Page 21

Dante

The gunshot still roared in my ears, a phantom echo against the sickening thud of Crispin Sinclair’s body hitting the floor of his office. I could still smell the coppery tang of his blood as it filled the air, like a metallic perfume clinging to the damp chill of the alley.

I didn’t think. To think was to drown in the icy grip of the deed, to become as shattered and lost as Danny.

His vacant stare now seared into my memory.

No, I had to act.

His haunted eyes, the way his trembling hand had clutched mine moments before... they fueled the frantic pulse in my throat, a desperate, savage rhythm. I needed to get him out, away from this fetid pit of shadows where rats squeaked obscenely in the gutters and the reek of decay clawed at my lungs. I had to find somewhere safe, a sanctuary where I could dissect this carnage, this violation, and decide what monstrous act would follow. My hands, slick with sweat, felt alien, cold, yet somehow burning with a fury I couldn’t comprehend.

But the cold logic gnawed: survive.

Protect Danny.

And then... then we would reckon.

Panic clawed at my throat, a taste of bile rising as we scrambled for the emergency exit. The back stairs groaned under our desperate weight, each creaking step a hammer blow against the suffocating dread. The air, thick with stale beer and the tang of fear, hit me like a wall as we burst from the Playground’s rear exit into the inky blackness of the alley.

My heart hammered a frantic tattoo against my ribs, a deafening counterpoint to the city’s low hum. The reek of decay and damp earth assaulted my nostrils, a chilling perfume of urban decay. Left, right—shadows danced, mocking my frantic search for escape, each one a potential threat in the oppressive gloom.

Where the hell were we? This wasn’t just about getting away; it was about survival. The weight of my choices, the chilling certainty of what I left behind, pressed down on me, heavier than the grimy brick walls closing in.

“Leave me,” Danny rasped. His eyes, usually vibrant, were dull embers, reflecting the flickering neon sign of a distant bar—a cruel mockery of life. The man he was, the fighter he was, had crumbled to dust beneath the weight of his actions. His hand, clammy and trembling, brushed against mine.

“Over my dead body,” I snarled, my raw fear for his sanity a bitter tang on my tongue.

I had to get him somewhere safe, but where? Home was a family drama waiting to happen. Stella and Digger would drag him back to the sterile hell of the hospital, where they’d dissect him, not heal him. The Soulless Sinners’ clubhouse? No. I couldn’t deal with the brothers’ curiosity or their brutal judgment. They’d tear the truth from me, piece by agonizing piece.

The decision, a gut-wrenching lurch of desperation, clawed its way to the surface.

A motel. A temporary haven, a fleeting respite from the storm raging around us. But even the sterile, slightly sour smell of bleach and stale cigarettes couldn’t mask the chilling premonition that this wasn’t a solution; it was only a desperate, fleeting postponement of the inevitable.

The stench of rotting fish and stale urine clawed at my nostrils as I hauled Danny down the alley, his weight dead against my arm. His shallow breaths rasped like a dying engine. My fingers were slick with a mixture of sweat and something else as I fumbled for my phone, the cold metal a stark contrast to the clammy heat of my palm.

Torment. He was my last, desperate hope as I punched in his number, each digit a prayer whispered into the suffocating darkness.

“Yeah?” His voice was cold and sharp.

“Torment, it’s Dante.” My voice, even to my own ears, sounded thin, brittle.

“I know, Intern. What happened now?” He knew me too well and heard the cracks in my carefully constructed facade.

“Meet me at the motel near Pier 83.”

“Why?” The question hung, barbed and menacing.

“Just be there,” I snapped, the desperation a raw, exposed nerve. The order was a desperate gamble, a last-ditch attempt to cling to some semblance of control before the abyss swallowed me whole. I slammed the phone shut, the sound echoing the hollow ache in my chest.

A shrill, desperate whistle sliced through the greasy night air, a sound swallowed almost instantly by the city’s growl. Sweat slicked my palms, the taste of fear metallic on my tongue. It wasn’t long—a blessedly short eternity—before the yellow glare of headlights cut through the gloom. The cab, a battered behemoth smelling of stale cigarettes and desperation, lurched to a halt. No gentle tap, no polite summons as I ripped the rear door open, the metal groaning a protest against my frantic shove. Danny, his face a mask of terrified resignation, tumbled inside. I followed, slamming the door shut with the force of a condemned man’s last prayer as my heart beat a frantic drum against my ribs.

“Harbor Motel, Pier 83,” I said as the cab driver sped off into the night.

My skull thudded against the vinyl headrest, a dull ache blooming behind my eyes. I squeezed them shut, desperate for a sliver of respite, only to be jolted awake by the cab’s violent shuddering halt.

