The Night Is Ours: Chapter 6 - To Kill a Rockstar
“You think this shit is just fun and games, dontchu.” I tightened my fingers around the revolver’s handle. "Just think you can kick the door down, kill whatever you want. Shred, get drunk, fuck all over the corpse."
“Not like anyone took the trouble to write down the Laws of the Hunt. Even if they were, who’d gonna be the cops? You miserable Apex fuckers?” He ashed his cigarette…wasn’t even talking harsh. No smugness, no mocking or judging me.
He pitied me.
Stillness hung between us.
I moved first.
Ferals used to control Penn's Point y'know...pft there's that pigeon-stare of disbelief. Yes you dumb pups, used to be Abathor and his slimy brood'd step from the edge of their turf in those swamps outside of West Dalton. They'd swim like sharks along a current of their making, crawl onto the shore, terrorize whoever their big daddy monster told 'em to...that's one reason the Point changed hands so many times – just a natural magnet for war I guess. Heh...give you three guesses what Vera was bringin' to the Point that night...
Doomed to be a killer
Since I came out the nutsac
I'm in a murderous mindstate
With a heart full of terror
I see the devil in the mirror
BUCK BUCK, Lights out...
I bobbed my head for a bit to Ice Cube barking rage into my ear. Dipped my finger in the jar of war paint.
Had to lean pretty close to the mirror to get the white jagged lines just right around my lips...never was much one for makeup, ‘cept maybe some eyeliner, bit of red on my lips when they weren’t hot with blood. Tonight though...ivory jaguar fangs, stylized but simple along my jaws.
That shit spoke to me, ¿entiendes? Jaguar Knights were long dead, their heads stuck on pikes by Cortés five centuries ago, but war…hell, long as there were Mortals, there’d be war. Used to be, the Knights, they dragged doomed fools off the battlefield, got their hearts ripped out to keep the sun rising day by day.
That big cat still crept through conflict like a symbol; even a stupid fuckin' gringo like Yusuf Mizrah could understand what it meant when I came at him wearing fangs. I'd leave 'im alive...probably...but I wasn't rolling up on Penn’s Point to take prisoners tonight.
‘Cause your body is exposed to the midnight mist,
All you weak motherfuckers give my ring a kiss.
A black stripe under each eye. Hair tied back undera blood red bandana. I held up Big Ben – a burnished blue S&W Model 25. Loaded with fat .45 ACPs. I flicked the cylinder, gave him a spin...I loved that sound, a rapid click-clack that sang different when loaded up with six man-stoppers. If I had anything to say about it - and I had everything to say - at least one of these would bust open Yusuf Mizrah.
Head. Guts. Maybe I’d blast his fuckin’ dick off, just to make a point. Didn't matter where, motherfucker would regrow it, but he'd get the message I shoulda given him the first time I walked up in his turf.
Yusuf Mizrah was that pea under my pillows, fuckin’ up my good night’s sleep. Asshole thought he was special, like he could get away with shit. "Don't wanna take me seriously, pretty-boy puto? Last mistake you make." It wouldn’t be, of course, he'd live to fuck up another day unless I decided to put more than two .45s through his skull -
I can't .
...the fuck ?
Like a voice in my head that was mine, but wasn't...like my conscience decided to choose the worst time to make her debut appearance.
Wasn't like me to hesitate before dropping bodies; nah, fuck that shit. If I needed, I'd shove the barrel right behind his teeth, kissin' up against the roof, pull the trigger and -
I can't.
"Qué chingados is that shit?!" I shouted, fangs ripping bloody from my gums. I screamed at the weak fuckin' bitch in my head who thought I was better than this. I wasn't better. There was no fuckin’ better, no worse —
This life was a zero sum game. You win, you live another day, you take home the prize.
You lose?
I slowly brought the pistol up, pressed the barrel to my temple, staring myself down in the mirror. "Buck buck. Lights out."
I was a bad fuckin' bitch with a big cat's killing grin, black ink-shadow around my eyes...looked good too. Navy blue sports bra, utilitarian and sleek, but it showed enough cleavage to keep Yusuf’s eyes wandering. Levis faded from too many trips through the laundry, they rode low and tight on my hips.
Wanted him to see who he was messin' with – take a nice long look.
Cuz real talk, I liked when he looked. More than when Mateo, Jo or Diana checked me out. Couldn’t admit it, not out loud, barely even in my brain-meat.
This bullshit contradiction rattled my skull – one minute I wanted him to smash me til I screamed, the next minute I wanted to blast him til he was dead – no doubt about it, some Enkindled curse. Got me all fucked up, hormonal catalysts weren’t doing shit. Never been in this kinda dumbass situation, my heart screaming wide-jawed for blood and my lower belly tense and coiled like a snake, calling for him.
