming—and stop short as I barrel past Guido into the room.
The place is neat and tidy. Bed on the right, TV on the left. My ears start to buzz and a stone rolls up my throat. Bile tastes sticky and acrid on my tongue.
Siena sits at the edge of the bed. She’s trembling, her arms wrapped around herself. Her face is pale and her mouth is open and she looks shocked and terrified.
She’s wearing this outfit. This fucking outfit. Low-cut top with lots of frills. A bow in her fucking hair. Lipstick, eyeshadow. Too much makeup. Shorts that are barely shorts, more like goddamn panties.
She looks like one of them.
I grip my gun so tight I worry it might go off but I’m frozen in the moment.
Siena looks from me to Guido. She shakes her head, her jaw working, like she wants to say something but can’t come up with the words. Guido comes forward and shoves my gun away, and I should kill him for that—but he’s right. I put it back into the holster.
“Siena, what is this?” Guido says again, his hands spread. “What the hell are you doing in here?”
“She made me do it,” Siena says, her voice a trembling whisper. Tears are in her eyes and they roll down her cheeks, smearing her eyeliner. She dabs at her face awkwardly with the back of her hand. “Zarita made me. She caught me—” She stops and looks at me.
Fuck.
I feel like lightning smashes into my skull.
We got caught. But how? Nobody was around. The place was empty. But it hits me.
Security cameras.
They have cameras.
Why the fuck didn’t I realize that?
Because I was too busy wanting Siena to stop and think for one second. I feel like a bastard, like a real piece of shit. I should be better than this, but I was too busy getting fucking hard and making her come to use my brain. And because of that, she’s here in this room wearing that fucking outfit.
I’m so angry I can barely think. I see red, and all I want to do is storm back down and kill Zita with my bare hands. I want to watch her eyes bulge out and her lips turn blue as the life leaves her worthless corpse.
She knew just now. She knew we’d find Siena in here. She saw which room we were going into and she fucking knew. That’s why she looked so horrified. She set this up, probably forced Siena into this whole situation. Everything becomes so clear and I want to scream with rage.
Guido moves toward her. “I never told her to do this,” he says menacingly. He looks ill, his face pale and his skin a strange green like he might be sick. “What did you do, Siena?”
“I didn’t mean to,” she says. “It was just a mistake.” She looks at me desperately and it breaks my heart to pieces.
“What did you do, damn it?” He grabs her arm roughly and shakes her.
“Stop,” I say, my voice a vicious growl, and both of them stare at me.
Something comes over me then.
A foolish, insane idea.
It’s one of those moments where the world stops spinning and I’m forced to make a choice. I can keep going on the way I’ve always gone, drifting through the world, struggling to earn half as much with twice the work as my brothers, or I can take a new route. I can take a risk and seize what I want, even if it might make my life a living hell.
It’ll never work. It’ll only make things so much more complicated, and my brothers will use it against me, especially Feliks.
But she’s in this position because of me, and I need to do something to fix this.
I force my muscles to relax as the thought takes hold and I feel myself drifting toward action.
Normally, I like to plan. I sit down and make sure I know what my course of action will be. It’s one of the few things that has helped me stay alive all these years, especially when I’ve had so many people trying to take my life. Planning, cunning, ruthlessness. I’ve had to be better and faster and stronger. One slip-up, one error, and I’m dead.
And yet I don’t let myself worry. I stare at Siena and remember how she looked in that dress, then later, naked and moaning beneath me, and I turn to Guido.