“What’s your name?” Alessio asks.
“Hawk,” he says quickly, like compliance might be the thing that saves his life. Maybe it will. “I’m serious, kill them all, I’m one hundred percent behind you. I tried to redeem them, and it can’t be done.”
“But you want us to believe you’re redeemable?” Sparrow asks the question that’s on the tip of my tongue.
I’m expecting another quick answer; empty-sounding promises that he’s not like them, that he’s good and pure and deserves to live. My finger twitches on the trigger.
“I don’t know,” he croaks. “I’ve done some horrible shit, but I swore to myself years ago when I got sober that I would make up for all of it. That for everyone I hurt, I’d save someone else to balance it all out, and I haven’t finished yet.”
“If we let him go, the Reapers won’t truly be gone, will they?” I murmur, more to myself than to anyone else.
Hawk answers anyway. “The Sleepless Reapers die with my brother, I can promise you that.”
“One minute, Spettro. Make a decision so we can bar the door and get our asses clear of the blast zone,” Alessio says.
I lower my gun.
“Don’t make me regret this,” I growl at Hawk. “We’re even now. You saved my life and I saved yours. I’m going to save a bullet and put your name on it. If I find out you’ve stepped one goddamn toe out of line, I will fucking find you.”
He nods and lowers his hands.
“Fucking go, man,” Sparrow barks.
Hawk jumps to his feet and tears off into the darkness.
“Alright, let’s get this done.” I tuck my pistol away and we hurry to chain the doors, then make a run for it. We’re halfway across the parking lot when the thunderous sound of the explosions rattles our eardrums and the sudden eruption of fire lights up the night.
I reach for Alessio’s hand, threading my fingers between his, and we rush through the door of the empty building where everyone is waiting for us. I stop right inside the door and turn to look out, watching in awe as the clubhouse is engulfed in flames that turn the sky orange.
It’s over. It’s really over. By the time it’s deemed safe enough for the fire trucks to get through the barriers, there won’t be any survivors, and the clubhouse will be nothing but cinders. The Sleepless Reapers are really and truly dead.
“We should celebrate,” Sparrow says.
I let out a breathless laugh, and I realize I can truly feel my heart beating without needing to put my hand on my chest for the first time since I woke up in the hospital. Alessio was right—there’s a whole future ahead of us now and I can be anyone I want to be.
“We should definitely celebrate,” I agree out loud, smiling at my brother and squeezing Alessio’s hand again as we all watch my nightmares burn.
Chapter
Twenty-Two
SPETTRO
The smellof smoke lingers in my nose and on my clothes, and I’m running on pure adrenaline and euphoria as we approach the doorman at Wonderland. He’s a huge, towering beefcake with white-blond hair, a sleek white beard, and a white rabbit tattooed on his bulging bicep. I don’t think any of us are strangers to Wonderland, but Anders seems to know the bouncer personally, giving him a fist bump and a kiss on the cheek that makes him scowl before he waves us all inside.
“Is this okay?” Sparrow asks, shouting the words next to my ear so I can hear them over the thumping bass and din of sultry, flirtatious voices permeating the air inside the club.
“I’m fine.”
I don’t think my sobriety has ever been more solid. The constant itch of craving that lives under the surface of my skin feels like it’s damn near gone. I’m not naive—I remember all the warnings my drug counselor gave me that I’ll always be an addict, that the feeling of wanting never fully goes away, it just gets easier to ignore over time with enough discipline. But Ithink living with the specter of the Sleepless Reapers haunting me every second kept me in that place, kept me tethered to the memories of my addiction in a way that was hard to shake.
I don’t think all my problems are solved, but I have room to breathe now and space to grow into a new version of myself.
There are tables and large booths near the dance floor where you can have a drink and watch the cage dancers if that’s your thing. They’re all full, as usual, but I’m starting to learn that a little thing like that doesn’t stop the Morettis from getting what they want. Salvatore approaches the group seated at the booth with the best views and pulls out his wallet. Alessio chuckles next to me, and I slide my hand up the back of his shirt again to hook my fingers around his leather harness. My gloves are in my pocket, so I can feel the warmth of his skin for real this time, and the little shiver that runs through him.
I use my grip to tug him an inch closer, keeping him as a shield between me and all the horny drunks, but also craving the heat of his body pressed against mine for the first time in my life. No, not the first time… It’s been a creeping thing, a growing thing that I’ve slowly gotten used to and started to ache for, ever since that morning in his bed when I pressed my bare skin against his for the first time. Without the Reapers taking up so much of my mental space, I can fully appreciate the desire now, the longing.
“I have a confession to make,” I whisper, purposefully brushing my lips against the shell of his ear just to feel him shiver again.