The motel’s lurid, blinking sign stabbed at my retinas—a cheap, neon promise of oblivion.

A wave of nausea rolled over me.

Slamming a crumpled bill into the driver’s greasy hand, I stumbled out, hauling Danny along in my wake. His silence was heavier than any argument. The air hung thick with the cloying sweetness of cheap perfume and stale cigarettes, a miasma clinging to the peeling paint of the motel. Each footstep on the cracked asphalt echoed the hollow ache in my chest.

Paying for the room felt like a surrender. Then, at the end of the dilapidated walkway, bathed in the sickly glow of the sign, he was there. Torment. Leaning against his bike, a silhouette against the bruised purple sky, radiating an unnerving calm that was far more menacing than any outright aggression. His eyes, dark and knowing, held a promise—or a threat—I couldn’t decipher.

Torment’s eyes locked onto Danny.

Before I could even register his movement, Torment was a blur of motion, a dark shadow propelled by something primal, something desperate. He scooped Danny into his arms. The groan that escaped Danny’s lips was a rasping sound that scraped against my own raw nerves.

“What in the hell happened?” Torment’s voice, usually a low rumble, was tight, strained, a barely controlled explosion held captive by sheer willpower. His touch, harsh yet strangely gentle, on Danny’s limp form sent a shiver down my spine.

My own hands trembled as I fumbled with the key, the cold metal biting into my palm. Each click of the lock felt agonizingly slow, the silence stretching between us thick with the weight of unspoken terror. The scent of pine from the air freshener, usually a comfort, now felt sickeningly sweet against the metallic stench clinging to Danny.

I pushed the door open; however, the stale air inside offered no respite from the storm raging deep within me.

The bed swallowed Danny whole, a pale island in a sea of crumpled sheets. Torment loomed, a thundercloud of fury, his voice a guttural growl. “What the hell happened, Intern? Spit it out.”

Ignoring the raw, animal rage radiating off him, I dropped to my knees, the cold, rough fabric of the carpet biting into my skin. I clamped onto Danny’s head, forcing his face towards mine, the tremor in his skull a sickening echo against my palm. “Danny! Where are you, goddammit?” His eyes remained sealed, lids fluttering like trapped birds. His body, a convulsing knot of muscle and bone, shook beneath me. A low, guttural whimper, a broken song of terror spilled from his lips. His gibberish clawed at my sanity. “Danny, come back to me.”

Nothing. Just the frantic, ragged rhythm of his breath, a rasping counterpoint to the pounding in my ears.

He recoiled as I rose and scrambled away, like a terrified animal cornered. His head in his hands, he rocked, a silent scream trapped within the confines of his skull.

The stench of sweat and fear choked me.

“Fuck!” I roared, clawing at my hair until my scalp screamed in protest.

This wasn’t just bad. This was a goddamn catastrophe.

Torment seized my arm, his grip like a vise, his face a mask of brutal concern. Hot breath washed over me, carrying the scent of his own fear. “What in the unholy hell is going on?”

The words ripped from me, raw and ragged. “I shot Sinclair.”

Torment released me, his gaze snapping back to Danny’s convulsing form. The harsh fluorescent light of the room seemed to amplify the stark horror of the scene.

“He’s seen enough death to fill a graveyard. That wouldn’t trigger this. Tell me everything, Intern. Because Sypher is shattering before my eyes.”

My voice cracked, my confession bitter. “We fought, okay? This is all my fault. If I had just told him the truth... none of this... this shit wouldn’t have happened.”

Torment approached Danny, extending his hand, only to have Danny flinch. His choked scream tore through the silence. “Don’t... don’t touch me!”

Torment retreated; his own eyes filled with a chilling understanding.

“Alright, kid. I won’t.” His voice, though softer, held an edge of steel.

“He’s... lost in his head. We need to let him find his way back.” My own voice was tight with suppressed panic.

“What do you mean, ‘ lost in his head’ ?”

“He does this sometimes. Disassociates himself from reality,” I admitted, my voice an inaudible murmur. “But... never this bad. He’s never been this... broken.”

“Disassociates?” Torment’s question, a rasping whisper that scraped against the silence of the room like nails on a chalkboard, echoed the chilling emptiness in Danny’s eyes. “Explain it, Intern. Now.”

The air in the room was suffocatingly thick.

