ILSA
There was a knock on the door just as I was settling back into bed. Huffing with frustration, I got out of bed for the second time that night. If I had left the city when I said I was going to, maybe I’d be sleeping soundly at this godawful hour of the morning.
A lie, but it was a nice lie. A new city wouldn’t help me forget the anger and pain swirling in my stomach every time I looked out the window. I had packed and unpacked more times over the past few weeks than I’d like to admit, and each time I was met with the same thoughts.
Where exactly would I go?
Back home? That was a fucking joke.
Every other city would be the same. A place I could afford to stay, and wanted to, would be much the same as this. Something about living in the suburbs amongst happy families didn’t sit right with me. As though the combat was part of my blood now, and even if it meant having to be on guard as I was walking down the street to get a coffee, something about that felt more like home than having a lawn and watching small children play in the street as elderly couples went on walks. I had fought so they could have that, but it doesn’t mean I had to want it for myself.
And anything resembling home was all I could cling to now because, God knows, I hadn’t found anything else in my life that gave me any sort of a sense of purpose.
In the city, at least, there were still fights raging and people who needed protection, a point that had been firmly cemented with my dealings with Ray.
Maybe this city needed me as much as I needed it.
Maybe I’d simply become the vigilante I had tried to stop in Ray.
“Kelly, I told you I’m fine,” I grumbled as I approached the door. “You don’t need to check on—”
“Hey, lover.”
Ray.
At my door.
For what fucking reason?
Slamming the door, I was met with resistance as she moved her foot in the way and held it steady with one hand. She was strong. Even shouldering the door, I had no chance of closing it.
“What do you want, Ray?”
The anger in my voice was matched in hers—the way she grunted and complained as I tried to shut her out. That only served to make me fume more. She walked out on me, so what the fuck did she have to be angry about?
“What was Kelly doing here?”
I was no longer fighting the door, but I wasn’t letting her in, either, leaning against the wood as it rested on an angle about six inches from being closed while she pressed her face in the gap.
“What’s it to you?” I snapped. She thrust Kelly’s handbag through the gap, and I snatched at it as I asked, “What the fuck did you do to her?”
“Nothing. She dropped it, and I thought she might want it back.”
“Oh? She just happened to drop it near you? It wasn’t because you did something to her?”
“I only tried to talk to her.”
That edge was back to Ray’s voice, the one indicating she was fighting to keep her demon under control. Obviously, she had learned nothing about self-control without me. I’m certain Ray wouldn’t have killed Kelly, not only because of the rules but because there was still a bit of me hoping she had a shred of humanity and decency left inside her. That some part of the Ray I got to know still existed, even though she had done a full one-eighty when she had gone with Emrick’s goons.
“Nice little conversation, was it? Over some coffee and cake?” I asked.
“For fuck’s sake, Ilsa, I’m not in the mood for this shit. Let me in.”
“You walked out on me. Why should I let you in?”
“Why was Kelly here?”
“What’s it to you?” I spat back. “You have no stake over me. Why are you even here?”
She hesitated, and I could see her in my mind’s eye biting on her bottom lip. “Because you’re a badass, and you’re smoking hot.”
“Not good enough.”
“Because you’re my best friend?” Ray offered quietly, her inflection rising at the end of the sentence.
I couldn’t help snorting. “I’m your best friend?”
“Fine. You’re badass, you’re hot, and I like you.”
“Ray…”
“Fuck, Ilsa, you’re going to make me say it, aren’t you?”
Grinning, I leaned my head against the door, glad she couldn’t see how much I was enjoying having the upper hand on her. I wanted to stretch this out. She deserved it for making me care for her then leaving the way she did. The pain was still thick in my chest, a throbbing reminder of how she had made me feel and what it felt to have that illusion of us shattered. There was anger there. Of course, there was, and I was trying hard not to overthink how quickly my anger had evaporated as I heard the frustration in her voice when she realized I was messing with her.
She was my purpose.
Fuck.
So, I waited.
“You’re badass, you’re hot, and…” she took a shuddering breath, “… you’re a good person, Ilsa, and I don’t know how to do that. I am what I am, and I can’t change that, but I want to do better...” She paused. “You make me want to do better.”
The final words were delivered through gritted teeth, and I could hear the edge to them.
Slowly, I straightened, relinquishing my weight from the door and resistance to her trying to push her way into my apartment. But the door stayed as it was. She had stopped trying once I had moved and was no longer forcing her way into my apartment.
Or into my life.
I’m not a fool. I know how much it would’ve taken from her to not only come to the realization she did, but to say it out loud. It took a certain level of willpower not to laugh when I stood to the side and pulled the door open, watching her standing there on the threshold, jaw tense and eyes boring into mine.
Golden eyes, not yellow.
She was keeping herself under control for me.
“May I please come in?” she asked curtly.
I smiled then. I couldn’t help it, and instead of smiling back, this only made Ray’s jaw tense further as she gritted her teeth against giving me a piece of her mind for making her talk openly about feelings. Oh, what torture that must have been to tell me her emotions.
“Of course, you can,” I said as sickly sweet as I could manage.
Stepping to the side, Ray swept past me, and I closed the door with a quiet click.
The moment I turned to face her, she was on me.