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What’s going on?
Did some bonehead actually set off fireworks indoors? What a major no-no. Cripes, the gallery owner could lose his business over something like this. Another event planning company in the city once provided its guests with sparklers at a party. The sparklers set off not only the fire alarm but also the sprinklers, ruining the floor and walls of an old historic building. Needless to say, this company is no longer in business.
Armed with my desserts and about to chew someone out about fire codes, I step into the gallery only to trip. Again. For the second time that night, a tray of food goes flying out of my hands. This time, I am falling right behind it, and there’s no handsome man to catch me. As I go down, the white, twinkly lights around the tall, skinny Christmas tree blur thanks to the speed of my descent.
Just no. Please. Not again.
More concerned about the desserts than myself, I watch a dozen perfectly-formed peach pavlovas bounce off the tray in the direction of the floor. Why is the universe messing with me? And what message is it trying to send?
And as I follow the pavlovas, wishing I could wipe out with half the finesse they are, I land on something soft and squishy, putting my hands out just in time to prevent a face-plant.
What. The. Fuck.
I have tripped over, and am now sprawled on, abody.
Like ahumanbody.
Why is someone on the floor of the gallery? Am I not the only klutz tripping over things?
A run pops in my pantyhose, zipping up the back of my leg like a little tickle, all the way to my thigh, and I scramble to get up to try and figure out what in god’s name is going on.
That’s when I look around the gallery and see that the body I tripped over is not the only one on the floor. In fact, for as far as I can see, the place is littered with bodies in varying positions. Unmoving. Not making a sound.
As if they might be sleeping, passed out, playing some sort of weird rich people game… or dead.
And the red stuff on the floor. Oozing red stuff that looks a lot like… blood. There are literal puddles of it, expanding, inching along like thick creeping vines, crawling slowly but steadily as if trying to reach some sort of equilibrium. And the smell. Strangely metallic, aside from the thinning smoke odor. Both fill my nostrils. The air doesn’t stink, not exactly, and yet I don’t understand why I suddenly want to vomit.
It’s odd, the things that blow through the mind when confused, like a list with two columns. It could bethis. But it’s notthat. Denial, acceptance, then denial again, reconciling something unfathomable when it’s right there, in plain sight.
I squeeze my eyes shut, just for a moment, hoping that when I open them again, I’ll find I’m hallucinating or having some sort of silly nightmare, having dozed off out of pure, overworked, holiday exhaustion.
But when I open my eyes, the bodies are still there, and for as far as I can see. A scream is stuck in my throat just like my feet are stuck in place. Actually, my thoughts are stuck, too, unable to make sense of what’s going on, and what I’m supposed to do about it.
That’s when a clicking sound from my right snaps me back to reality.
The good-looking guy from earlier, the one I dumped shrimp on, whose watch is in my pocket, is still standing, as are his two friends, just next to him.
Pointing guns. The three of them.
At me.
* * *
CHAPTERTHREE
VALENTIN
I slammy brother’s arm with the barrel of my gun.
“We’re not doing this, Grish,” I snarl, in part because I know what he’s thinking and it pisses me the hell off, and also because I want to snap him out of a reflex that has gotten him in trouble on more than one occasion.
My quick action is successful, because his gun no longer pointed at the redhead. Instead, he turns toward me with frenzy in his eyes, letting me know I’ve not gotten completely through to him yet. I’m all too familiar with that look. I grew up with it.
“I’ll kill you, so help me—” he shouts, raising his hand to take me down.
But Artem jumps in, and just in time. It’s not that I can’t defend myself against my brother, it’s just that I don’t unless I absolutely have to. Most days, reason is better than force, and thanks to Artem, Grisha is on his way to being under control again. At least I think he is. Sometimes it’s better to be confronted by a non-family member.
Our attention returns to the redhead, the one Grisha flirted with earlier, and who, until a moment ago, he was ready to shoot dead like the rest of the poor bastards lying all over the gallery floor.
