Текст книги "Daggermouth"

Автор книги: H. M. Wolfe

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Текущая страница: 9 (всего у книги 33 страниц)

Jameson straightened, determination settling cold and heavy in his chest. “Then I’ll go alone.”

The words hung in the air, absurd in their audacity. Several assassins laughed outright, the sound sharp and dismissive.

“You?” Reeve sneered. “Against the entire Veyra guard? Against Haven Tower’s security systems? You wouldn’t make it past the first checkpoint.”

“I’ve been smuggling people and contraband between the rings for fifteen years,” Jameson replied without looking at him. “I know ways into the Heart that even your scouts haven’t mapped. Routes that bypass the checkpoints entirely.”

Jameson leaned in closer to Jaeger, his voice dropping to a dangerous whisper. “You and your Daggermouths need to get her out,” he said, a threat layered into the words. “If you won’t do it, I’ll go into the Heart and do it myself.”

Jaeger scoffed. “You’d die trying.”

“Maybe,” Jameson acknowledged. “But I’d die knowing I didn’t abandon her like you.”

The conviction in his voice silenced the room. The assembled crowd exchanged glances, reassessing the man they’d dismissed as just another of Shade’s temporary distractions.

Jaeger leaned back in his chair, eyes never leaving Jameson’s face. “You really would, wouldn’t you? Walk straight into the Heart on some half-baked rescue mission. Die trying to save her.”

Jameson’s answer was immediate. “Without hesitation.”

“Even knowing she might already be broken? That the woman you find might not be the woman you lost?”

Jameson’s jaw tightened. “She’s stronger than that.”

“Everyone breaks eventually,” Jaeger said softly, the knowledge of personal experience edging his words. “The Heart has methods that can crack even the strongest minds. If they want information from her badly enough, they’ll get it. And what’s left afterward won’t be Kael anymore.”

“Then I’ll find whatever’s left of her and bring her home,” Jameson replied without having to think. “And love whoever she’s become.”

There had never been an easier answer. Jameson meant those words. He would never leave her to die. He would never abandon her. He would give everything, if it meant she had a chance at survival.

A heavy quiet fell over the bar. Even the most hardened assassins seemed affected by the raw conviction in his voice. Jaeger drummed his fingers against the table once, twice, three times. Then he reached for the bottle, pouring another shot.

“Three days,” Jaeger finally said. “Give me three days to gather better intelligence, to put a proper plan together. My contacts in the Heart are working on locating her exact position in the tower, the security protocols, the guard rotations. If we’re going to do this, we do it right.”

Jameson hesitated, weighing the offer against his desperate need to act immediately. “Three days,” he agreed after a long pause. “Not one hour more.”

Jaeger nodded once, then raised his glass. “To Kael. May she still be Shade when we find her.”

Jameson squared his shoulders. “She will be.”

He turned to leave, feeling the weight of Jaeger’s gaze on his back. This time, no one mocked him, only stepped aside so he could pass.

At the door, Jaeger’s voice called after him. “Vine.”

Jameson paused, looking back over his shoulder.

“If you try to go in alone before our three days are up,” Jaeger said, his voice carrying easily through the silent bar, “I’ll have you killed before you reach the Cardinal checkpoint. For her sake, not mine. A failed rescue attempt will only ensure her execution.”

Their eyes locked across the room, predator recognizing predator.

“Three days,” Jameson repeated. “After that, I’m going in—with or without your Daggermouths.”

He pushed through the door without waiting for a response, stepping back into the cold Boundary night. He let a deep, shuttered breath pass over his lips, finally allowing himself to truly feel the fear of what would come next.

Jameson looked up at the Heart, its spires gleaming against the stormy sky like daggers poised over the city as he melted into the shadows, already plotting his next move.

Somewhere in that cage, Shadera waited—alive but captive, turned into a symbol against her will, caught in Maximus Serel’s web.

Three days to plan. Three days to prepare. Three days to imagine what they might be doing to her in that tower of glass and metal.

Three days to honor his promise to Jaeger. If anything happened to her before then—if any word came that she was being hurt, tortured, prepared for execution—no force in New Found Haven would stop him from burning the Heart to the ground to find her.

Some promises were made to be broken. And some people were worth dying for.

Chapter twelveMy Sweet, Spineless Heir

The elevator door to Greyson’s apartment floor swept open with a hiss like a final exhalation before his sanctuary became a battlefield. That’s what it would be with a Daggermouth living beside him—a battlefield.

He pushed his key into the apartment door, twisting until it clicked, then pushed it open. For a moment he hesitated, knowing the second he took a step forward, there would be no turning back.

