Page 14 of Ghost Ribbon

The performance wasn’t for them. It was for the donors, the press releases, the social media posts, the tax advantages. The actual children of power such as myself were expected to attend, to be photographed supporting the cause. It made future deals smoother.

Dimitri had refused to come so Ivan, his father, had sent me instead.

“Represent the family, Alexei,” Ivan had said on the phone two days earlier. “Dimitri’s absence would be noticed. You go. Stand there. Smile at the appropriate moments. Don’t cause problems.”

I had agreed because refusing wasn’t worth the conversation that would follow.

So I stood near a pillar in my black suit, the fabric tailored but plain, my tie a dark line against the white shirt. The noise pressed against the inside of my skull like static, laughter too loud, conversations too bright, the constant clink of champagne glasses raised in toasts to nothing that mattered. I wanted them to die. Why did the world have so many people?

The effort of standing still, nodding at the correct moments, avoiding any conversation that might require more than three words, cost more than I usually spent on such things. Each minute drained something from me.

I lasted an hour before it became unbearable.

I slipped out through a side door when no one was looking and climbed the narrow access stairs to the rooftop.

Bloodburn’s main building had a flat roof with low stone parapets. On clear nights astronomy students such as myself sometimes came up here with telescopes, tracking stars and making notes.

Yes, I knew how funny it sounded for a mafia heir to major in astronomy. I guessed we had a certain boy with curls to blame for that.

Tonight it was empty.

Above me the sky was black and endless, pierced by thousands of stars.

I walked to the center of the roof, tilted my head back, and let them fill my vision.

Under them my own emptiness felt correctly proportioned.

Manageable.

I reached into my pocket and touched the ribbon. It was thin now, worn almost to transparency in places. The pale blue had faded to grey. I had touched it so many times over the years that it had molded to the shape of my fingers, curved into the cup of my palm.

I had been there twenty minutes when the rooftop door creaked open behind me.

Matt Langford the Third stepped out alone.

He was the son of a mid-level politician, the kind of kid who had never heard a “no” in his life. He was also the one who had started the rumors about me. He had been needling me for weeks, escalating each time I refused to respond, and the reason I didn’t respond was because he was too boring for my attention.

He must have seen me leave the gala and followed, thinking he could corner me without witnesses.

He was lucky Dimitri wasn’t here. If Dimitri had heard the things Matt was saying about me, Matt would have received a very public death. Dimitri didn’t know the full extent of what lived under my mask, but he was loyal to blood, and Matt had crossed lines that family didn’t forgive.

Matt spotted me and grinned, his teeth white in the darkness.

“So the freak finally found somewhere to hide,” he called, swaggering closer. “What is the matter, Morozov? The party too much for your cold dead heart?”

I said nothing.

“You gonna say something now, you mute freak?” he sneered, stepping closer. “Or are you just gonna stand there like a—”

I grabbed him by the throat and slammed him back against the stone parapet.

His head cracked against it. Blood welled from his scalp instantly and ran into his blond hair, turning it dark and wet.

It was so boring. God, this was why I wasn’t paying attention to him. Now I had to deal with the effort of killing him.

He had forced this by following me, by opening his mouth one time too many. This wasn’t the art I preferred. It was physical, unsatisfying, but Matt had chosen the physical route by thinking he could intimidate me.

So be it.