Rage pounded through my veins as I stalked out of the meeting room and through the Holloway mansion.
My hands were clenched into fists at my sides, though my fingers ached to reach out and grab one of the blades hidden on me.
Bailey. Finn. Mickey . . .
I could only imagine my expression promised murder, considering number three on my list had just reminded me that he remained untouchable. For now. And that the rest of us still risked his wrath.
For once, that wrath wasn’t me.
It was the first Sunday meeting Mickey had been to since all the shit had gone down with the Borellos. And he’d taken the opportunity to remind nearly every man who worked for him why they loved him. Why they blindly followed him. All the while he’d subtly hinted at a traitor within Holloway. He’d loosely suggested that people who craved power couldn’t be trusted.
His eyes had locked on one person.
Me.
I stormed into my room, but when I gripped my door to shut it, I realized how different my room felt.
Everything stilled.
All the rage and hatred and fear burning inside me froze.
A knife was in my hand in an instant, and I was listening for any sounds that shouldn’t be there. But all I could hear was my own heart and the rain.
The rain. My window was open, and it was fucking raining.
I let out a frustrated breath and closed the knife as I walked over to shut the window. My movements slowed when I glanced down at the carpet and saw small, wet footprints leading away from the window.
I strained to hear anything as I slid the window down, but there was no indication that anyone was still in the room until something sharp pressed against my spine.
Despite my previous anger and the monster that flickered to life inside me, respect for this girl forced a corner of my mouth up.
She was so damn quiet.
“We’ve got to stop meeting like this, Nightshade.”
I glanced over my shoulder and bit back a curse when I saw her.
Dark hair soaked from the rain, dripping onto the carpet. Thin shirt plastered to her body. Her chest rising and falling heavily, emphasizing her full breasts.
She was every man’s fantasy mixed with danger and chaos.
And she knew it. Used it.
I hated her for it.
For what she was and for still inciting a reaction in me. For intriguing me and making me want her when I’d spent my life focused on one other girl.
“Then again, I’m starting to think you want to since you took this.” She dug the knife harder into my back, her tone breathless and seductive.
I let my body fall toward the window when I felt her lean into me again, spinning away at the last second so she stumbled into the window and I was now behind her.
I grabbed her wrist and pulled her hand behind her back, higher and higher until she cried out and released her hold on the knife.
“Thought I’d hold on to it until I got my wallet back,” I growled into her ear. “Figured if I found what was mine, you’d know where to find what was yours.”
Her near-black eyes found mine. Chaos and laughter and something destructive swirled deep within them. The makeup around them was smeared from the rain, and fuck me if it didn’t make her sexier.
“You got your knife. Why are you still here?” Tossing the knife toward my bed, I pressed her firmly against the glass and spoke in a low tone. “You have three seconds.”
Her full lips curled into a sneer.
“Two.”
“I’m looking for something.” Anger filled her confession. Fear replaced the hint of teasing laughter usually present in her words.
My heart rate slowed, but I fought that consuming darkness. “Wrong answer.”
“It’s the truth.”
“How long have you been watching us?”
“I already told you,” she said through clenched teeth.
“How long has Mickey had you watching us?”
She jerked against me, her face tightening with disgust. “Unlike some assassins in the room, I wouldn’t do a thing for that sick fuck if my life depended on it.”
The monster flickered and groaned. My chest rose and fell in rough jerks as every kill flashed through my mind until the faces blurred together. As the memories of every meeting held off this estate turned my stomach to lead. As every betrayal to my blood made the suspicion of the girl in my arms grow.
All under Mickey’s orders or in an attempt to stop him.
I ground my teeth and tried to force every dark and destructive need away.
“Then tell me why.”
One of her eyebrows arched. “I have my reasons.”
“Keeping those reasons to yourself might get you killed, Jessica.”
Despite the warning, her lips parted with an exhale and her eyes darkened with need.
A need I refused to acknowledge or explore.
But in those seconds, the space around us felt like it came alive.
And then she opened her mouth.
“You’re one to talk, Nightshade.” That taunting was back. As if every word was edging on a manic laugh. “Your secrets lost you a princess.”
I jolted, the movement jerking her arm up higher and causing her to cry out. But the cry ended with a wild laugh as she tried to press back against me.
