Page 86 of Tethered Souls

My jaw drops. My pulse spikes.I’ve changed my mind. This is a terrible idea.The thought of standing up in front of a crowd and singing sounded like a straight-up nightmare. When I dreamed of it, I never thought it’d actually happen!

He nods, the decision final, and I let out a little squeak before I control myself.This is a good thing, I tell myself. It’s progress. I can suffer a night of embarrassment for that. Exhaling slowly, I nod back. “Okay then,” I finally manage. “It’s a date.”

“Why did you become an assassin?” The abrupt turn in the conversation throws me off, and my mind blanks for a second. I blink a few times to get it back up and running.

I shrug. “I’m a Black.” I’m not ready to trust him enough to tell him about Lou. About what she means to me. He already has Dayne as collateral. As someone to torture if he ever needs to break me. Dayne, as much as I hate the idea, can handle it. But Lou? She wouldn’t last a second under a knife.

“You could’ve married into a different family.” His hands grip my hips, a subconscious movement that locks me to him.

“Would you want to be someone else’s toy?”

“No.” He pauses, then asks, “Do you like burgers?”

I blink, trying to figure out how we possibly got onto this question. “Um, yeah. I guess.”

He nods, but his lips are tight. Like he isn’t quite pleased with himself.

Remembering he said he likes them too, my lips twitch.Is he trying to ask me on another date?“We could go out to eat after karaoke if you’d like. Just the two of us.”

“Mmm,” he says noncommittally, but there’s an easing to the tightness of his lips. “Why do you specialize in killing kids?”

I tense, then force myself to relax, not giving anything away. If anyone finds out Dayne and I’ve been scamming our clients, not even the Shadow name will stop me from being blacklisted, and there will be absolutely nothing to protect Dayne.

The thing about charging six figures for a kill, as well, is all of your clients are stupid rich, and the rich get especially bitchy when they get played for fools. Given they clearly have no morals against hiring hitmen, they’ll hunt down not just us, but all the kids too. There are more than a hundred of them. It would be impossible for Dayne and I to save them all while we’re also on the run.

“Easy kills,” I say with an indifferent shrug.

He watches me, his eyes looking past my words, and I struggle to keep my breathing even, my face free of any sign of deceit.

His fingers tighten minutely on my hips. He opens his mouth slightly, hesitates, then says, “If my lack of magic gets passed down…” He stops, his lips pressing together as he looks away. My brow furrows as I try to figure out what he’s attempting to say. Whatever it is is clearly weighing on him.

And then it hits me.

The line of ascension follows the Shadow bloodline due to the magic in their veins. If Sau had ever decided to cheat, her firstborn would have been the legitimate heir to the throne. Her husband would have lost all status, only able to rule because of his connection to her. It’s why most of the coups in this Family have tried to put Leno on the throne rather than their own children. Their sons would never be recognized as Boss.

“The Boss has to have the shadow magic,” he says. “Or at the very least be able to pass it down.”

“And if you can’t?” I ask, my throat tight.

“Then it is the reaper’s duty to kill me and any children like me.”

My heart plummets past my stomach and into the soles of my feet. I can’t speak, can’t move. I don’t even want to look at him. How could he have ever asked me to do this? To have a child and fall in love with them, only to watch them die in their teens?

Because he’s Varius fucking Shadow.A fucking monster.

I start to shake as I climb off him. But his fingers dip into my hips, refusing to let me go. “Get off me,” I snap.

“I don’t have a choice.”

“Everyone has a choice! You could step down and just let Leno be Boss!”

“That would be a death sentence. I know too much.”

“But they’rekids. Innocent fucking kids and you –” I stop, horrified at what I’ve just revealed.

“The Family will pay you for them. Your going rate is a hundred thousand, is it not?”

I clamp my mouth shut. I need to put my mask back on, my indifference, but I can’t stop the word from crawling out. “Them?”