Page 63 of Oblivion
“I don’t…” he trailed off. “I don’t know what to say, Birdy. This sounds like a fucking telenovela.”
“But wait.” I grimaced. “That’s not all.”
I stood up and looked down at Cillian.
“Lazar wants me to take over The Syndicate, Kill. He wants me to control it, and I don’t know what to do.”
“What?”
“Yep,” I answered. “He wants me to take over, to be the next, what? Leader?”
“So what are you going to do?”
“I don’t know.” Shaking my head, I paced from left to right. “I have no fucking idea, but with everything going on, I think maybe I should take it. Maybe this could help us.”
“Are you sure?” he asked carefully. “After everything that's happened.”
“I don’t have to say yes now. I don’t have to do anything right now, but it is an option. He wants to get to know me. He wants to make up for all those years. I don’t know if I could let him. I don’t know if I’m strong enough to let him in.”
“Phee,” Cillian murmured and stood up, taking my hand in his. “You’re one of the strongest people I know. We can talk about this, go through the pros and cons. You don’t have to decide right now.”
“But it could help, right? It could help us to flush out this Belladonna person and to clear up the mess Nikolai left behind.”
“Yes, it definitely could.”
“Kill,” I looked up at him. “He’s going to kill Logan.”
He winced as soon as I said his father’s name, but I knew it wasn’t because he felt bad for him. I had no idea what Logan did to Cillian, but it was obvious to everyone around that there was no love lost between them.
“Let him. Ask him if he needs help, because I would gladly put a bullet through his fucking head.”
“Look,” I started saying and stepped toward the front door. “I think… I think I’ll try to meet him here and there. I mean, he seemed genuine enough.”
“Are you sure this isn’t just another trap?”
“Yes. No.” I huffed. “I don’t know. I just know that something here,” my hand pressed to my stomach, “is telling me that he’s honest and that he wants to try. Maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad thing, having his support. Logan is now leading this entire operation, and I know that there are other assholes involved. Powerful people who need to be stopped. Having Lazar Asterov and his entire empire backing us wouldn’t be such a bad thing, would it?”
“No.” He shook his head. “It wouldn’t be a bad thing, but I think we need to be careful. He may have cleared out his house, but Nikolai had quite a lot of supporters. I wouldn’t be surprised if one of them tried to harm you, while pretending to be on your side.”
“I know, and I will be careful. But for my own sake, I think I want to try at least. I don’t know. Just to try to have some kind of relationship with him. I believe him when he said he tried. I just can’t shake off this feeling that all of this could’ve been avoided if they weren’t trying to wage the war on my back.”
“Well, if he’s willing to try now, maybe you should really hear him out.”
Maybe I should. But would I really be able to let go of the past?
18
OPHELIA
One month later
July
One single matchwas all that was needed to set the fire. You wouldn’t have imagined that such a small thing could cause such destruction, and I felt that my entire life was made out of matches, set to burn one by one, destroying me and everyone around me.
All the secrets.
All the things I was never told about.