Greyson took a deep breath then closed his eyes, not caring about the guards or the Daggermouth at his back, and let himself feel as the last vestiges of control slipped through his fingers.

This was it, this was his life now.

His father had won.

His eyes shot open as two hands slammed against his back, jolting him forward and over the threshold. Pain flared through his body as his head snapped toward Shadera and his fingers found the wall for balance.

This fucking Daggermouth.

“Move,” she barked, elbowing past him into the entryway.

He swallowed back a snarl, his eyes narrowing on her as the Veyra slid in beside him and fanned out into the apartment, scanners already whirring to life in gloved hands. Four of them, armed and efficient, their masks reflecting his apartment’s sterile surfaces. His wound pulsed beneath the bandages, each heartbeat pumping blood that oozed out of the torn flesh, each heartbeat a reminder of the bullet that sealed them into this nightmare.

She stood three feet to his left, close enough that he could hear her breathing—controlled despite the bruises mapping her face. She didn’t look at him, keeping her eyes fixed ahead, her posture deliberately casual, though her shoulders remained rigid. Blood still crusted her hairline, her left eye swelling rapidly—evidence of what the Veyra had done to her in that prison.

Greyson found himself wondering what other wounds she was hiding underneath her torn clothes, what other prices she’d paid for her failed assassination. None of them would be enough.

The only fair price was her life.

“Standard security sweep, sir,” Mikel announced, though Greyson knew this was anything but standard. His father’s paranoia ran deeper than protocol. “We’ll need thirty minutes.”

Greyson nodded once, the gesture mechanical. His throat had gone dry the moment they’d stepped through the door. Beneath his bedroom closet, wrapped in anti-scan mesh and hidden under a false panel in the floorboards, lay enough contraband medical supplies stamped with the Serel serial number to earn him a public execution.

One moved to the windows, scanner humming as it swept for recording devices. Another opened kitchen cabinets, running gloved fingers along shelves, checking for hidden compartments. The third guard had already begun dismantling the entertainment system, pulling components apart to inspect the wiring.

But it was the fourth officer that made Greyson’s fingers twitch against his thigh. The man headed straight for the hallway leading to the bedrooms.

Shadera shifted her weight, arms crossing over her chest. The movement was relaxed, but Greyson caught the way her eyes tracked each guard, cataloging their weapons, their positions, their blind spots. Even beaten and bloodied, she was calculating angles of attack. He wondered if she’d try something stupid. Part of him hoped she would—it might provide enough distraction to keep the guards from being thorough. Or at the very least get her killed.

Either would work for him.

“Living area clear,” the first guard reported, moving toward Greyson’s study.

The wound in his abdomen chose that moment to tear, sending a lance of fire through his core. He kept his expression neutral behind the mask, but his hand pressed against his side.

The motion drew Shadera’s attention. Her green eyes flicked to his hand, then up to his mask, and for one suspended moment he thought he saw something other than hatred there. Recognition, maybe. He knew from how she fought, she knew pain intimately—lived in it, breathed it, distributed it like currency.

The thought eddied from his mind as her lips curled into a smug smile and her eyes turned back to the Veyra.

The officer in his study was pulling books from shelves now, shaking them open, checking for hollowed-out pages. Each thud of a book hitting the floor was an echo of his rapid heartbeat. Greyson’s pulse hammered against his ribs. If they found the supplies, his father would know everything. The careful balance he’d maintained for years would shatter.

“Clear,” came the call from the study.

Three guards headed toward the bedroom where their captain was already searching, converging on the hallway. Greyson forced himself to remain by the door, knowing that following would only draw suspicion. His fingers curled into his palm, nails biting crescents into skin. Beside him, Shadera had gone perfectly still, the stillness of a predator sensing a shift in the wind—sensing danger.

The master bedroom door opened. Greyson heard drawers sliding open, the rustle of clothing being moved as the captain searched. One guard was checking behind artwork on the walls. Another had dropped to his knees, running the scanner along the baseboards. The third—

The third opened the closet door.

Time dilated. Greyson listened as the sound of the guard’s boots thudded into the walk-in closet, heard hangers scraping against the rod as clothing was pushed aside. The man would check the walls first, then the ceiling, then—

“Captain.” The guard’s voice carried from the closet. Greyson’s stomach plummeted. “Walls seem solid, but I should check—”

“Leave it,” Mikel interrupted. “The President wants this done quickly. If the Daggermouths managed to smuggle any surveillance devices in here, our preliminary scans would have detected it.”

The boots’ tread grew louder as he exited the closet, the officer moving to check the bathroom instead.

Greyson allowed himself a microscopic exhale.

