Page 47 of Flame
Or the figure sauntering toward me now, her head held high. Her cold, hard stare warns that she’s fully prepared to finish what he started.
“So, just how long have you been fucking him, huh?” Mara demands, her hands on her hips. Several people turn to stare, but she doesn’t bother to lower her voice. “He denied it,” she adds haughtily. “But he didn’t have to. I just wish my so-called friend would have been the one to tell me so that I didn’t make an ass of myself, trying to seduce a man who’s already taken. I knew you were an ice-cold bitch, Hannah. But that’s low, even for you. Why are you even here?” she adds, gesturing around us with a wave of her hand. “It’s not like you give a damn about Faith. Or is it because of him?” She jerks her chin in Rafe’s direction as he departs. “You’re so desperate to stay on his dick, you’ll chase after a dead girl? That’s sick, Hannah.”
“Mara!” I start toward her, but she spins on her heel and marches away, drawing disapproving glances from those on the outskirts of the service.
As the attention turns to me, I set my candle aside and start across the park. Shame sears my eyes with the threat of tears and tightens my throat. Deep down, I know I don’t have the right to be upset.
Iama liar. One who’s gotten so good at it, she fools herself most of all…
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” comes a voice that freezes me in my tracks, snapping me from my thoughts.
Rafe. His tone is even colder, but I sense that even before I turn in his direction, he isn’t talking to me.
However, he’s close only a few feet away near a swaying copse of trees—and he isn’t alone. A taller man stands across from him, his silhouette stiff and formidable. Even with his face in shadow, I recognize him instantly—Rafe’s uncle.
“Don’t play games with me, Rafael,” he growls. “First, you pussyfoot around our enemies. Then a girl is murdered in our territory, and you do nothing. Fucking seems to appeal to you more than upholding your duty.”
Rafe remains rigid. Frozen. I’m too far back to see his face clearly, but I have no trouble picturing it—watchful eyes, terse frown. The way he suddenly shifts reveals even more. He’s on edge.
“I don’t understand why you’re itching for a fight so badly,” he says in a tone that rings out firmly. Cautious. “Gino’s just a punk—”
“You don’t decide that,” Shen snarls. “I do. And I think it’s time I stop coddling you, the same way I had to stop enabling your father’s bad habits.”
“What are you saying?”
“I’m saying if you want to play at independence, then fine. Start with repaying Zhang’s debt, you can repay me for your little shop as well. Consider yourself financially independent. I’m done bankrolling your ass.”
“I earned my money,” Rafe says so fiercely my gut clenches in response. He sounds the same way he did when he spoke of his mother. When he swore he was nothing like her. “I’ve done everything you’ve asked of me.”
“Have you?” Shen cocks his head in a way I can only describe as smug. “I don’t think so, boy. You shy away from using force to protect our territory. You balk at anything that might offend your pathetic idea of mortality—but you forget. Everything you are, everything you have is because of me. Do you really think you can stand on your own?”
He turns, leaving Rafe to follow.
Which, despite a second of hesitation, he eventually does.
Dread rips through my chest as I watch him go, his shoulders hunched. In contrast, his uncle moves leisurely, radiating confidence in a way that makes me shiver, though I have no idea why.
Several seconds pass before the realization slaps me in the face—he walks the same way Branden does. So sure of his control, he doesn’t doubt for a second his hold on the person under his thumb.
Like a predator.
They’re barely out of view when another sound catches my ear—a persistent, musical ping. It’s coming from my bag, and I reach inside. Instantly, my hand falls over Rafe’s phone, the culprit of the noise. It’s pinging with incoming messages. I scan them warily, feeling the air leave my chest as I register the topmost one.
Where are you?
From Branden? Somehow, he got ahold of this number, always one step ahead. I whip around, eyeing the shadows. I’m so ready for him to jump out from behind a tree, eager to corner me again. As I open my stance, I try to tell myself I’ll fight this time. Scream. Run. Anything but stare and wait. And wait…
