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I hope Hadria will think so, too.
I send her to steal a car while I secure Ariadne with zip ties that we brought along for the planned infiltration. We can come back. Grandmother might run, but I’ll track her down whichever sewer hole she scurries into.
Right now, getting Sarah back to Elysium is the priority.
When Scarlett returns with a nondescript Toyota, we haul Ariadne’s limp body into the back seat. As we do, Scarlett asks, “If Sarah was never dead, why did you all think she was?”
“They never found a body. That’s why the guy got off. Her boyfriend. He was charged with murder, he just…wasn’t found guilty in a court of law. But on the street, we all knew.”
“Turns out you didn’t, though. Right?”
The observation catches me off guard, and I shrug, trying to play it off. “Maybe he didn’t kill her, but the guy was bad news anyway,” I mutter, but even as the words leave my mouth, I can feel the seed of doubt taking root. It’s true the guy was no innocent. He was an abusive asshole and he was much older than Sarah, almost thirty when he died.
But Scarlett has a point. We killed someone for something he didn’t actually do.
I slide into the driver’s seat, mind racing as I head automatically toward Elysium. Beside me, Scarlett is silent, her gaze fixed on the road ahead. I glance at her, wondering what she’s thinking, what she’s feeling. The urge to reach out to her, to offer some kind of comfort, is almost overwhelming.
But I hold back.
Elysium is north of the city, but not all that far away from the industrial complex. Still, the drive there is tense, the silence broken only by the hum of the engine and the occasional sound of Ariadne getting bumped around in the back seat. I keep one eye on the rearview, half-expecting her to wake up and attack us at any moment.
But she remains unconscious, her bruised face pale and still in the dim light.
As we near the gates of Elysium, I feel something I’ve never felt before when I’ve seen those familiar gates: apprehension. This is where I belong, where I’ve always belonged. But now, with Scarlett by my side and Ariadne—Sarah—in the back seat…
Who the hell knows what’s going to happen.
The guards at the gate look surprised to see me, but they let me through without question, trusting that I can vouch for whoever is with me. “Get Hadria on the radio,” I order them. “Tell her to meet me out the front of the house.”
And as we pull up to the main house, I take a deep breath, steeling myself for what’s to come. Hadria is waiting for us, her face morphing from slight concern and confusion into cold fury when she sees who’s sitting there next to me in the passenger seat.
Before she can say a word—or pull a gun—I jump out and place myself in her line of sight. “We need to talk.”
She stares at me, icy eyes like a damn freeze-ray, and she smiles. “Yes,” she says. “I think we do.”
And that’s how I know I’m totally fucked.
CHAPTER 15
Scarlett
I shift in my seat, heartbeat picking up, as I lay eyes on the infamous Hadria Imperioli, Hades, for the first time close up. Her athletic frame is clothed head to toe in somber black, silver-gray eyes like chips of pale fire as she leans past Lyssa to look at me again
I feel like a sample under the microscope.
Or rather, like something about to be dissected.
“Well?” she bites out to Lyssa, though she keeps looking at me. “What is the meaning of this? Because unless I am very much mistaken, you told me she—” Hadria stabs a finger at me. “—was dead. You told the Syndicate she was dead. But she doesn’t look dead to me, Wolf.”
“I—” Lyssa begins.
“Wait,” Hadria says, before her lieutenant can get another syllable out. “I want the whole Syndicate here to witness this. That way, at least, I’ll know I’m not hallucinating. Because I feel as though I am, Lyssa. I feel as though I must be.”
Lyssa gives a sigh. “You don’t have to be so dramatic. But sure. Call everyone down.”
With an imperious wave of her hand, Hadria beckons over someone lurking in the shadows of the mansion’s entrance. A thickset man with weathered features and gnarled, disfigured hands ambles forward, eyes glinting with thinly-veiled malice as they land on me.
“Ricky,” Hadria says, “gather the others. We are going to make an example out of the assassin once and for all.” Her gaze swings back to Lyssa, mouth curving in a slight, cruel smile utterly devoid of warmth. “And as for you…I ought to gut you where you stand for this betrayal.”