Only violence could unravel this kind of twisted shit.
Violence solved all problems; war was good for absolutely everything.
I snapped the safety, slid Big Ben into my waistband…cold steel kept me on my toes. Civvies could gawp all scared but I didn’t give a fuck. Uncle Sam himself gave me the go-ahead, Louisiana state law said I could open-carry all I wanted. Didn't need no clerk’s permit.
You'd be hard pressed to find someone in the Riviera who wasn't strapped or rolling with someone who was. It was just that kind of town. So was Penn's Point, but Mizrah? Galen? Too arrogant. Yusuf was from tulip-blue Chicago, wasn't used to how we did things down here in the Land of Traitors.
Out the door of my mama's house – passed down to me when the liver disease took her. Wasn’t much to flex about, low-slung bungalow with a white picket fence and yard. Unlike other slobs in my neck of town who were lucky to score a family-dwelling home this deep in-town, I kept it clean. No vehicle-corpses bleeding oil on the grass. No overgrown, ratty-ass yard like a field of untrimmed pubes. Hell...I even kept up that rusty-eaten old jungle gym me and my hermanita beat to shit when we were kids.
I kept my ride at home – just a thirty minute walk through the neon-blazing streets, sidewalks thick with civvies getting lit and thieves taking their due. The Crimson glow colored my white hoody red as maraschino cherries, red as organ blood...made me think of the light in that bathroom at Temple Hall (not to mention it smelled a bit like piss out here too).
I popped a marb from a red box in my pocket, slid it between my lips...tonguing the filter slowly, rolling it between my sharp teeth and tasting the bitter war paint. My thoughts drifted back to when I first got a load of that prettyboy hijo de puta ...
Lotta Firstbloods couldn't tolerate big-ass, rowdy crowds of Mortals. Sensory overload or whatever – too much paranoia around Prey that could suddenly turn on us, wipe us all off the face of the Earth. Lucky me, us Night Howlers weren’t so easily shook.
Yeah, I loved a room full of easily spooked mortals as much as the next Turnskin, but I wasn’t chasing no 'undying glory' .
I threw down a quick but heavy imprecation – the Humans would see exactly who they expected to see – and I juked past security, Jo’s 9mm hugging my hip. I wasn’t exactly looking to start shit, cuz you didn’t bring a Glock 17 if you were serious about dropping a Therid. Bleeding Yusuf out though, that wasn’t the game plan when I followed him into that rank-as-sin bathroom.
Not gonna lie, there’s something dirty about jumping a dude while he’s taking a piss. Honest as I’m standing, I really considered it, watching him piss into that concrete ditch. Honorable, cool-headed thing to do would have been to just wait for him to finish, zip up, then have my words with him.
Thing is, I’d heard about Yusuf Mizrah. A disciple of Celais Song wasn’t gonna look at me seriously if he didn’t know I could take him out. I’d stick his ass in checkmate first, then we could hash it out.
I whispered that same imprecation against him and his brain cloaked me against his eyes. He glanced right past me, smirking all confident even he thought he was alone. He zipped up (and yeah, I had to resist the urge to check what he was workin’ with). I slid behind him while he was washing his hands, and good on ‘im. I’d probably have just gunned him down on principle if he hadn’t.
I stabbed the barrel up against his kidney. Squeezing off a bullet there meant he'd bleed like a stuck pig, fucked for his little show…not to mention it’d hurt like a burning bitch to fix the pulped meat I’d leave him with.
“Just take my wallet before you start to regret this," and ooo he sounded real pissy. Even all angry like that, I could feel its baritone thrum working its bullshit magic.
This wasn't the time to act like some fucking fool girl with a hard clit and a headful of jitters.
Nah like, I probably overcompensated when I snatched the back of his neck and slammed his princely face right against the bathroom countertop. Rattled his teeth, bruised his cheekbone. "Don't even think about trying shit, I'll cap you before your show. You wouldn't like that,” I warned him, a quiet threat…bit too close to a purr for my liking. I dug my fingers into a pressure point, real mean, just to remind him who was holding the cards.
Son of a bitch wasn’t fazed for shit.
He cranked his head to look at me from where I had him bitch-bent on the sink–motherfucker was smirking. “You’re Vera Estrada, aren’t you.”
I kept my mouth shut but the quiet was louder than any answer.
“Heard you had some balls on you, didn't think you'd just come kicking into my turf like this,” he chuckled in this…dumb fuckin’ Yankee accent all cocksure.
Goddamn if I wasn’t flattered.
I leaned my elbows up against the Baxter Bridge railing, watching yachts churn the oily water. Their wakes smeared rougey lights across the Red Rock River...looked like a river of gore, pouring into the Gulf's hungry maw. I bet there was some hidden meaning there, but fuck if I could figure it out.