I sank into the stiff chair, the worn fabric digging into my thighs, my head a throbbing weight in my hands. The fluorescent lights hummed a nauseating counterpoint to the rhythmic rocking of Danny’s body on the bed, a percussive beat to his silent suffering. “It began subtly, in his sophomore year. These... episodes. He would withdraw from everything. Classes? Forget it. He barely tolerated breathing near other people. Even me at first. But I could always reel him back in. I’ve pulled him back from the precipice many times. But this...” My voice cracked, raw with grief. My gaze locked onto Danny, a broken marionette muttering incomprehensible gibberish, the rocking motion a desperate, frantic attempt to claw his way back to solid ground. “This... this is different. He’s fallen into the abyss, and I can’t... I can’t reach him.”

My words hung in the air, heavy with the suffocating weight of helplessness.

“Is he suicidal?”

“What?” My gaze snapped up. Torment’s eyes, cold and calculating, bored into mine. “No.”

“These episodes... how many times have you dragged him back from the brink?”

“Three. At least three times I’ve had to wrestle Danny back from the abyss. After a few nights of rest and a mountain of caffeine, Danny would claw his way back to the surface.”

“Before these... episodes... was Sypher stressed?” Torment leaned forward, the flickering neon sign outside casting his face in a strobe of lurid light. His intensity was a physical pressure.

“What the fuck do you think?!” I exploded, years of suppressed fury erupting. “He’s Sypher. The goddamn legend. The Biker Federation’s digital whisperer, dancing on the razor’s edge of their brutal underworld. Reaper has his number on speed dial. Universities were throwing scholarships at him like scraps to a rabid dog. Professors—desperate, pathetic vultures—circled him, tried to pick him clean. Every fucking alphabet group known to man wanted him and tried relentlessly to recruit him. Danny hasn’t been able to take a breath, have a moment of peace, a single goddamn second to himself since he was sixteen and the fucking world discovered the unholy power at his fingertips.”

My hands clenched into fists, my knuckles bone-white.

The weight of Danny’s burden, the crushing pressure he carried, was almost unbearable—even for me.

Torment’s eyes narrowed. “So, the kid’s been carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders. And you, Intern, you’ve been his anchor.” His voice was steady, but his eyes flickered with a mix of calculation and concern. “What changed this time? Why did he fall so deep?”

I shook my head, my throat tight with the weight of my failure. “I don’t know. Maybe it was Sinclair. Maybe it was the constant pressure. Or maybe...” I trailed off, the truth too bitter to voice.

Torment growled, his gaze boring into mine. “Maybe what, Dante? You need to tell me everything if I’m going to help you pull Sypher back from the edge.”

I took a shuddering breath, my unspoken words clawing at my throat. “It’s my fault. I should have told him the truth and then maybe he wouldn’t have ended up at the Playground with that cunt.”

The room seemed to shrink around me, the stale air heavy with my unspoken truth.

Torment’s expression softened, and the hard edges of his face relaxed as he took a seat at the table. “Dante, I can’t help Sypher if you don’t tell me what happened. Something caused this break and you know what it is. Tell me.”

Looking at him, I whispered, “He remembered.”

“Remembered what?”

“Me.”

“That should have made him happy, not throw him into a mental breakdown.”

The bitter taste of bile rose once more in my throat. My head throbbed, a dull, insistent pulse mirroring the frantic hammering of my guilt. Danny’s ravaged face, the vacant stare that had replaced the vibrant spark I had once loved, seared itself into my retinas.

It was my fault.

My fingerprints were smeared all over this catastrophe.

“He was screwing Carrie,” I rasped, my words catching in my throat, each syllable a jagged stone. “She was a former one-night stand from before... before us. Sinclair, that son of a bitch, dug her up. Used her like a pawn to checkmate Danny. He called me earlier, his smug voice dripping with satisfaction, and told me where to find them.”

The memory slammed into me, the stale scent of her cheap perfume assaulting my nostrils. Sinclair’s opulent office, the dark wooden floor doing little to muffle my approach, the sickening tableau that unfolded before me. Danny, his body slick with sweat and betrayal, tangled with that... thing . Carrie, her face a mask of knowing malice, a cruel smirk twisting her lips. Then, the chilling sound of my name, uttered by her like a curse. The icy grip of dread tightened around my chest as I watched the flicker of recognition ignite in Danny’s eyes.

It was the slow, agonizing crack that shattered his fragile sanity. And I witnessed the light in him go out, replaced by a terrifying emptiness.

If I hadn’t been there... If I hadn’t ripped apart the illusion.

“What happened next, Intern?” Torment’s voice cut through the suffocating silence, a whiplash of cold steel.

My gaze locked with his, burning with a feral intensity. The guttural rasp of my confession ripped through the silence of the room. “I blew her fucking brains out!”

My words hung in the air, heavy and irrevocable, stained with the crimson horror of my act.

The taste of blood—hers and Sinclair’s—still on my tongue.