LOGINELARA'S POVI stood in front of the mirror and took a deep breath.My hands were shaking. I wiped them on my jeans, then on my shirt, then on my jeans again. Nothing helped. I looked at myself in the glass. My hair was down, brushed out, falling past my shoulders. I wore a simple blue dress Knox had bought me. It was soft. It had pockets that I liked.But I didn't look like me. I looked like a girl playing dress-up. A girl who was supposed to be happy and normal and whole.I wasn't whole. I was in pieces. I was glued, and tape and Knox's hands held me together at night when the bad dreams came.Knox had dropped me two blocks back. I'd asked him to. I didn't want him idling at the curb like a guard dog while I did this. I didn't want it to be about him, or the club, or the men who followed me everywhere now. For one hour, I wanted to be a girl meeting an old friend for coffee. That was all. That was everything.My phone buzzed.I picked it up. It was a text from Kathy. I could see her
KNOX'S POVThe grass was wet under his boots. Morning light cut through the trees, bright and sharp, but the air was still cool. Knox walked with his hands in his pockets, his shoulders tight, his jaw working like he was chewing on something bitter.Marcus followed him quietly not knowing what to say at first. "Knox," Marcus said.Knox didn't stop. He kept walking, toward the back wall, toward the old fountain that hadn't run in years."Knox," Marcus said again, louder.Knox stopped. He turned around. "What?"Marcus looked at him. His face was the same as always…calm, careful, the face of a man who had built a life out of managing other people's chaos. But his eyes were different. They were scared."You can't be serious," Marcus said. "You can't throw everything here away."Knox stared at him. "I'm not throwing anything away.""Yes, you are." Marcus stepped closer. His voice dropped, but it got harder. "You know this is the reason I didn't want to tell you about Elara in the first p
ELARA'S POVThe pain came first.A faint, distant throb in her left shoulder, like a heartbeat that was at the wrong part of her body. She opened her eyes to gray light filtering through the curtains. It seems like she was in Knox's room.She turned her head. The movement sent a sharper spike through her shoulder, but it was manageable. She lay still for a moment, letting the room settle around her. The bed was large, soft, smelling of lavender and him. Her hand rested on the pillow beside her, wrapped in white bandages that went halfway up her forearm. She flexed her fingers. They worked just fine.She smiled. Tiny was dead. She remembered the chain in her hand, the wet crunch of metal on bone, the screaming that had come from her own throat. She remembered Knox pulling her back, holding her, the warehouse burning. It was over. The man who had sold her brother, who had sold her, who had smiled while the world burned, was meat in a hole somewhere.She sat up. The room tilted around
KNOX'S POVI knocked on the metal door of the warehouse office. Inside, I heard the sound of someone moving. The sound of a chair scraping. The door opened and tiny stood there. He filled the frame of the door , a wall of a man in a stained white shirt, suspenders cutting into his shoulders, a cigarette dangling from his lip. He looked at me and his eyes went wide for a second. Before they went flat and dead.He didn't move . He also didn’t reach for the gun I knew was on his hip. He didn’t shout for his men.He just stared at me smiling."How did you find this place, amigo?" he asked. His voice was hard,the same as always. But there was something underneath it now. That wasn’t there when we were brothers.I smiled. "Lucky guess."I stepped past him into the office. He let me. The room was small, cluttered with boxes and a desk covered in cash and burner phones. A bottle of cheap whiskey sat open next to a half-empty glass. I picked up the bottle, found a cleanish cup on a shelf,
ELARA'S POVThe warehouse was cold. The concrete sucked heat from my body through my thin clothes. I sat with my back against the pipe, my ankle chained, and watched Anastasia breathe. Her chest rose and fell in shallow jerks; it seemed she was catching a cold. I held her hand. It was ice."Ana," I whispered.She didn't move."Ana," I said louder. "Why did you come back?"Her breathing stopped. For a second, I thought she was dead. Then her head lifted. Her eyes found mine in the dark. They were hollow. But they were awake."I thought we escaped," I said. I remembered the fire. The heat on my back. Running back into the smoke for her, dragging her out, both of us coughing and thinking we would die. "I came back for you. In the fire. I came back. So why are you here? Did they find you? Did they catch you?"She shook her head. Slowly, like she was struggling to say something."I was not caught," she said.Her voice was quiet. But before she was more of a shadow, that never spoke more t
THIRD PERSON POVKnox held her hand. His fingers laced through hers, tight, like he was afraid she would slip away if he loosened his grip for a single moment. He led her out of the basement, up the stairs, past the kitchen where the Vipers were drinking and talking, making up for the lost times. Nobody looked up and there was no need to hide anymore . And in a way they understood, they have always understood that they loved each other even if no one wanted to speak up, because doing that would have meant death for Knox. In the hallway upstairs, he stopped. Turning to look at her. The light was dim, just one bulb burning above the stairs, and it made shadows on his face. He looked tired. He looked scared. She had never seen him this scared before.He cupped her cheek. Using his thumb to brush her jaw,he leaned in and kissed her. It tasted like salt because tears were falling from her eyes.He pulled back. His forehead rested against hers. His breath was warm on her lips.“Baby,” h