“Your secrets got you stabbed in the back,” she continued, her eyes getting brighter with excitement the angrier I got. “What was it about her anyway? What was it about Lily O’Sullivan that turned Holloway’s assassin into a man wandering around lost?”
“She wasn’t a whore.”
The words were out before I could stop them. And, God, I wished I could’ve stopped them.
I wanted to beg her to forgive me, but the words wouldn’t form.
I couldn’t figure out how to ask her forgiveness when I wanted to hate the girl pressed against me—when I wanted her to hate me. When I still couldn’t be sure she didn’t have something to do with Mickey’s investigation on the Holloway members.
Our ragged breaths and the rain hitting the window were the only sounds in the room. The sudden silence between us felt crushing as seconds slipped by.
“Fuck you, Kieran.” The insult was nothing but a breath on her lips when she finally spoke. And it felt like a knife to my chest.
“Jessica . . .”
Loud banging sounded on my door followed by Conor’s frantic voice. “Kieran. Kieran.”
I hadn’t even heard him walking down the hall.
He tried the knob, but the door didn’t give. “Open up, man.”
I stared at Jessica for another few seconds, dropped her hand, and stepped away.
Before I could tell her to hide or leave, she was backing away from the window into the darker corner of my room.
I started turning toward the door, hissing a curse when the cold air in the room hit my wet chest from where she’d been pressed up against me.
Conor tried the knob again and knocked harder. “Kieran.”
Gripping my shirt, I tore it off and threw it across the room then hurried to unlock the door.
If I hadn’t felt like such an ass, I would’ve been more impressed that I’d never heard her lock it.
I barely had the door cracked before Conor was shoving it open and barreling inside.
“Beck told me.” The guy was six and a half feet tall and a solid wall of muscle—a nearly identical build to his brother. But right then he seemed to crumble on himself. “You’ve gotta help me.”
“I’m trying,” I said in a low, placating tone. “Finding a ghost takes time.”
My eyes darted through my seemingly empty room as I wondered if the ghost had already come to me. And what that wraith of a girl would do with the things she overheard then.
“Beck wants me to run.”
“Don’t.”
“Don’t?” he asked, his chest heaving with a stuttered breath. “Don’t? If I don’t, I’m standing here waiting for him to kill me. And I don’t know why my grave’s being dug. I tried to . . . I did everything to keep Lily safe.”
“I know you did.” I looked at Conor, cursing myself for being the reason he was in this impossible situation.
I’d put him on Lily’s guard because it was supposed to be the safest position in Holloway.
Supposed to.
Then one night I’d sent him away to spy on a meeting for me. And the Borellos hit, looking for the girl they felt they deserved.
The only remaining child of Mickey O’Sullivan. Lily.
A week and a half later, I’d left to do a job for Mickey, and they’d hit again—almost killing Conor in the process.
My fault. Always my fault.
And all the while, Lily had been seeing the leader of the Borellos without him ever realizing her true identity.
I’d been oblivious to it all.
Not noticing the knife slowly inching into my back until it was piercing my heart. Not noticing the shadows I’d spent a lifetime hiding in were betraying me. Blinding me to what was happening right in front of me.
But their betrayal had forced a truce between the Borellos and Holloways . . . and had been the ruining of Holloway.
“It’s nothing you did,” I finally said. “He chose you because no one would want to see you die, and he needs to ensure his safety. But, running? Mickey would send me to find anyone who ran . . . I have no doubt he would do the same to whoever he hired.”
Conor drove his hands into his hair, gripping fistfuls of it.
“If you run, you will die. If you stay, I might have enough time to make this all go away.” I stepped toward Conor and clapped his shoulder, then dropped my voice low enough so Jessica couldn’t hear. “We just need to keep Mickey alive until I can kill the person he’s hired. All right?”
Conor dropped his hands and gave a firm nod, but his face was covered in agony.
He should’ve never seen this life.
One day I’d get him out of it. I’d made that promise long ago, and I intended to see it through.
As soon as he was out of my room, I shut and locked the door, then turned, and crossed my arms over my chest. Waiting for when she would appear.
