The Dark Elite (The Dark Elite 1)

It’s a strange sort of feeling, one I’m not going to try to work out. I don’t do that. I don’t examine my feelings. I bury them. But out of curiosity, I let this emotion linger for a little while, not knowing what to make of it.

It’s not attraction, though Grace is a very beautiful woman. She always has been. I used to watch the way she moved, the way she laughed, the lines and curves of her body—she’s always been effortlessly graceful, as if her name was chosen to match who she is on the inside. What she’s made of.

Grace.

It feels almost the same watching her now as it did back then—a feeling like it’s just me and her in the world, my mind empty of any memory but Grace. Any scent but Grace. Any thought but Grace.

Sitting near her now, every wrong in my life feels miles away instead of nagging at the back of my mind. When I look at her, something settles inside me, making the beasts on my shoulder grow quiet for a moment.

Unconsciously, I memorize her features, wanting to keep this feeling with me.

I want to be able to recall the curve of her neck and shoulder, the dip in her throat, the bow of her lips. I want to remember what it feels like to be sitting here with her when the demons come out. When I forget who I am and th

at my body is my own.

Grace’s eyelids flutter, but she doesn’t stir.

I like the darkness, the silence.

I like being with her.

8

Grace

“And of course, a toast to my beautiful daughter.” My father lifts his glass, smiling at me from across the table. “On her fifteenth birthday.”

My mother sits to his right, smiling the dutifully demure smile of a woman who respects my father and his work. The smile of a mafia queen, a woman accustomed to ruling her household from behind the scenes.

The Blind Pour is packed, friends of my father from the syndicate and their families seated at the tables that fill the room. I can’t help the slight blush that warms my cheeks as everyone’s gazes settle on me. Most of them are people I only vaguely know from Dad’s work, but it hardly matters. There are only four sets of eyes I feel staring at me—everything else fades into the background.

At the table nearest mine, watching me with lopsided smiles and knowing smirks, are the wild four.

My secret crushes.

The four boys I’ve grown up alongside.

Zaid and Lucas, the twins, are carbon copies of each other with green eyes and blond hair highlighted by strands of copper. Lucas is the one with the flecks of brown in his eyes, only noticeable if you look closely; Zaid has slightly darker hair in the right lighting. They seem to do everything together, as if they’re connected telepathically somehow. Their movements, gestures, body language—it’s like watching a double image. I’m not sure if it’s practiced between them or natural, but either way, it’s amusing.

They’ve only been part of our group for a few years, so I haven’t known them my entire life like I’ve known Ciro and Hale. But it feels like I have. Zaid likes to joke that they make up for lost time by being so outgoing and charming. It makes it easy to forget that they haven’t always been a part of my life.

Ciro is quiet, but I like him. His hair is such a dark black that it almost looks blue when it catches the light, and his eyes are a steely gray that hold hints of blue too.

He tugs at the edges of his long sleeves, and I know it’s to hide tattoos that I’ve seen glimpses of. Dark whorls of ink cage his arms and biceps, teasing the collar of his shirt and wrapping around his neck. I wonder how much of him is covered in ink, where the designs start and end. He hasn’t said one word the entire dinner, but I’ve caught a smirk teasing at his lips, a gentle laugh escaping from time to time.

I like it when he laughs. I like when I make him laugh. Every one feels earned somehow, in contrast to Zaid and Lucas, who laugh often and with abandon.

And Hale…

He sits directly across from me. Perhaps the most attractive of the four young men, but definitely the most arrogant. He’s the leader, and even though he’s much younger than my father, my father seems to respect him. As the son of Damian Novak, he holds power—and he knows it. He doesn’t shy away from it like some people might. His eyes are a striking dark blue, deep and overwhelming as a vast ocean. His brown hair glints in the light as he watches me, unblinking, and I find that I can’t drag my gaze away from his.

“Grace,” my mother says slowly, interrupting my thoughts and pulling my attention from the four boys at the other table. “Why are you wearing that monstrosity of fabric?”

Confused, I look down, expecting to see the outfit I had picked out for this day last week—a beautiful red dress that comes to the middle of my thigh, complementing the newly forming curves on my body.

But that’s not what I’m wearing.

Instead, I’m wearing a mass of white fabric, with a full skirt and delicate beadwork on the bodice.