Page 115 of Ripped Lace (Ripped Bratva)

Raj looks like hell warmed over. Pale and gaunt with blood loss and hunger. But the steely determination in his eyes doesn’t bode well for our mission here.

Elyssa is still standing in the hallway where I left her, breathing softly. Then, as if making up her mind, she steps inside the cell.

“Raj,” she says, a little shakily.

“I don’t want to fucking talk to you, whore.”

She doesn’t rear back like I expect her to. She just takes it all in stride. Nodding, she sinks into the chair my men set up for her. Perched on the edge, she looks into Raj’s eyes with something that resembles compassion, if I’m not mistaken.

Part of me wants this to fail. She is so pure that she thinks the whole world works how she does. Thinks how she does. Feels how she does.

She hasn’t seen of the darkness to understand just how wrong she is.

“Can I tell you something, Raj?” she probes gently.

My ears perk up. Raj’s do, too, though he tries to hide his interest.

“I worry sometimes that I’m broken. I spent my whole life in the Sanctuary, and I can barely remember any of it. It’s almost like… Don’t laugh at this, but it’s almost like I was born again the night I left. I know that must sound silly. It sounds silly to me, too.”

He swings slowly from his cuffs. Not answering, but not looking away, either.

“Whole chunks of time are just gone. Years and years, hidden away in my head behind stone walls of trauma and fear. But you know something, Raj? I think… I think I’m starting to remember some things.”

Now, he’s definitely paying attention. So am I. There’s an energy in the air that I’m not sure if I like or not. Raw and pulsing. Dangerous.

She brushes a stray lock of hair behind her ear. It’s a casual, automatic gesture, but something about it makes my chest constrict painfully.

“Can I tell you something else?” she continues. “Lately, I’ve been hearing crying children. All the time. Whenever I’m alone in a room or on the beach or in the shower, I hear them. I even have dreams about them. I used to think it was my son crying for me. But now I realize that it’s not him I’m hearing at all. Who is it, Raj? Whose children am I hearing?”

“How the fuck am I supposed to know?” he growls.

“That’s the thing,” Elyssa says softly. “I think youdoknow. I think you know a lot more than you’re letting on.”

“I had nothing to do with your runt being taken, if that’s what you’re asking.”

She flinches at that one. I nearly leave my seat to charge into the room and beat some respect into this son of a bitch. But then I notice her hand. She doesn’t lift it past her shoulder, but the gesture is clear.Don’t interfere.

As annoyed as I am right now, there’s also something intensely sexy about watching her take charge. She’s soft-spoken and gentle, but there’s determination there. A steely strength that I never noticed before, though I don’t know how I could’ve missed it.

“Maybe not. But the people you work for, the people who sent you to the Sanctuary in the first place… The powers that be? They did. They have my little boy.”

“Can’t help you.”

To my surprise and his, Elyssa suddenly lunges forward to her knees. She grabs a fistful of Raj’s bloodied white pants in each hand as she looks up at him and says, “Yes, Raj, you can. You know things. Because I’m not the first one this has happened to, am I? I’m not the first mother separated from her baby.”

He stiffens. For a long moment, we’re all suspended in time, wondering if he’s going to crack. If the truth will finally emerge.

He grits his teeth. I can practically hear them grinding together.

“Children need their mothers,” Elyssa presses in a tear-stained whisper. “I know… I used to work at an orphan—”

She breaks off suddenly. Her hands fall slack, her eyes go wide, her face drains of color. I almost stand up and go to her, but I stop myself.

Someone cracked, indeed.

But it wasn’t Raj.

Elyssa slumps back against the legs of the chair. Her eyes pinwheel, wild and unfocused.

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