My first big mistake? Not hitting him from the get go. I’m not talking kissing his face against the countertop, I mean something real . Blowing his kidney out, for example…or at the least pistol whipping his teeth into his mouth. Wouldn’t be smiling all cute and shit then. Yeah...that's what I'd do this time when I got to him. No words, just let the pistol do the talking.
"Can I do it?" I asked aloud, grinning at my distorted reflection like a fuckin’ lunatic...looked like some goofy bitch, neon-lit all red like I was blushing, smiling like a dumb-ass girl at one of his concerts. That's what his Enkindled bullshit did to me.
"Kinda the first question aint' it. Just how *deep* are those little bitch-claws of his sunk?"
My reflection mirrored my lips, like she was asking the question.
I wracked my brain, hunting for what he did to make me hesitate...
"Can I look at you?"
It wasn’t like he came at me all hard like, 'bitch show your face if you're gonna roll up on me', or all 'look me in the eye'. His voice was soft, a bit husky like he was clowning around. Not like he had lead ready to punch through him.
“The fuck – bro.” I moved my hand up his back to grab his hair, my traitor fingers wandering over the crags of his sinews threaded on his spine. He wasn’t supposed to be acting all coy and shit. “I’m not here to play with you – ”
“Well I wanna know what you look like, and then I’ll talk."
I balked just a bit, caught like a buzzard hovering in the thermal of his voice.
“Come on,” he purred all mischievous and unshaken, “we’re both just running through different parts of the Jungle…least you can do is look me eye-to-eye if you’re gonna roll up in my turf.”
Damn him...even in this piss-and-shit stinkin' bathroom I could smell him, and he smelled good. Too good for his own good.
His voice wrapped around me like smoke, and I found myself wondering what the harm was…yeah, you know, I wanted him to have a look, see just who the fuck he was messing with.
I thought he’d size me up, maybe sneer at me like a real tough guy.
Yusuf Mizrah, trouble maker, kin-killer, an annoyingly handsome threat (even if my own pack was too damn blind to see it)...
He drank me in like I was stunning. Even with the Glock staring down his belly, ready to rip holes in his guts, son of a bitch made me feel beautiful.
I hated that shit.
I fuckin’ rejected it.
I loved it , even as I was setting myself up for the hurt.
The male gaze wasn’t exactly what got me off. Not most of the time anyway. Jo used to tell me my eyes were a sacred darkness; Mateo loved my hair, called it a ‘black silk waterfall’ - only poetic thing he ever said. Diana was all about my tits, said they were nice and perky–but Yusuf’s eyes crawled over my everything, hooked on all my best parts.
I stuck my lower lip out like I was getting bored, hooded my gaze to kill the light in my eyes. My belly did this flutter-kick when his stare dropped to the space between my neck and hips. It made me remember the slick heat between my thighs–Mateo and I had gone at it earlier, he was still hot in me. Wasn’t something I’d normally even register.
This time I felt desired. Real sexy. I knew he could smell my packmate in me, didn’t know he’d look at me like he wanted to push Mateo’s cum deeper in…I tried not to think of his own, mingling together in me. Fucker could tell I was thinkin’ something, grinning all snide like that at me. Something about his eyes on me, got my palms all sweaty.
Yusuf was a fine bastard and he knew it. He wasn’t as big, not as thick in the chest as Mateo but those six feet still stacked like the protag of an action movie. Nice hair too. Looked like he’d gotten a fade and let it grow just enough for those black bristles curl a bit in the humidity. I remembered how it felt under my fingers, soft and sharp, springing back into place.
Had to say somethin’, elsewise I’d start gawping like a fangless groupie. "You tryin’ some Enkindled staring-contest shit to mesmerize me, bonitillo?” He didn’t answer…can’t lie, I was staring at his abs, wondering if I could find a reason to throw hands with him, find an excuse to drag my nails over them.
Then he said it: “Nah…pretty sure you already got me all spiral-eyed. Might wanna gun me down first before it gets complicated.”
It was a hokey fuckin’ line, and it made my heart's season change from slow-thawing winter to dew-slicked Spring.
Summer heat burned in my chest, putting steel in my step as I stalked across Baxter Bridge, keeping my eyes peeled for turf warnings.
Spotted one right from the get-go…motherfuckers were serious. One of the red-painted cross struts on the bridge had been tagged with a pair of interlinked blue crowns. Decent graffiti. Weren’t just a claim.
It was a challenge facing my own territory, like they were beckoning us to stroll into the Point and find out just who ran the show. If they’d had their roots dug in here the bridge would have been warded; runes filled with Accursed Blood, emitting a psychic scream only we could hear…like a dog whistle carved outta asphalt. Would made my ears bleed, and they’d come running, loaded for bear.