His shirt had gone damp underneath the Veyra uniform jacket, and the tremor in his hand had begun working in overdrive. He cleared his throat, clasping his hands behind his back, and tried to mimic some semblance of a man unbothered.

Twenty minutes stretched like hours. The guards were thorough but not exhaustive, their search designed more to establish presence than to actually find anything. His father’s real message was clear.

I own this space now. I own you both.

Finally, Mikel approached. “The sweep is complete, sir.” He paused, mask tilting toward Shadera. “Any attempts to leave will be interpreted as violation of the President’s directive.”

“Understood,” Greyson managed, his voice steady despite the adrenaline still flooding his system.

“Not you, sir. Just her. Of course you may come and go as you please, uninterrupted,” Mikel responded as Shadera scoffed.

That was a lie.

He could no longer exist uninterrupted, let alone walk the streets of the Heart without being watched from every angle. Greyson nodded in response, not trusting himself to speak. Right now, his words would only lead to violence.

The Veyra filed out in formation, the door clicking shut behind them. Greyson waited exactly three seconds, then reached up and pulled the obsidian mask from his face. The cool air hit his skin like absolution. He placed the mask on its stand by the door then pulled open the entry table drawer.

The scanner was where he’d left it, small and inconspicuous. His father would have had devices planted—he was too paranoid not to. He pulled it out, then pulled out the handgun he always kept pushed to the back in case of emergencies and tucked it into the back of his waistband. He would sleep with it now if he had to. He wasn’t going to take any chances with an assassin was living under his roof.

Greyson powered on the device, the display showing a subtle electromagnetic field overlay of the room. He began at the door, moving in slow, methodical sweeps.

Behind him, Shadera remained where she’d stood during the entire search, watching him with those calculating eyes. He could feel her gaze on the back of his neck as he worked, could sense her processing this new information about him—that he didn’t trust his own father, that he had secrets worth protecting, that he was perhaps more than just the Heart’s obedient Executioner.

The scanner picked up its first device embedded in the entertainment center’s speaker. Greyson marked its location mentally and continued his search.

They were now prisoners in a glass cage, every word and movement monitored.

The scanner picked up two more devices—one behind the mirror in the hallway, another embedded in the kitchen’s exhaust vent. Greyson marked each location in his mind, creating a map of his father’s surveillance network. There would be more.

“You should—”

“Don’t fucking speak,” Greyson snapped, cutting Shadera off as his eyes flickered from the scanner to her face.

She stared back at him for a long moment, her features hardening even as understanding dawned on her face.

She was a fucking cunt, but she wasn’t stupid.

She stayed silent, pressing her lips together in a tight line as she gestured for Greyson to continue. Another device, tucked into the window’s black metal frame.

“Actually, fuck you.”

I take it back. She is fucking stupid.

“Your Daddy should hear when I make his perfect little prince squeal in pain,” Shadera said from behind him.

Greyson’s head shot up, eyes locking on to hers as annoyance flared in his chest. Shadera’s back straightened.

“Put the fucking mask back on, Serel. Taking it off is what landed us in this shit situation.”

Greyson couldn’t hide the exasperation that washed over his face. “You trying to assassinate me is what got us into this situation. And why should I? We’re already as good as married according to mask law.” He turned away from her, moving along the wall as the scanner light turned green.

Shadera scoffed, the sound sharp enough to cut glass. “I’ll never marry you.”

She moved past him toward the kitchen, her gait slightly uneven from whatever damage the Veyra had done to her. Greyson tracked her movement peripherally while keeping the scanner steady. She opened the first cabinet—empty. The second held crystal glasses he’d never used. The third—

“There we go.” She pulled out a bottle of vodka, made before the city’s partition. Worth more than most Boundary residents saw in three years. She twisted off the cap and drank straight from the bottle, no wince, no hesitation. Just a long pull that made her throat work in a way that drew his attention before he forced his eyes back to the scanner.

She was actually insane.

Nine devices so far. Another one in the entrance to the bedroom hallway.

“Fuck, that’s smooth,” Shadera breathed, wiping her mouth and inspecting the bottle.

“My father doesn’t care what you want,” Greyson said, circling back toward the living area. He would inspect the bedrooms last. “Or what I want. The law is the law, and now that we’ve seen each other’s faces, there are only two options. Death or the Vow.”

“You’re all riding the law like it’s a dick,” she said, perching on one of the kitchen island stools like she already ran the place. Another pull from the bottle. “Your own dick, I might add, since you made them. How does it feel to get fucked by yourself?”

“I didn’t write any of these laws, my father did,” Greyson snapped back, his patience with her childish remarks growing exceedingly thin.

