Page 118 of A New Days Don

A ring.

The ring.

The air in the car thickens as I stare at the familiar etchings that have made themselves present in all of my nightmares.

Everything around me slows, yet my heart only seems to beat faster and faster and faster.

The ring glints tauntingly at me again. As if it’s saying hi to an old friend or a person it used to know.

That stupid, god-awful ring.

He kept it.

Even though he knew it was one of the only things I could remember from that night. He kept that horrible ring, hanging it from his rear-view mirror like a souvenir or trophy

A gasp tears through my lungs as they desperately try to grab hold of any oxygen in this car, but nothing diffuses into my bloodstream. Not with my heart beating as fast as it is.

I blink a couple of times, meeting Vicek’s gaze out of the corner of my eye, a sociopathic smirk pulling knowingly at his lips. Strong lips. Sharp jaw line.

No, please!

Blurry images start to overlap themselves in my mind from that night.

Sharp jawline. Strong hazel eyes. Tall.

The similarities between Vicek and that doctor are uncanny. I didn’t see Alverez standing beside Gerardo as I left the station the other day. It was Vicek.

Another gasp that I try to hold in, but it is no use.

Vicek chuckles something vile, the smirk pulling into a grin that makes him look like the murderous rapist he is. His detective mask melts off his handsome features until all that is left are the features of a baseless, malignant plight in society.

“You finally remember me, babe?” James. But his name was not James. As I figured.

My screams and the pain radiate through my body, but I school my features despite the panic flaring inside me. I will not panic. I will not let him have the satisfaction of winning again.

Chapter 49

Massimo

“Boss,” Ren’s voice is urgent and out of breath as if he’s running.

“What’s going on?” I stand from my desk, where I had been watching Mila’s blue dot pulse across the department. She seems to be on her way out by the looks of things.

After she texted, she was fired. She told me she would be gathering some last-minute information and meet me here, at my condo.

“Get on the computer. You need to watch the video I sent you.” I pull up the footage as he speaks, every nerve in my body on alert with the fear lacing his tone, “I’m on my way to grab Raphael, Caleb, and Adriano. Watch the video, and then we are going to need your direction.”

Ren is already planning for an infiltration?

Hitting play, I watch as the shitty camera footage pans to a group of three people.

The same three people from the first video. Thiago, Vicek, and Fabio.

There isn’t any sound until a minute in, when it cuts in to Fabio speaking, “He’s here.”

Who?

Thiago claps his hands together, a pleased, cat-like grin pulling on his lips. I want to reach through the video and strangle him.