None of that though. The only sound was traffic and Penn’s Point crumbling before me…place was basically a shit-filled ditch compared to the Riviera. It was one of those districts you shunned unless you had business you couldn’t avoid – like Ashland’s outskirts, riddled with nothin’ but car dealerships and meth dens. Here across the bridge, it was all foundries and warehouses, stinking of soldering flux and sun-cooked tin roofs roasted the air.
Sweaty workers whose jobs hadn’t been sent off to China, Mexico or New Sarmatia took their anemic paychecks into brownstone wannabes. Their facades were coal-stained and rain-worn.
I bet ya’ll think I’m paranoid about the so-called ‘Kings of Midnight’...just two of em, nothing against an established pack of four, right?
Well those two bastards had cleaned out the bratva , those unaligned perdedores squatting at that arcade – hell I heard they killed Big Belly, giant-ass Spider-Ogre living on top of the train station.
Two guys pulled that off in three nights.
You think a force like that was gonna just stop there?
Obviously not. They were more than just a danger to our pride; the Kings of Midnight were a pair of knives pointed at our throats and hearts. I wish Mateo would pull his skull outta his ass and take ‘em seriously.
He’d been slipping, ever since he started cozying up with the Fangs. Probably had it in his hollow head that they’d protect us.
It was like he’d forgotten how we took the Riviera by our own damned selves with nobody at our backs.
The faint stink of someone smoking a clove nearby brought Yusuf’s visage flashing before my eyes - dragged my thoughts back to that bathroom…
“Look at you. El rey de su pinche cuchitril. Bet you feel real big.”
Yeah…look at that bastard grin, you know he was feeling like he was nine feet tall. “Been wondering since I crossed the bridge, started dodging trash, this got something to do with the shit you and your skinny-ass boyfriend stirred up in Baton Rouge? Draggin’ darkness to our doorstep?”
Saw how that pushed his buttons. Baton Rouge was a fuckin’ disaster. It’d never been a paradise, even if it’d flown Apex colors.
Now the Jungle there was a moon-blasted ruin, packed with moon-blasted, freakshow Wolves. Black Banner fingerprints all over, caught silver-handed.
Shoulda been humiliating for ‘em, but nothing ever dented their confidence.
Sure enough – “No, it doesn’t.” Rolled right off his back, barely seemed to care. "But you know same as I do – there ain't a lotta people who could survive something like that. So...like you said."
He posed for me, cocky as hell like he was on camera. “Here we are.”
Made me feel like a background extra, not the queen-bitch of the Riviera who’d spilled liters of blood from man and monsters claiming this place.
“For now,” I agreed, invading his space and jamming the tip of Jo’s Glock under his chin–had him looking serious for a hot second, 9mm would blow out his brainstem and even we didn’t recover easily from that.
“But I want you to understand something, fuckin’ pendejo. If you fuck with my people, if you so much as hum your little songs up in my territory, we'll take everything you have. All of it."
“Think you can take everything I'm bringing, huh?” Fucker didn’t even blink.
Didn’t even flinch.
Sounded like he was inviting me for a roll in his sheets, and I ain’t gonna lie: it was pretty hot. Too hot.
Enough that I let him push the pistol away slow and easy, breaking down my last shield against him.
"Think you can take me?" he dared to ask.
This -fucking guy-. "Me cago en todo, cabrón…" I hissed through my teeth, like I was exhaling burning propane. “They said you were a fucking talker, didn’t know you for a playful fool.”
Then again, I was the one holding the pistol slack by my side…so you tell me:
Who was the fuckin’ fool here exactly?
At that point I'd lost.
Tried to sound tough, like I wasn't bitin’ what he was sellin’ but he'd hooked me through the lip. I coulda salvaged it by leaving right there. Coulda saved my pride.
But I was just a blue bottle by then, buzzin’ loud and talking trash while his poison melted me from the inside.
That night the killing blow came from three angles at once.
First – he invited me to stay and watch him and Galen and play. Simple thing, like he was needling a knifepoint between my ribs.
Second – he did this…thing. Strode past me all confident, absent fear, brushed his shoulder against mine…felt his hip pass against my own. Didn’t even look at me, casual as Saturday. I knew it was a calculated move, bastardo probably overlaid a dweomer to make sure I wouldn’t forget how it made me hot and bothered.
Third – the actual killing blow itself, it came from that stage.
God. Fucking. Damn.
I’ve been to a hundred shows - from boy bands with my sister to badasses spittin’ bars, DJs famous and obscure. I’ve ever had guys serenading me at my window, and I’m telling you nothing coulda prepped me for that.
They weren’t just kings.
They were fuckin’ Tyrants.