“Oh, so incest. That’s pleasant. Tell me, little heir, what’s Maximus packing? Seems like maybe two to four inch—”

“Do you ever shut the fuck up?” Greyson finally hissed, cutting her off. “We don’t have a choice, so either deal with it or prepare to be executed beside me.”

Greyson had no intention of dealing with it, or being executed in the square. He did, however, have every intention of finding an open window and shoving her from it. They couldn’t blame him if she died trying to escape.

A horrible accident, an unfortunate mistake.

She laughed, but there was no humor in it. “There’s always a choice. You could have kept your mask on. You could have let me kill you instead of whatever dramatic surrender that was.”

“Would you have?” he asked, turning to face her. “Killed me if I’d kept the mask on?”

Her green eyes met his over the bottle. “Without remorse.”

He believed her. There was something clean about that, something honest. She would have ended him and felt nothing but satisfaction. No guilt, no second thoughts. Just another Heart elite removed from the world.

“Then you shouldn’t have hesitated,” he said, returning to his search.

Ten devices. Another one behind the ventilation grate in the main room.

Shadera slid off the stool, bottle in one hand, and moved toward the small table near the entry where mail accumulated through the automated drop system. Her fingers reached for the stack of papers.

“Don’t touch my shit.” The words came out as a bark.

Greyson crossed the room in three strides, snatching the papers from her hand before she could examine them. Supply manifests from the Cardinal, coded but still dangerous if someone knew what to look for.

She smirked, that particularly infuriating expression that made her split lip pull tight. “Our stuff now, My sweet, spineless heir.” She took another drink, eyes never leaving his face.

The insult landed precisely where she’d aimed it.

Spineless.

It was the word he whispered in the dark, the word that festered beneath his skin, that fed on his cowardice. He was too weak to stand up to his father. Too weak to stop the abuse of his mother. He lived in both worlds, smuggling for the rebels while carrying out executions that tore at his soul. Each death a fracture, a silent scream, another piece of himself lost. But Shadera wasn’t an innocent. She was a Daggermouth.

And Daggermouths deserved to die.

“Call me whatever you want,” he said, voice dropping low. “It won’t change the situation.”

“No?” She stepped closer, close enough that he could smell the vodka on her breath mixing with the copper scent of dried blood. “Then what will? Because I promise you, I’m not spending the rest of my life shackled to the Heart’s favorite murderer.”

The scanner in his hand beeped. Another device, hidden in the kitchen island’s underside. Right where she’d been sitting. Greyson showed her the display, watching her eyes narrow as she studied it.

“Eleven so far,” he said. “Everything we say, everything we do, is being recorded. So maybe think about that before you announce your plans to kill me.”

She tilted her head. “I think everyone already knows that’s my plan. Seeing as I’m the reason you can barely stand. That wound is bleeding through your uniform.”

He glanced down. She was right—a dark stain had spread across the fabric where the staples had torn. The pain had become background noise, static compared to the relentless screaming of his current reality.

“I’ve had worse,” Greyson retorted.

It wasn’t a lie.

Though he had never been shot or even stabbed, the scars his father had inflicted on his body had been much worse, and those came at a greater cost.

“Sure you have.” She took another drink. “Let me know how that works out when infection sets in. I’ll be sure to tell the President you died very bravely.” She turned toward the hallway to explore the rest of the apartment.

Greyson watched her go, noting the way she favored her left side, the careful way she held her shoulders to minimize pressure on what was likely a fractured collarbone.

“You know what your problem is?” Shadera started again, turning back to face him. The words carried a different weight now, something dangerous threading through them.

Greyson set the scanner on the counter, already exhausted by whatever insight she thought she had about him. He rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Please, enlighten me.”

“You have no respect for life. Not even your own, since you practically begged me to kill you.” She moved closer, her gait still uneven but predatory now. “Day after day you murder innocent people while hiding your face, and somehow you think it makes you noble. You think standing on that platform makes you better than the rest of us.”

The rage that surfaced was immediate and volcanic. “I am better than you,” he growled, his hands curling into fists. “You’re a Daggermouth. You kill for credits. I kill for order, to keep this fucked-up city from falling into chaos. How many people have you killed to fill your pockets?”

The proximity of her body sent warning signals firing through Greyson’s nervous system. She was dangerous, injured but still lethal.

“The difference is I don’t pretend it makes me righteous.” She was close enough now that he could see the individual bruises on her throat, purple-black fingerprints where the Veyra had grabbed her. “I kill because I’m good at it. Because every contract I fulfill keeps medicine in the clinics, keeps families in the Boundary from starving even for just a few more days. You kill because Daddy tells you to.”

