Page 82 of Silent Schemes

There are no words for this.

She weeps, and I watch the world go by, counting heartbeats, waiting for the moment when she can breathe again.

When she finally looks up, her face is wrecked, but her eyes are clear. “I want you.”

“Good,” I answer, kissing her again, this time slowly.

Outside, the world keeps spinning.

Inside, it finally stops.

CHAPTER TEN

Sienna

The morning starts with blood in my mouth and the taste of betrayal on my tongue.

I've been awake for hours, watching Varrick sleep beside me, counting his breaths like they're numbered.

Which they are.

Twenty-three days left on my father's deadline.

Twenty-three days to figure out how to save him, Maya, and the secret growing inside me that makes everything infinitely more complicated.

The sunrise paints Vancouver in shades of gold and crimson through the floor-to-ceiling windows, and I can't help but think it looks like the city is already bleeding.

Prophetic, maybe.

Or maybe I just see blood everywhere now—in sunrises, in wine, in the way Varrick's lips turned red from biting them last night when he was trying not to wake the neighbors with what he was doing to me.

My hand drifts to my stomach, still flat, still keeping its secret.

Four weeks now, maybe five.

The nausea comes in waves, usually in the morning, and I've been hiding it by pretending to go for early runs.

Instead, I sit in my car in the parking garage, breathing through the sickness, wondering how something so small can already be changing everything.

My phone buzzes at 6 AM.

My father’s number.

My blood turns to ice.

I slip out of bed carefully, padding to the bathroom so Varrick won't hear.

If there’s one thing my father doesn't like, it’s to be kept waiting.

"You've gone quiet, daughter." His voice is razor wire wrapped in silk, the same tone he used when I was twelve and learning how to hold a knife steady. "So much silence after your cousin's unfortunate accident."

"Bastian's wrist will heal," I say, keeping my voice neutral, professional.

The voice of a weapon, not a daughter.

"His pride won't. But that's not why I'm calling." There's a pause, the kind that makes smart people nervous and dead people out of stupid ones. I hear him lighting one of his Cuban cigars, the ritual he performs before delivering bad news. "The Rosetti family is restless. Something about their money going missing. Their collector. Three of their men left bloody in a warehouse. You wouldn't know anything about that, would you?"

My stomach drops.