They roared their edicts into a mic; shredded an apocalypse from bass and guitar; that drum was a thousand grenades blowing the world to bits.
Galen and Mizrah were the tyrants of our hearts, and nobody in that audience could resist them.
I dipped after the third song. Played like I was bored and had better shit to do, but the truth of it? If I stayed under Yusuf’s fiery stare, Galen’s razored grin, I’d be doomed.
Worse than I was now.
“I’m ripping that little snare of yours apart with my teeth,” I growled at the river, as if Yusuf was sneering up at me from the water. "Gonna make you beg me not to kill you this time...gonna make you *cry* like a scared little bitch."
Cuz there was no way I'd want him after that. Right?
I could do this.
I’d break him.
I’d free myself.
I'd click him off like a light-switch when I pulled the trigger, and just like that I'd be back in the dark.
Alone among my pack.
Walking blind in the dark where nobody could watch me fall.
That was better.
…right?
I crossed the bridge…immediately the change hit me, like stepping off the plane in another country (I’d never actually left the States but a girl could imagine).
The skyscrapers of the Riviera, clawing at the clouds for more , ever more, tumbled down into coal-stained brick carcasses…grungy warehouses with tin-roofs that heated up in the sun like a flat iron…
The air weighed more here.
It was thick with the final breaths of the murdered; whether they got stabbed in alleyway muggings gone wrong, or bled out slow in the jaws of industry, ghost-echoes of their death-screams polluted the smoggy air.
It didn’t fit Mizrah, didn’t fit Galen.
They were joy-drunk intruders – laughing, rocking out on stage – in a place made for hard-nosed bastards raised on a diet of gravel and disappointment.
That was part of why I clocked them as a threat from the get-go; they were dynamic in the bustling dust-stasis of Penn’s Point. The Red Crows? Blind.
Too busy squabbling with each other, puttin’ on this useless show of strength.
We were wounded lions arguing over who got the prettiest spot at the watering hole – the Midnight Kings were jackals. Already circling. Waitin’ for us to fall asleep.
I shoved my hands deep in my pockets and walked to DoomKnight’s.
About thirty minutes later.
"It's nothin' personal ese...nothin' you did." I explained myself, cool as steel as I shoved him into the alleyway.
He stumbled over his own feet, arms flailing like a baby bird tossed from its nest. Slammed hard into the pavement with a wet –smack–. Watched him with neutral disgust…weak Mortal prey.
He didn’t deserve this.
I ripped his pink and black tie-dye shirt at the collar hauling him around, and his jeans shorts were slipping down his waist. Briefs and buttcrack for all to see. Didn’t know his name, didn’t need to.
Didn’t matter. Wasn’t like I kept a list of all the people I’d mugged, back when that was my game. Fatass rolled over on his knees. "Wait wait PLEASE! Stop, here!" he held his thin wallet out in front of himself like a shield as much as an offering.
Under the surface, beneath the snarling beast I’d become years ago, I felt a twinge of regret. Reflexive, like reacting to a punch.
Don’t engage it. Don’t think about it.
Just do it.
I dug my fingers into his ripped collar, hauling back with a clenched fist–
–CRACK–
"NgghgHAAAAAGGGGH!”
The sound of his nose breaking was louder than it should have been. He covered his mouth as blood gushed down his chin. My middle knuckle ached as I drew back again.
Don’t think about it, Vera.
Punched him again. Right eye. Hard enough to make it swell shut, if not break his orbit.
A second punch, to the other eye, tears mixing with blood and snot. It smelled coppery and hot against the ashen air. He flailed and babbled, scrambling back and begging for mercy.
Don’t think.
He never hit me back once, never even tried. Just screamed. Bled. Sobbed. Tried to crawl away.
It's just business.
I hauled him up onto his knee, and this time he struggled; not enough to stop me wrenchin’ his arm behind his back.
I twisted, the joint popped free from socket and he made an animal sound of agony; his head shot back, hitting my sternum. Yeah it hurt, but he’d be fine, just pop it back into socket, weren’t like it was broken. I dared to look down at this man I was brutalizing.
Thinning hair yanked back in a greasy ponytail…didn’t look a day past 30. Fat and weak from a life of indolence and shitty food.
Couldn’t help but wonder who he was…who was I tormenting? Was he lonely? Did he have people depending on him? Anyone waiting at home?
*If Yusuf hadn't fucked with me, I wouldn't be making this guy pay for it.*
… Liar.
I spent a good minute boxing him on the ground, kicking him in the ribs. “Why?! What did I do?!” he begged through the tears, the blood, the mucous. I didn’t have a good answer for him, so I just kept swinging.
Didn’t pop no organs. Didn’t crack no bones – pretty sure I bruised his ribs though.