The words barely left her mouth before he moved. Not a conscious decision, just his body reacting to the insult, to the truth of it. His hand shot out to grab her wrist, to force her back, to make her stop fucking talking.

She twisted away faster than he’d expected, using his momentum against him. Her elbow caught him in the ribs—not hard, but enough to make pain burst from the center of his wound. He turned toward Shadera just as she swung the vodka bottle, aiming for his head. He ducked under the blow, his shoulder slamming into her midsection and knocking her to the floor, the bottle shattering beside them.

Shadera’s knee connected with his groin as he tried to pin her, the breath whooshing out of him in a pained grunt. She followed with a fist to the jaw, snapping his head back, then rolled out from under him, coming up in a crouch a few feet away.

Greyson surged to his feet, his eyes blazing. “You fucking bitch,” he snarled, spitting blood onto the floor.

Shadera grinned at him, a feral flash of teeth. “What’s the matter, Executioner? Can’t handle a little foreplay?”

Greyson charged her again. This time, he caught her around the waist, lifting her off her feet and slamming her back against the refrigerator. Magnets scattered, clattering to the floor like metallic rain.

Shadera drove her fist into his kidney once, twice, three times, but Greyson clenched his jaw through the pain and tightened his grip, one hand digging into her hip as the other closed around her throat.

Her hand slid between their straining bodies, finding the bandage on his stomach, and dug her fingers into the wound.

The pain was exquisite, white hot, obliterating. Greyson’s grip on her throat loosened as he gasped in agony, vision going dark at the edges, and Shadera used the moment of weakness to shove him backward. He stumbled, his back slamming into the island, and she was on him in an instant, her forearm pressing down on his windpipe.

For a moment, they just stared at each other, both of them panting, their faces inches apart. Her green eyes were wild, her pupils blown wide with adrenaline and rage.

Greyson’s hand shot up, his fingers closing around her fractured collarbone and squeezing. She didn’t bite back the scream that tore from her throat as her knees buckled and Greyson kicked her back against the counter opposite of them. He pinned her there, his body pressed against hers, his hand still tight around her collarbone.

“Not so tough now, are you Daggermouth?” he growled, his lips brushing her ear. “Without your knives and your guns, you’re nothing. Just a scared little girl playing at being a killer.”

Shadera snarled wordlessly, bucking against him, trying to throw him off. But Greyson was bigger than her, stronger, and he had the advantage of leverage. He ground her down into the marble, his hips fitting perfectly against hers.

“Is this what you want?” he asked, locking her in place with his body weight as her eyes connected with his. “To fight until one of us is dead? If it is, I’ll be sure to make it slow—to savor it.”

“Is that what gets you off, little heir?” she breathed, taunting him as he pushed his chest closer to hers. “Do you like it rough? Like inflicting pain?”

He fucking loved it rough.

Greyson shook the traitorous thought from his head as a charged silence grew, both refusing to be the first to break.

“Mr. Serel?”

Chapman’s voice from the doorway shattered the moment like a bullet through glass. Greyson shoved away from Shadera so violently he nearly fell, keeping his back to Chapman so he wouldn’t see his face.

“What?” The word came out as a snarl.

Chapman stood perfectly still in the doorway. His mask on, hands clasped behind his back in his typical pose as he took in the destroyed kitchen—broken glass, scattered papers, blood on the counter.

“I apologize for the intrusion,” Chapman said, his tone professionally calm. “I rang a few times, but the President ordered I enter to help Ms. Kael settle into her rooms.”

Greyson’s jaw worked, fury and annoyance fighting for dominance beneath the pain. Behind him, he heard Shadera push off the counter, her boots crunching on broken glass.

“Fine,” he bit out. The word was insufficient, too small for everything boiling in his chest, but it was all he could manage.

He needed distance. Space. A locked door between him and that fucking animal. Without looking at either of them, he strode toward his bedroom, his gait slightly uneven from the reopened wounds.

“Mr. Serel,” Chapman called after him. “Should I send for medical—”

“No.” He didn’t turn around, couldn’t look at them. If he did, he might do something stupid. Like show another person his face.

The bedroom door slammed behind him with enough force to rattle the bed frame. He pressed his back against it, chest heaving, and slowly slid down until he was sitting on the floor. Blood seeped through his fingers where he pressed against the wound.

Through the door, he could hear Chapman’s measured voice, asking Shadera if she required medical attention. Her response was too low to make out, but the tone suggested threats of violence if he came any closer.

Greyson closed his eyes, letting his head fall back against the door.

His father wanted them to destroy each other, and it seemed he might just get his wish.