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I lifted my eyes to the mirror.
I didn’t recognize the face looking back atme.
My expression was void of emotion. A statuecut from marble. My lips stretched into a thin line. My eyes adarker green, shadowed, inhuman while my sins clawed at my insides.The dead screamed in one unison cry inside of me. All the men I’dkilled throughout the years. Some nameless, some faceless, some Iremembered, some had faded into the deep abyss of what remained ofmy soul. I just added one more.
I heard Cillian in the space. “You can tella lot about a man watching him kill,” he said. His voice oozedsomething that made me feel dirty, violated, without even beingtouched. I watched him in the mirror as he dropped an envelope onthe desk. “Your summer assignment.”
Without another word, he walked out.
The contents of that envelope held the namesof the people that needed to be erased. My grandfather’s kill list.The reason he’d kept me alive.
My eyes dragged back to my reflection andfor a heartbeat, a shadow passed along the mirror’s surface.
Death.
A slow smirk lifted the corners of my mouth.Yeah, fucker. I’m coming for you.
Chapter Three
Tomás
Mad Dog meant to pull the car into a sidepath, drive the few miles to the edge of the mountain, shove me outof his car, and Sparta-kick me off the mountain after putting thebulletbackinto my head.
“Stop it,” Mad Dog growled. “You’re gettingon my nerves.”
I stopped bouncing my knee. A nervoustwitch. “Are you going to kill me?”
“No,” he growled out for the hundredthtime.
“Because this would be the perfect place forit.” We were in the mountains with nothing but trees.
“Are you trying to change my mind?”
I almost rolled my eyes. The knee bouncingstarted up again. “I need a blunt.”
“We talked about that.”
After I woke up at the hospital with atwo-inch scar just above my left ear,hehad talked. Talkedabout how I was an idiot. Talked about how I had two options facingme. One—do something stupid like I’d done to get us in the hospitaland die, or two—do as he says and survive.
I’d never met anyone who wanted me alive sobad. Option two became my default setting.
Maddox Brennan had saved my life that day.He’d slammed into me and used his body to protect me from thebullets meant for me. Two bullets had been popped. One had slicedthe side of my head just above my ear. That one had been aimed atmy head, but when Maddox slammed into me, the bullet grazed me. Thesecond bullet entered the back of his shoulder blade. I don’t knowwhat happened after that. I’d woken up a few days later in ahospital. Mad Dog in that same hospital mad as shit. Hence, thename I’d given him. But instead of torturing me and killing me inthe traditional way, he spun some lie to his brothers about a hit.I’d been collateral damage. Just a kid in the way. And for someunknown reason, he felt responsible for me. Or he really wanted tokill me up in these mountains. I wasn’t sure yet.
I ran my hand down my pants, jittery asfuck. “I’m eighteen, blunts are legal now.” I had turned eighteenlast month.
“You haven’t officially graduated highschool, makes you a minor.”
We already had this convo too. After he tookme to his condo instead of jail or a dirt bed, we’d fought morethan talked. I hated him. I did. He killed my family. He locked mein a room to calm me down until I could listen to reason. That hadbeen what he said. I wanted reason all right. I wanted to know whyhe killed my dad and brothers. But he didn’t give methosereasons. After a few weeks, he told me he bought me from my moms.Just like that. Paid a good price for me too. Said she got thebetter end of the bargain.
He'd officially adopted me.Legallyadopted me. He’d shown me the papers too. He’d backdated thedocuments to when I turned fourteen. Like a slap to the face, he’deven changed my name to Tomás Brennan. As if he’d wiped away mypast. As if I was supposed to forget my family. The Moya bloodinside me. And the worst part. For a few seconds I had beenrelieved. As if Mad Dog would protect me, take Daniel’s place orsome shit. And that made me hate myself, but hating him felt betterso I clung to that.
Over several months, I thought about themany ways I could kill him. A kitchen knife to the throat. Ratpoison in those fancy drinks he liked. A bullet to the head. Ishook the thought away. Thoughts would get me nowhere. And rightnow, I was exactly there. No Where. “I could’ve graduated if youhadn’t taken me out of school.”
Mad Dog gave me his real pissed off look.Like the look he gave me when I woke up in the hospital, my headall twisted.
“My old school don’t care about grades andshit. They just wanted me out.”
“And then what? What would you havedone?”
