Page 57

“Well, the thing is, he’s in Italy. So, get to the tarmac, and it’s wheels up in an hour. I’ll be there in thirty.” He sighs, going quiet again before the sound of the wind returns.

“I’ll be there in ten.” The call goes quiet, and I know he’s hung up. Pocketing my phone, I head to the armory, grabbing everything we’ll need.

I drive through the gates of my private airport, making my way to where the plane is stationed. Luckily, the airport is right next to the interstate, so it takes barely a minute to get here once I exit. When the plane comes into view, so does Viktor standing next to his bike.

What catches me off guard is the neon pink bike sitting next to his, my Moss sitting sideways on it, her legs swinging back and forth.

Parking my car next to her bike, I leave the fob in, and it beeps three times after I get out and close the door, telling me I left the fob in there.

“What is she doing here?” I bark at Viktor, angry that he let her come here.

“She begged to come with. Wouldn’t stop following me. It’s your fault you got her a bike faster than mine.” Point taken on that. I wanted her to have the best bike out there, in her favorite color, which I’ve been told is pink.

Also, I’ve seen it since I slept in her bed one night at the Manor. It was the night she slept on the roof. It was the first night in months I’ve slept peacefully, surrounded by her scent.

I look over at her. I can’t see her face as it’s covered by her helmet, the visor still down. I curse myself again for getting her a visor I can’t see through. “Penelope, go home. You have no place here.”

I’m taken aback when she gets off the bike, her shoulders square and chin up. “I’ll be on the plane,” Viktor says before making a quick exit.

She closes the distance between us, so close, yet so far that I can barely smell her. “Why are you doing this to me?” Her voice quivers slightly, muffled by the helmet.

I smirk. “Doing what, Penelope?”

“THIS! Pushing me away, pretending I don’t matter, like I don’t exist in your eyes.” I can hear her hiccup through the helmet, telling me she’s started crying. “You fuck me, then leave me. You were supposed to replace the bad, but you just keep adding to them!” She’s screaming by the end of her words, sobs wracking through her body. I’m taken aback by her words. She thinks I’m adding onto the bad memories? “YOU KEEP LEAVING! TEASING ME! FUCKING WITH MY HEAD!”

“I’m doing this to protect you, Penelope. My world is bad. It will grab you with its claws and tear your little body in half. If you’re with me, you’re a target.”

“You forget that I’ve been in nothing but dark since I was six. Dark from my past is nothing compared to the light you bring to my present. I want your dark. I want your good and bad. Your pretty and ugly parts. I WANT YOU. I need you.” She holds my eyes through the visor, daring me to fight back. She has such fire in her stance, showing she’s not going to back down.

“You don’t understand. You don’t want this life. It will kill you!” I yell back, feeling my anger rise.

“It’s either this life does it, or I do it myself. I’m tired of feeling like nothing, Dmitri. I want to feel wanted. You make me feel like nothing. A crumb on your shirt. A piece of gum on your shoe!” She screams. “You show yourself to others. No mask now, right? Just your face. But I can’t have that privilege too? You have my heart and my soul, but all I want is yours.”

I can’t reach out to her fast enough before she turns around and gets on her bike, starting it. She waddles it next to me, stopping and lifting her visor. Her eyes are beyond red and puffy, her raw emotions written all over her beautiful face.

“So either want me and keep me, or just leave me the fuck alone.” Those are the last words she says to me before taking off, her bike echoing in the emptiness.

I stood there for a few minutes. I know when she gets on the interstate because of the sound of her engine roaring, bouncing off the plane garage. I look towards the road, seeing her bike zip by in an instant. I really fucked up.

Walking into the plane, I see Viktor focused on his phone, typing furiously on it. He looks up when he hears me, pocketing his phone quickly.

“Okay, time to plan this shit,” I say, taking a seat across from him as the crew boards the plane, getting ready for takeoff. An invisible mask slides over my face, wiping it clean of any emotion that showed outside.

It’s about eight hours before we land in Rome. We spent the whole time planning how to capture him.

We have pinpointed where he’s been staying, thank God for high-def cameras. Once it’s night, Viktor and I will go in and break into his suite through the roof. Dumb bastard has roof access through his room, and we know nobody monitors up there at night.

There are cameras, but Jacob will splice the videos from New York once we get ready to storm in. We’ll gag him and have a helicopter come pick us up from the roof once I call them. His guards will be notified of a helicopter hovering above the roof, but we’ll be out of there before they even get to the roof.

We get off the plane and load into the black limo waiting for us on the tarmac. We’ll go to a hotel near his building and wait until dark, going over the plan so we have it rooted in our minds. We leave at one am.

Once back at the hotel, it’s nine am, the day just starting for this side of the world. We decide to sleep before going over the plan again, not wanting sleep to cloud our judgment.

The second I walked in the door, I kicked my shoes off, unbuttoning my shirt and throwing it on the chair next to the door before striding to the bathroom and turning the water on to the hottest it’ll go.

The hotel bed feels like a cloud, almost swallowing me whole. It takes a few hours before I fall asleep. Penelope’s words keep repeating in my head. Her tear-stained face looks at me every time I close my eyes.

So either want me and keep me, or just leave me the fuck alone.