Page 3 of Crescendo (Beautiful Monsters #1)

“Brick walls always look a little better covered in a layer of chemicals, don’t ya think?”

I nod, though I don’t know why. Spray paint paired with brick walls typically infers some kind of graffiti. Vandalism. I glance down at his hands again, and what I’d first mistaken for dirt and grime takes on another identity.

“You paint?”

“Well, now, that’s one way to put it. Come on.” He jerks his head toward the opposite end of the alley from the way leading to the hotel. “I could use your expert opinion, little Pyro Girl.”

I freeze solid, digging my heels into the pavement. “You should go.” I’ve been so stupid.

Vinny’s man will be here in exactly thirty seconds...twenty-eight seconds. Every bone in my body warns me to walk away before the hound dogs come running, but I can’t . My brief minutes of freedom were intruded on. It just isn’t fair. He’ll have to leave first.

“Please.”

“Awful strange request to be left alone in an alley with matches, Pyro Girl,” the man says.

I realize, for the first time, that he’s concerned.

The line of his gaze travels from the matchbook clenched in my fist down to the barrel of newspaper.

“What kind of law-abiding citizen would I be if I did that, huh?”

“Some people are coming,” I blurt out, staring down at my clenched left hand. My words come unguarded without Vinny here to filter them, and apparently, the truth is a reckless addiction. “If you’re here when they show up, they’re going to put a bullet in your head.”

“Oh, is that so?” The man seems to mull it over, but shock isn’t one of the emotions that crosses his shrouded features.

In the end, he laughs. “Well then, that will be one hell of a way to end my night. Come on.” He holds a hand out to reinforce the words that seem like a command on the surface. But they aren’t. A request? A question.

For five precious seconds, I eye his hand.

It’s entirely possible this graffiti artist who smells like cigarettes and stale body odor means to lure me down the alley for some nefarious purpose.

Would God really be so cruel as to throw me into the frying pan twice in one night? Could he really be so merciful?

My time is almost up, but I don’t hear footsteps. Vinny’s man is a second late, and I seize the moment by nudging the stranger’s palm with one outstretched finger. Handshakes. Hand holding— those embraces most people take for granted. I can’t remember how to initiate them properly.

Amused by my attempt, the man laughs. Then he flexes his fingers and captures my entire wrist in a firm grip.

“Come on, Pyro.”

I try not to balk when he steers me down the narrow alley and then toward an even narrower strip between two buildings. Like a snake, the man weaves in and out through the tight spaces, bracing his back against the wall. Left with no choice, I copy him, sucking my waist in.

Eventually, we reach another alley. Then another—but we seem to be moving in circles. I bet we’re only a block or so away from the hotel, but for some reason, he prefers to take the backstreets. I’m sure the thought should terrify me. Instead, it intrigues me.

“So...do you like art?”

“Huh?” I frown at the question.

“Art.” The man chuckles. “Though I suppose I should have asked that question before dragging you off to see my mural, huh?”

It seems like a rhetorical question, so I don’t answer. It isn’t until he glances back at me that I remember what he initially asked.

“So...art. You like it?”

I shrug and then nod. Up this close, the stranger doesn’t seem so threatening.

He may be tall, but he’s nearly as thin as I am.

There’s a gracefulness to the way he walks, like a dancer, almost—nothing like Vinny’s hostile, jerky movements that make me suspect that he’s always anticipating the moment someone might put a bullet in his head.

This man—or maybe he’s more like a boy. His eyes are close-set and definitely blue.

There’s a line of stubble along his chin, but I wouldn’t peg him as any older than nineteen—maybe two or three years younger than I am.

“Is this a stupid question?” he asks suddenly, his mouth cracking to display two rows of slightly crooked teeth. I think he’s smiling.

For some reason, I try to smile back. “Yes. I like art... Yes.” My mind may have stupidly forgotten the timer on my freedom, but my body hasn’t. My skin burns beneath the stranger’s fingers, almost as if threatening to betray me. He’ll know. He’ll know.

I yank my hand back, twisting it out of his grip. This time, he lets me.

“So, art,” he says quickly, as if trying to postpone the moment I’ll turn on my heel and run away. For some reason, it does. Talking is too addictive. Too tempting. Words hold less power here, outside of Vinny’s fortress. It’s way too easy to let them slip. “What kind?”

“Music,” I say on command. I couldn’t stay silent, even if I’d wanted to; the answer is ingrained in my soul.