A few seconds later, she slowly rounded the corner out of my bathroom, her hips swaying like it was as natural as breathing for her.
“Beck,” she murmured, lifting a shoulder lazily. “I’ve only ever come to watch him. But sometimes you or Lily or others are with him. During meetings, for example.” Her lips twisted in a wry grin as she settled against the wall. “I’ve been watching people—spying on them—for as long as I can remember. All my mom’s drug dealers. Her boyfriends. My brother.”
My brow pulled tight at the casual mention of the last person, but I didn’t ask.
“It’s just what I do. I become nothing. But I hear and see everything.” A grim look passed over her face but was gone within a blink of an eye. “Then when I was fourteen, this young guy, who was built like a tank, came into the game and was able to put real fear into every other drug dealer in the city. It didn’t make sense. Of course, my mom went to him because she thought she could trick him out of more drugs. And trick him, she did. Or, at least, she thought she did.”
“Beck.”
A breath of a laugh tumbled from her lips. Her head tilted in confirmation. “Soon after, Momma started getting drugs for free and thought she’d hit the jackpot with Beck. But it was only because I had to pay for what he’d given her. But he kept telling me he’d protect me, that nothing would happen to me. And he said it like he had that power, and I wanted to know how. So, I hid in the back of his car one night and ended up here. Found out more than I ever wanted to about the men behind the bags with skulls and Celtic knots, but I kept coming back. I needed to know everything about the people trying to kill my mom.”
“She’s killing herself, Jessica.”
Her eyes narrowed into slits. “Our lives have been ruined because of him. Don’t you dare tell me what is or isn’t happening in my life because of the men in this damn house.”
I rubbed at my jaw and sighed, knowing there was nothing I could say to change her mind. “And what have you done with what you’ve heard here? What are you going to do?”
“Keep it for when I need it. Take it to my grave.” She shrugged. “Whatever comes first.” She tapped her head as she pushed away from the wall, grinning softly. “I have a lot of secrets stored here. For example, I was hiding in the room over four years ago when you told Beck everything you and a recently deceased Aric O’Sullivan had been doing with the Borellos to take down a certain Mickey.”
I stilled, my breathing slowing as my mind automatically went through every way to stop her.
To stop the threat.
“And yet,” she continued when she was just inches from me, her raspy voice dropping lower, “that’s the first time those words have left my lips. Probably the last too.”
“It needs to be the last,” I said on a growl.
She gave me a look far from reassuring and turned to saunter toward the window. “Good night.”
My mouth opened to remind her we were on the second floor, but I bit back the warning.
She’d been getting in and out of this mansion for a decade—she’d already been in and out of my room to hide my wallet. I was sure the balcony was nothing.
But I couldn’t stop from asking, “How are you getting back to Raleigh?”
Jessica glanced back at me, an amused look on her face. “I got myself here, didn’t I?” When I only continued to watch her, she sighed. “I have my ways, Nightshade. As you pointed out earlier, I am a whore.”
I’d never wanted to apologize for something more in my life. I hated that I felt I owed it to her. My hands fisted and my jaw clenched to keep from saying a word.
Her eyes darted from one to the other, not missing anything, and then slowly met my stare. “Does it bother you when people call you an assassin? No. Because it’s what you are.”
“It’s what I was raised to be,” I said through clenched teeth. “There’s a difference.”
Her gaze drifted to the side and got a faraway look. “Sometimes it feels it was inevitable for me too.” Without another word or warning, she disappeared through the window and onto the darkened balcony.
I followed after her . . . to see how she did it, to watch her, to stop her . . . when suddenly she was there.
Her hands in my hair, her mouth at my ear.
My hands automatically went to her waist, gripping the rain-soaked shirt and pulling her closer. My body vibrated, having someone in my arms like this, that monster inside raging and begging for something I refused to feed it.
“What if it was her? What if it was her who couldn’t be what you needed? Who couldn’t handle what you are. Who ruined the relationship.”
I went still.
There was no beast. No ache in my chest. Just the feel of Jessica in my hands as her words echoed in my mind.
“Because since she left, you’ve changed. I’ve never seen a driven man so lost. But I’ve also never seen you so human. So, what if it was her?” Her lips ghosted across mine, and then she was gone.