Page 114 of Darkest Sin

Sitting beside Nico in his car while we head to Lev’s house – I will never be able to think of it as Denis’s house – is the strangest thing I’ve ever done. He’s my enemy but we’re choosing to work together to stop this wedding. We don’t want Denis and Cillian gaining power over us.

I’m still sore and tired. Unable to sleep last night, I tossed and turned the entire time, thinking of Natalya. Thinking how I couldn’t save her.

And how I have to try.

We arrive at the brownstone and burst in, ready to kill any of Denis’s guards but…

There’s no one here.

We search the whole house and it comes up empty.

“They’re not here,” Nico states the obvious. “Which means that they must be at the wedding already.”

“Denis knew I’d come for him. He must know I’m not dead. Why else hurry the wedding up?”

“Who knows. But where’s the wedding going to take place? I have no idea. My men don’t know.”

I sigh. “CCTV. We can hack it. I have a man who can do it.” I text Charlie and he responds, letting me know he’ll get right on it.

“It will take a while to find. Your wife might already be married by then.”

“So, I’ll just shoot Cillian and call it a day. It won’t be a legal marriage anyway. She’s still married to me.”

“What is going to happen after you get your wife back and I kill Cillian?”

“You mean, I kill Cillian,” I say.

Nico smiles like he finds me amusing. “You’re funny. He’s betrayed me. I think I’m the one who gets to kill him.”

“Well, he stole my wife and is trying to marry her. I think that wins me the right to kill him.”

“Well, I guess we’ll figure it out when we get there.”

“Wherever there is,” I mutter.

Nico sits down on the couch as if he has all the time in the world when we don’t. But for him, killing Cillian isn’t urgent. For me, it is. Natalya could be hurt and I have to stop it.

“You didn’t answer me,” Nico says. “What are we going to do once we stop Cillian? Let each other go? Or kill each other?”

Nico knows I’m hurt. He knows he has the upper hand here. I have to be smart about this.

“Let’s just focus on finding them first and then go from there. Ok?”

“Fine. But you better not shoot me in the back.”

“And you better not shoot me in the back either,” I respond.

Nico smiles once more. “Fine. Deal. If we’re going to shoot each other, it’s going to be in the front.”

“Deal.”

We wait around in awkward, strained silence waiting for Charlie to get back to me. It takes him around thirty minutes to get me the footage which is just time we don’t have.

“Ok. I know where they went,” I say after watching the footage. “Let’s go.”

I’m going to stop this wedding before it can happen.

Natalya