I drove the ceramic into the base of his skull. He never looked away from the windows, never flinched, never made a sound. I caught him as his weight went limp and eased him back into the booth, his body heavy and still warm against mine.
Blood covered my hands. I wiped them on my jacket but just smeared it everywhere.
He slumped against the booth, eyes still open, still facing those windows like he was watching Rio even in death. I'd done this. Driven the blade where it needed to go. Caught him when he fell. Held him like he'd held me all those years ago when I couldn't stop shaking after my first kill.
The copper smell hit me, and my stomach turned over. This was Dionysus' blood. The man who'd saved me. The man who'd made me.
The man I'd just murdered.
I should run. Grab the coin, disappear into Rio's favelas before Rafael arrived. I could be gone in minutes, lost in the sprawl of the city where even the Pantheon would struggle to find me.
But my legs wouldn't move. Some fucked-up part of me wanted to be here when he showed up. I'd spent my whole life running away from things. Maybe it was time to stop.
Besides, I'd promised. And keeping promises to dead father figures was apparently my new thing.
“You.”
Weight suddenly crashed into me from behind. My attacker drove me into the booth's edge, punching air from my lungs. His knee slammed into my kidney, and white-hot pain shot up my spine. His hands twisted in my hair before I could react, yanking my head back. My scalp burned where he grabbed.
Rafael. Of course it was Rafael.
"You killed him." The words came out raw, broken, his breath hot against my ear. "You fucking killed him."
I tried twisting away, but his grip tightened. Fingernails dug into my scalp. His other hand found my throat and squeezed. My vision started narrowing. Black spots danced at the edges.
His grip loosened just enough to let air rush back into my lungs. I gasped, choked on it. His breathing came ragged and desperate behind me.
"I came here to make him answer for what he'd done." His voice dropped to a whisper, deadly calm settling over the rage. "But you took that from me."
He pulled out a blade.
"Now I'm going to take everythingfrom you."
I pressed my bladeharder against Lorenzo’s throat, just deep enough to draw blood. One more inch of pressure. That's all it would take. So why couldn't I fucking do it?
"He was my father, you piece of shit!"
Lorenzo went still. The sudden lack of struggle hit me in my body first, my brain catching up a second later. His back pressed against my chest, and his ass fit against my hips like we'd been carved to slot together.
"Do it," he said quietly. "I know you want to."
The blade dug deeper, another thin line of red blooming under the edge. Tears burned my eyes, or maybe it was rage; I couldn't separate them anymore.
His life was in my hands, and he wasn’t even fighting. The bastard had submitted completely, and my body was reacting all wrong.
I couldn’t stop my hips from pressing forward, couldn’t stop closing my eyes to breathe in the scent of him like it was a perfume. Blood rushed south. My cock stirred, then hardened, and for a moment I forgot I was holding a knife to a killer’s throat.
But only for a moment.
"You took everything from me," I snarled. "My mentor. My faith. My father. Everything I thought was real."
"Your mentor was a monster selling children. Your faith was built on lies you helped fund. And now you know I’m right because they’re hunting you, aren’t they?”
I froze. "What? How do you know that?"
"Your father told me. He said you were on your way here for answers. He made me swear I’d protect you, even from yourself.”
I gritted my teeth and shifted my hold on the blade. "Why would he do that?"
