"If I were a narcissist, I would have let the Volkovs have you just because you left. I wouldn’t care what happened to you after,” he said, his grip firm. “You have a history of throwing tantrums, Indigo. I needed to know the difference between you being angry and you being in danger. Between something that could be fixed with a conversation and something that required blood."
I yanked my wrist. He didn't let go.
"Bullshit."
"I was asking for a conversation, and you stabbed me." His eyes held mine, pinning me with a cold, unrelenting weight. "In the chest. With a kitchen knife. You didn't ask me to listen. You didn't explain. You just reacted."
"You deserved it. You protected that bitch," I hissed, though the memory of the blade sinking into his skin made my own stomach lurch. I hated that even an ounce of remorse still lived in my chest.
"I wasn’t protecting her—and maybe I did," he conceded, his voice dropping into that low, mechanical vibration. "But you know I don't process things like other people, Indigo. I don't operate on 'feeling.' I operate on information. You accuse me of being indifferent and narcissistic. You are too." His head tilted. "Any time things don't go your way, you destroy something. The keypad. The car. The plates. Shoes. Clothes. You don't ask for what you need. You don't explain what's wrong. You just break things or you run."
I let out a short laugh. “That’s not narcissism, Malachai. That’s what happens when nobody’s listening.” I yanked my wrist again, even though I knew he wouldn’t let go. “You want calm, rational explanations? Then act like someone I can actually talk to.”
His voice stayed calm. Flat when he responded. That made it worse.
"I was listening. You were yelling unintelligible things. I was trying to find answers before I made a decision. Because that's what I do. That's who I am. You knew that." He paused. "But you just want me to follow your command. You want blind obedience. Kill your brother. Kill Sasha. Automatically. Without question."
He stepped further into my space.
"But if that was who I was, things would have been different when you set fire to my car. You knew that car meant something—one of the only things I kept from my father." His jaw tightened. "I would have made you watch while I torched something you loved. Maybe broken your leg so you couldn't dance."
He stepped even closer, looming over me.
"If I was what you wanted, I would have grabbed you by the throat the first time you slapped me. Pinned you down and reminded you exactly who you were dealing with. I wouldn't have let you bite me until I bled and then asked if you felt better." His hand came up, hovering near my face. It didn’t touch me, though. "I wouldn't have handed you the knife to stab me."
I responded the only way I could at the moment, trying to shift some of the guilt his words created back onto him. "I replaced the fucking car."
He shook his head, looking completely exasperated. "Indigo, please, stop this. I haven't slept well in seven hundred and thirty-one days. I haven't tasted food right. I can’t feel the fucking sun. How do we resolve this?”
I looked at him—really looked at him. His eyes were hollow. He’d lost weight. Before, his eyes had looked empty; now they just looked tired.
Had I made the Hand of God… human?
Good. He needed to feel some type of emotion other than anger and possession. The kind that sat in your chest and didn’t move. The kind that didn’t bleed out… just stayed. If I had to live with the ghost of our baby, he had to live with the ghost of the past me.
I reached out, my fingers tracing the sharp line of his jaw, caressing his face. "We resolve it when you let me kill the person who killed my baby—and that’s not possible."
I waited for his response, expecting him to shut down.
Instead of speaking, Malachai just closed his eyes, leaning into my hand like my touch was the only thing giving him peace. When he opened them, the weariness was gone. I saw the devil in them.
"Okay," he said, his voice terrifying calm. "Get dressed."
Chapter 11
Indigo
I watched the highway signs as we drove. Malac had me in a part of Florida I wasn’t familiar with, somewhere between Polk County and Orlando.
The drive was quiet, but it wasn't the kind of silence that offered any peace. It was tense and exhausting. I kept thinking about where he was taking me. Malachai sat like a statue behind the wheel, his eyes fixed on the road ahead. He didn't reach for the radio or offer a single word to bridge the gap between us. One hand steered while the other rested near the gear shift. He didn't have that "she's going to run" look on his face either. He knew he had me stuck between him and a big fucking rock. I couldn't leave until he handled the Russians.
"Where are we going?" I finally asked, having tried to resist the urge.
"You'll see," he replied. Short and final—exactly what I expected from him.
We eventually pulled up to a warehouse that seemed to sit on the very edge of St. Pete. There were no streetlights and no signs of life, just metal and concrete blending into the dark. Malachai killed the engine and sat there for a moment, still refusing to look at me.
"I always meant for you to have your retribution. This is..." He trailed off, his jaw tightening. "This is me giving it to you anyway, even though you ran."