He laughs again and continues to tug me down the alleyway, one slow step at a time. He’s savoring this adventure. I’m anticipating its violent ending. Almost two whole minutes, now...

“ Music. Oh, God. Which bastion of modern music do you subscribe to? Composer Swift or Maestro Bieber?”

I shake my head, not recognizing the references. “Bach,” I say. “Yo Yo Ma.”

“Ah...a true musician. Singer or player?”

“Cello.”

He nods as if the answer had been obvious all along. “So, you make music as well as fire with those magic fingers, little Pyro?”

I don’t answer. My love of music is like an old wound that can never fully heal.

Some days, I think it’s starting to close up, the rent flesh knitting together again.

Other days, Vinny likes to cut it open and rub salt into the festering gap.

Afterward, he’ll always kiss the bleeding sore and murmur, “All better.”

Like tonight. Tonight was his peace offering. His gift. My torture. Pain mingles with hope and shame, and it’s suddenly harder to breathe .

“You all right?” the stranger asks, cocking his head.

I flinch. Even my facial expressions are suddenly out of my control. I fight to return my mouth to its worn, “charming” smile. Vinny’s man can’t be far now, but I’d hear him coming, at least. I won’t let the man in front of me pay for my stupidity.

“I’m fine...”

“Save the pouting for when you see this piece of shit, okay? It’s just up ahead.”

We travel ten more steps, though once again, I can’t help but feel like we didn’t go very far at all. I can still hear the same sounds I heard when I left the hotel—the same concierge yelling for a taxi and the same cadence of honking horns.

Abruptly, the man stops, and I almost run into him.

“Voila,” he says, gesturing to yet another brick wall. “Boom, there it is.”

“Wow.” I take a step forward, transfixed by what’s in front of me.

Right here, in the middle of neatly laid bricks, is a whole new world slapped onto the impromptu canvas.

A man watches me from amid it all, larger than life, his glowing, red eyes transfixed on my body as if he can peer right through my flesh and into my very soul.

Vinny wouldn’t call this art. Vulgar , he’d say before rattling off something demeaning in Italian.

Tailored suits and well-made cigars— that was where his appreciation of the word ended.

“Is that supposed to be the devil?” I blurt out while some inner part of me laughs at the notion. The devil lives in a high-rise. He wears suits with custom cufflinks and sips imported champagne from glass flutes.

However, if I still believed in the fantasized version of Lucifer, this mural would depict him well: a dark shadow lurking in the bowels of the city...watching. Always watching.

“Something like that,” the stranger says. “Though...a little more abstract. He’s missing something. Here. ”

I flinch when something cold presses into my fingers. They curl around it automatically, and I glance down to find that I’m holding a can of spray paint.

“Maybe you can help.”

“I...I can’t.” I try to give the can back, but he backs away, holding both hands up. “I’ll mess it up.” My voice cracks. In a world of “perfection,” mistakes are harshly punished. “I can’t—”

“Put those magic fingers to use,” the stranger insists.

I swallow hard at that taunt. Magic fingers . “I had an audition today,” I say to the wall. I don’t know why the words rush out, but it’s easy to say them when the man beside me says nothing in return.

He doesn’t try to shut me up. He doesn’t prod me to go on...

I’m silent for four precious seconds. Then the truth spills free, and it’s like a dam breaking.

“It was an audition for an orchestra—not a big one.” It feels important to clarify that when he lets out a sharp breath.

He’s impressed, though I don’t know if it’s by the words I say or by how quickly I say them.

“Not a big one. But they wanted me. They offered me a job to play in the strings, second chair. Second chair. It’snotabigdealbut—”

“That’s awesome, Pyro Girl,” he says quietly.

Awesome. I lock that word away, somewhere deep inside myself where I hope Vinny won’t be able to find it.

“I can’t take it though. I can’t take it.

I have...” My throat aches beneath the bigger truths that won’t come out so easily.

I have Vinny at my shoulder, whispering in my ear.

You don’t need to make a living, Mi Bella.

I’ll take care of you. He let me audition as a pittance.

The fact that he wouldn’t allow me to accept my prize was just another game we’ve played since we were children.

Vinny comes second to none. No one. Nothing. “I have...previous commitments.”

My voice breaks—a weakness that wouldn’t go unpunished in Vinny’s presence .

My stranger notices. Even worse, he notices and merely sighs. “That fucking sucks, Pyro Girl.”

“Yes,” I hear myself croak. My hand trembles and the can still in my grip rattles. “It f-fucking does.”