By the time I was finished with him, he was bent forward over himself on his knees. Holding his guts, his chest…crying like a little bitch. Normally I’d spit in disgust, watching a grown man bawl his eyes out.
Now though? I just hated myself.
Shit I mean, look at that. I was glad he couldn’t see my face when I bent down and undid my bandana, wiping the blood from his eyes. He crunched in on himself, inhaling wetly, bracing for more.
“Shh. I’m almost done, I promise man. This ain’t your fault,” I assured him. I lifted the back of his shirt, slid a sharpie from my pocket and wrote in thick, jagged letters:
MEET ME AT THE TALLEST SPOT IN YOUR TURF CABRÓN
WEAR SOMETHING YOU DON'T MIND BLEEDING ON
Finished it up, quick and clean. Then I hauled his broken ass to the doorway of DoomKnight’s. “Brace your head…chin against your chest,” I instructed in a softer voice than anyone ever heard, and threw him down the stairs like a swollen bag of trash.
Didn’t want no broken neck. Wasn’t that kind of monster yet.
I even slid a hundy in his back pocket before I tossed him.
Later.
I was sitting on the edge of DeFleur Tower. Hardly a tower – just an ugly brick shithole that stood a bit taller than its busted-ass siblings. My elbow was propped on my knee. In my head I was flipping through how this would go down, over and over.
Would he try to fight me? Show me the muscle he’d used on the wolves who’d owned that arcade?
No way he’d ambush me. Wasn’t his self-righteous, big bullshit style.
Bet he’d try talkin’.
Bet he’d try softenin’ me up with that silver tongued bullshit.
Wasn’t gonna be like last time, no no. I was gonna lay it out for him, straight and simple, let him in on how reality worked. I’d bury it home in his body with a .45 ACP round, so deep he’d carry my words to the worms.
I slid the revolver into my palm, popped the cylinder, spun it…that ratcheting click was a promise, and its rhythm cracked through me.
Reminded me of –
– Galen hammering the drums, fast as a machine gun, strobe lights flaring like muzzle flashes; saw him staring me down in the audience, hungry like a hawk leering at a rattlesnake. I hungered back, but to be taken into the sky and torn by him.
I felt...special.
Mizrah, a boot stomping down on a skull-shaped amp, fingers dancing across strings and fretboard till his guitar was screaming like a war-goddess, howling for more…never taking his eyes off of me.
Even when he screamed into the mic and–
"Vera." His voice clove the air behind me…baritone sharp as a skinning knife.
I slid my tongue over the ivory sharpness of my fangs. Snapped the cylinder home with a –CLACK– of threat.
Here’s where we end whatever the fuck you did to me, cabrón.
"Real shit hole you got here, Mizrah. Can't say it brings me joy bein’ back." I rose slowly, iron dangling in my hand as I turned to face him. Steeling my heart against his...fucking radiance.
It was starting to rain again, made that bristle-black hair of his shine.
He'd stopped about twenty feet away; close enough that I could get lost in the details, far enough I couldn't just claw them away.
He had this white wife beater strainin’ against his carved chest, leather jacket hanging open against the evening warmth. Had his hands in his pockets, like he didn’t even give a fuck what I was doing.
“Pretty sure I know what brought you here.” His smirk buried itself in his words.
Motherfucker.
"Coulda just called. Didn't need to get medieval with Randy. Poor bastard," the music of his voice dropping into a rough growl.
"You know fuckin’ well why I did," I countered, closing the space between us. Slow, deliberate.
The Night Howler in me was thirsty for his fear, but he offered none.
Not even a drop.
"Why?" He asked, tipping his chin upward at me, easy challenge.
Shoulda been pissed, acting like I hadn’t just kicked down his door and dragged his guy through hell. That shit shoulda been humiliating.
"Three reasons." I ticked them off with the barrel of the gun, circling him like fresh Prey.
"First, y'all just parked your Therid asses in my backyard, didn't even invite us over for a barbeque. Poor fuckin’ form." He turned with me, never let me get at his back. Smart boy.
"Second, you got a rep. You're Black Banner, War's the only language you assholes speak."
"Guilty on both fronts I guess,” Yusuf slid a box of cloves from his jacket, bit one between his teeth, “but you know the rules of the game, baby."
Baby. What. The. Fuck.
"Third," my voice softened against my will, betraying me, "cuz of whatever trick you pulled on me."
I completed my circuit, popping the cylinder again - had to fight to keep my hands from going ‘round his neck, or trailing down his chest.
I watched the cherry of his clove glow like a hot pearl, reflected by his eyes. Smoke curled around him, ghostly. Watching me, glancing at the gun like it meant nothing.
Lazy.
Cool.
Dangerous.
