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I couldn't stop picturing Grace's charred body. Her soft skin curled and burned. Her vacant eyes staring at me.
I also couldn't stop imagining flames consuming Alessandro and singing his sweeping chestnut hair while swarming his olive skin in smoke. I pictured them holding one another as they were wiped from the world. I couldn't turn off the morbid thoughts plaguing my consciousness. I didn't want to try to sleep, even though I was absolutely exhausted. I was too afraid to see what nightmares my mind would conjure. It was a devastating realization and an irony I couldn’t fathom. All this time, I’d been protecting them. Now, despite my best efforts, I was the reason they were dead.
Don’t believe everything you think.
Maybe they were alive? Maybe somehow, someway, they...
I watched the security footage with a heavy feeling in my chest. I'd pulled it the moment I landed and got word of the explosion. I couldn't even tell you how many times I watched the video. I stared at it nonstop, rewinding and hitting play until I had every frame of the footage memorized. I burned it into my mind as I watched helplessly.
It started off normal. Grace marched up to the plane, her fiery hair trailing behind her as Alessandro jogged after her like a lost puppy. They faced each other and talked for about a minute before she was hugging him. A weird sense of jealousy hit me in the gut. They had grown closer over the years. I wished I could experience it. I wished I couldwitnessit firsthand. There was something about the two of them being friends that made me happy; I just wished I could add myself to the dynamic. I guessed I'd never get the chance.
A crushing blast of grief abused my mind. I remembered a time when I held peace in my arms. Red hair. Porcelain skin. Smile like fire. I remembered the strength of a boy who was most definitely now a man. A precious mistake I wished I could fix. A broken heart I’d always been destined to mend.
I continued to watch with a pained expression, then paused on the moment Alessandro and Grace were hit with the blast of the explosion. Bright flames bathed the screen in light. Debris and smoke shot out with a vengeance. I took in every single millisecond. The force of the bomb made the security camera shake, then turn black. There was nothing else. I couldn’t stop trembling. Tears stung my eyes as I crumbled in pain.
Dead.
Dead. Dead. Dead.
I fleetingly considered what their funeral would be like, not that I could go. Who would stand and mourn them? I wanted to believe that they'd survived. I couldn't handle the alternative. If Alessandro and Grace were gone, then all of this was for nothing.
And even more so, they died because ofme.Because of my involvement with the Ringleaders, two of the people I loved most in the world were gone. Guilt felt like stuck tar on my skin, clinging to me with its messy and sinister grip.
I'd been avoiding my phone. I didn't want to read the smug message from my contact. He was the one who told me what happened. He sent the footage with a threatening message that would be burned into my soul for the rest of my life.
A Ringleader shares his cage with no one.
My cage was suffocating me. The bars were closing in.
I never wanted to be a part of this elite group, but there wasn't much I could do. It was like ramming your fist into a brick wall. I was a good little soldier trapped in a cell.
I took a drink of whiskey and sobbed. The room they kept me in was dark, the only light creeping in through the blinds leading outside. I'd never been to Sydney before, but for the foreseeable future, it was home. I wasn't up to sightseeing anyway. I just wanted to lie in bed and grieve Grace and Alessandro. It was always like this. I was a valuable asset to the Ringleaders. They knew that no one could hack like I could. A valuable, unwilling prisoner.
Sometimes, I wished that I could just acclimate and adapt to the Ringleader way of life. It was like a wealthy cult that worshipped money and power. If I would just drink the Kool-Aid, my life would be much easier. But the initiation is brutal and bloody. You have to sell your soul for a spot, and I wasn’t capable of leaving my compassion and humanity for the illusion of freedom.
I needed my best friend. I needed to cry to Sunshine and let her hold me, reassure me. I just wanted to wallow with the only person who could make this abyss of pain in my heart feel a little less damning.
My fingers moved slowly. I grabbed the burner cell phone without thought, and I dialed her number without obsessing over the consequences. I was a broken man. I willingly left to protect my best friend, but no one was safe. No one could escape the Ringleaders.
"Hello?" her soft voice answered. I let out a hiss of air. Burning hot tears streamed down my cheeks. "Hello?" she called again. A pain-filled sob escaped my mouth. I'd been so lonely for so long. I missed human contact. I missed having people to share my life with.
"Nix?" she whispered. I didn't dare speak. I couldn't. It was bad enough that I called her. "Nix," she said again, her voice soft and full of pain. "Baby, where are you? Let me help you." I sobbed harder. My face was hot with emotion. My entire body trembled. I felt completely, utterly broken beyond repair. "Where are you? We can help you," she pleaded.
No. No one could help me. There was no escaping this. I refused to lose her too. I just needed this. This one moment of her and me. I needed to feel connected to the only person who could comfort me. "You can't talk?" she asked. I knew my place was bugged. They'd make me move again if they heard me talking to her. It was only a matter of time before they disconnected my call. I let out another huff of air in answer. Sunshine was always good at reading my mind. Every one of my idiosyncrasies was burned into her awareness of me.
"I'm assuming you're calling about...her."
Smart girl, not using names.
Her. Her. Grace.
Him, too. Oh, Alessandro.
Another sob escaped me.
A fresh wave of tears slipped down my cheeks, and I wiped at them with the back of my hand. I had to take my glasses off because there were so many. "Do you remember the time we found that rat in our apartment?" Sunshine asked. Her change of conversation caught me off guard. I sifted through memories, then released a wary smile when I remembered what she was referencing. We found a dead rat lying on the floor of our apartment. She squealed and screamed, begging me to pick it up. I bent down to grab it, but the fucker jumped away. Turns out, it wasn't dead after all. I nearly pissed myself out of shock.
Wait.
