Page 133 of Caught in the Crossfire

“What do you want to do?” Ciel asked.

I stared down at the man. “Where were you going?”

He swallowed. “Shipment pickup. I’m supposed to be down there. They’ll know if I don’t come.”

I glanced at the stairwell, trying to decide if Ciel and I could go after those men ourselves.

“We can’t,” Ciel said softly. “Not the two of us alone. We’ll have to come back.”

Ciel was right. Despite how much I wanted to go storming through those tunnels and rescue the victims held captive there,it would be foolish to do it just the two of us. Frustration bubbled inside my chest.

The darkness behind my sternum writhed. These men had been operating under my nose, using hidden tunnels to walk around literally beneath our feet. I’d been on this street before. I’d busted a brothel not four blocks from here. The sex workers on the street even knew who I was.

Yet still, I didn’t see this happening. They’d taken their victims through those dark tunnels, and when they’d emerged again, they’d stuffed them into cars and carried them away to something even worse.

I knew exactly what I wanted to do to this man. He was right that the other Albanians would know he never showed up.

“Flip him onto his stomach,” I said as I pulled out my knife.

Ciel did what I asked without question. When he realized what I wanted to do—he knew I’d done it before—he nodded solemnly.

He held the man down as I cut his throat. He watched while I carved into his back, separating the muscles and bones from his spine. He didn’t flinch as I pulled his lungs through his back.

The blood seeped into the linoleum, staining it a dark, ugly red.

“Help me string him up,” I said when it was done. We found rope in the back of the store, and he tied it to each of the man’s wrists. Then we strung his body up in the front window of the electronics store.

The blood eagle.

The man’s corpse was a signal and a warning. We were watching. We were coming.

When we got backto the penthouse, covered in blood, I stopped Ciel before he could go to his room.

“Thank you,” I said softly. He could have tried to talk me out of what I’d just done. He could have acted with disgust or horror. But he didn’t. He helped me tonight. Without him, I probably would have rushed into that tunnel by myself, and who knew what would have happened?

“I’m glad I was with you,” he responded. His eyes flicked down to where my hands trembled by my sides. They’d been shaking ever since we got home.

I didn’t regret killing that man. I had no qualms about the violence itself. I had just been consumed with anger. At the Albanians for their horrific actions.

At myself.

“I’m sleeping in your room tonight.” His blue eyes were clear when his hand closed around mine and he pulled me inside.

I didn’t kick him out.

First, I showered. Then, he did.

When we both crawled into my bed, exhaustion overtook me. Our hands interlinked while we lay side by side. As I fell asleep, I couldn’t stop thinking that, despite Ciel’s and Leona’s assurances, I wasn’t a good man.

Maybe I should stop trying to be.

44

RYUJI

It was plastered all over the evening news.

Obi had come stomping into the living room after dinner. He grabbed the remote and clicked the TV on without saying a word. Then we were all treated with the news story about the single most brutal incident of gang violence in the city in over fifty years.