“Dunno what you're talking about. All I did was talk you outta making a mess of my show and got you to watch us.” Bastard winked at me. “You liked it too, don't lie."
Winking at me now? Shit, winking at me?! Hijo de puta .
“You think this shit is just fun and games, dontchu.” I tightened my fingers around the revolver’s handle. "Just think you can kick the door down, kill whatever you want. Shred, get drunk, fuck all over the corpse."
“Not like anyone took the trouble to write down the Laws of the Hunt. Even if they were, who’d gonna be the cops? You miserable Apex fuckers?” He ashed his cigarette…wasn’t even talking harsh. No smugness, no mocking or judging me.
He pitied me.
Stillness hung between us.
I moved first.
Slammed my knee up into his gut, bent him double with a grunt.
Flipped the pistol – came swinging down with the grip to dent his skull, but Mizrah shot in and slammed me against the brick roof access.
He got his hands around my wrists, pinning them above my head against the brick. We bared our fangs, growling like beasts, ready to tear flesh.
" FUCK you," I snapped my teeth, barely missing his lips. "You think the Jungle's just some fuckin' stage for prettyboys like you and Galen play your little songs, swing your fuckin’ dicks?"
"Better Jungle than yours,” he snapped back, voice raw with anger for the first time, “you think it's a fuckin' cage . You’re like a coyote in a zoo.”
I wanted to bite his lips off / to kiss him, so fucking badly.
My claws dug into his wrist, hooked a heel behind his; tripped him hard, cracked his skull against the roof.
I straddled him before he could recover – the revolver’s barrel stabbed against his forehead. "It ain't about fun and games,” I spat in his face, “it's about what we gotta do!"
"And how the fuck is that workin’ out for you, huh?!" he shouted at me, pretty even when he was bleeding.
It was terrible. I was broken. Isolated.
"The Riviera is ours,” I barked back but it sounded weak. I drilled the barrel harder against his skull, like it’d give truth to my words. “Best turf in all Ashland.”
I bent forward, sneering and scenting him. “I smell the sweat soaked into your skin...stink like you been sleeping on couches and beds that weren't yours. You playin' somebody's hoe before you got a hold of the Point, Mizrah?"
Didn’t expect to hurt him, but it did. Clear as fuckin’ day…his eye twitched. Teeth clenched, like he was battling the breaking impulse.
No.
Don't look at me like that.
You're supposed to look pissed.
"I liked you being there."
No.
There it was, the fuckin' trick again – when he said that I started feeling .
Not the usual anger, the old jealousy you can’t taste after months of eating it. Inside my chest a tightening pressure grew, and that jaguar-grimace flowed away like oil down a gutter.
"Shut the fuck up," I tried to snarl at him, but it was fragile. Small.
"After you left in the middle of Operation Thunderfist - "
"Yusuf that’s such a stupid fuckin’ name - "
"Galen's idea, don’t tell him. Look, after you left, G didn't stop asking about you...'who was that bad hottie in the audience?' and like, 'you get her number you pig?' and I had to endure him getting up my ass about it 'til I told him who you were...gave me an even harder time after."
Prettyboy was an actor, clearly - I refused to believe any of it. Not even when his rough voice got all quiet, made me feel warm in the night rain.
I jerked his collar, jostling him roughly. "Don't you fuck with me man," I pleaded, more than I demanded.
"You came at me from that stinking darkness,” he rasped, “like a stiletto with my name burned across the blade. You didn't cut me yet, but I'm still bleeding. Right here." He tapped at his heart twice.
Who...the fuck said shit like this?
Was he following a script ? Was that just how musicians rolled?
It was so...lame. Just this uncreative tripe.
It melted me like whipped cream on a summer day.
"If you're gonna do me, just do it," he dared.
Yusuf closed his eyes and let his arms fall down to his side.
I wanted to shoot him in the head, end it here / I wanted to kiss him, tumble down the spiral.
I let go of his collar.
My hand grew a mind of its own, traced my fingertips along the stubble of his cheek...beautiful bastard. Something forbidden.
"I oughta," I clapped low-pitch chains around my words, hauling back at the emotions threatening to carve free of my chest.
"You've gone and ruined things for me...think I'm the one who crawled from the dark to stab you, hijo de puta . Whatever imprecation you pulled on me...you've made it so I can't think straight. Fucked up my humours."
Dug your teeth into my heart.
" That’s what you think is going on? That your juices are outta whack?" I didn't even realize I'd pulled the gun from his forehead until he was dragging the barrel down to point at his heart...calling my bluff, damn psycho.
Then he dropped a nuke on me.
"I've been on fire for you since you came to Temple Hall."
Who the fuck said shit like that? What kind of kumbaya singin’, granola-munchin’ dipshit was open like that?
I hated it / I loved it.
I couldn't even put words to what was happening to me.
The emotional intensity was like…a twenty-car pileup behind my ribs. A solar flare arcing behind my eyes. The gush of hot blood in my mouth from a jugular bite.
"You're a liar ." The accusation sounded more like I was begging for him to stop. Tendrils of my hair brushed his jawline.
"You're talkin' like you've got something loving and kind in your heart, but Firstbloods ain't like that. Black Banners ain't like that, you're bringing war to my doorstep. I know you are."
"The irony is that you don't even think peace is real .” I don’t think I’d ever seen a man speak so earnest. “Every step you take, every word outta your mouth since you first saw me has been an invitation to fight. Here we are, though. You've had this gun trained on me cuz you're waiting for me to say it first."
His fingers crawled over the back of my hand, holding the revolver.
No, no, NO .
"Vera," he began, his fire-ringed eyes so black I could drown in them. "I know you got Pack. I know Mateo is your man.”
“But I want you."
"No," I prayed. I shook my head, like I could somehow rattle his words back out my ears like I’d never heard them.
I ignored the fact that I was straddling him against the rooftop, that I’d stopped fighting him, was leaning into him. He was winning again.
I shoulda pulled the trigger.
"I want you badly ," he repeated, a whispered promise of sin.
And when he pressed his palm against my side, slid it up my ribs...I arced into it. The sound that escaped my throat wasn’t right - a sound of surrender as my body went slack for him. I was needy.
I was weak .
I didn't stop him, couldn't as he pushed up into a sitting position, my knees on either side of his hips.
I hated him.
I adored him.
He made me feel good and he wasn’t supposed to. He was seeing me, fighting him and pushing back, and he only ever came back with open arms.
What did he even see past the threats, past the ugly thing of concrete and steel that these streets, that the Jungle had made me?
I knew I’d lost when hope took root in my heart.
"Damn you," I cursed him as our lips crashed together.
I broke open.
Shattered like a discarded liquor bottle.
And all the light and rage and hate streamed out from my chest, leaving me an empty vessel to be filled with...
Joy.
Serenity.
The feeling of being wanted .
His lips were soft…they shouldn’t have been. Not on a war-hardened prince of the stage like Yusuf Mizrah. His tongue tasted like that clove I’d knocked from his mouth after I tripped him and what the holy hell –
There was a little steel stud through the tip of his tongue.
A slick, dirty thought wormed in: how that metal would feel against my breasts, between my thighs.
He wasn't supposed to make me feel this.
I felt his other hand, nails dragging down my back, finding the flare of my waist–I gyrated against him without even thinking, felt his cock hardening.
The want came like one of them Hurricanes with the lady names; its howling moan drowned out Mateo's grousing, Jo's doubt, Diana's barbs.
He wasn't supposed to drown out the sadness.
My hands weren’t mine no more; my nails snagged in the cotton of his wife beater as I gave in and traced the shape of his torso…like one of them Greek muscle breastplates. He smelled like leather, sweat, need . Too good for this world, too good for me.
My fingers were already working to undo his fly.
He wasn't supposed to make me want him like nobody before.
I broke the kiss reluctantly, breathing against his mouth, desperate. "Yusuf Mizrah..."
"Vera Estrada," he breathed back, his gaze stripped clean of cock-ass arrogance...just a beautiful phoenix of a man, burning me alive in the dark.
No.
I grabbed the gun.
Pressed it against his throat.
Pulled the trigger.
BLAM
The muzzle flash seared my vision for a moment. When it cleared…he was staring up at me–wide eyed with disbelief.
A great gory hole smoked where his jugular was blasted open. His life was gushing out over the rooftop. Yusuf choked.
Gasped in his own blood.
He reached a shaking hand up to claw my eyes out ...it reached my mouth, stroked my lips feather soft. It fell away.
I stayed straddling him, knelt over the ruination of this beautiful man.
Watching the red flow of his pulse grow weaker, his tawny skin get pale.
I did it.
…I felt...
Nothing.
No satisfaction, triumph or liberation.
There was just a space in my chest, torn open and emptied of him, of a weak little fucking girl’s nameless hope.
And you know what the fuck I did?
I kissed him one last time. Tasted his blood.
I left him there.
This time I didn't cry like I did with my back turned to Mateo. This time though, felt like I'd killed something beautiful before it'd even had a chance to breathe.
The Night Was Mine.
But it felt so terribly empty now.
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
Not every victory is sweet. I've had my share of bitter wins that leave your tongue swollen and your belly empty; the reward is putting one foot ahead of the other one for another day...losing ain't a choice we have. Yusuf thought he could win her over but Vera? Too strong for that. Too weak for that. Ain't that a kicker? Yeah you try and put that together in your heads you lil' dumbasses.