Vipers and Virtuosos （Monsters & Muses, #2）
Sav R. Miller
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PROLOGUE
There’s blood everywhere.
It soaks my clammy palms.
Burns my eyes where it drips down my forehead.
The smell of death singes my nostrils, permeating the air like noxious fumes, and all I can think about is how angry my mother will be when she gets home.
My vision blurs as I try to move—from the blood, or the sudden sharp pain that licks down my spine, I can’t be sure. Whatever the cause, it immobilizes me, and I choke out a puff of air.
What if he comes back?
Oxygen rattles from my lungs, catching on the thick sludge blocking my throat.
A throbbing sensation prods at the base of my skull, then seems to echo all over; in my ribs, across my collarbone, and zinging down my legs.
I manage to wriggle a hand up, sliding it over my stomach. My index finger snags on a slit in the fabric, but that can’t be right.
I’m wearing a dress.
It was finally warm enough outside after a cold start to spring, so I put on a dress.
Why is there a slit in the middle?
Wetness gushes around the pad of my finger as I press down. It stings, but I keep pressing, keep investigating. Maybe if I figure out what’s happened, I can fix it.
Agony ripples through my abdomen, but for some reason, I don’t register it completely. It’s a tsunami breaking before it hits the shore, whipping against me with the dull aftershocks.
I’m leaking, bleeding out on my mother’s white carpet.
God, she’s going to be so pissed.
With every bit of strength I can muster, I will my body into motion. I have to get out of here before it gets worse, although it’s hard to imagine how it can at this point.
Shards of glass dig into my back as I shift, attempting to find some sort of purchase on the floor.
Footsteps, deliberately heavy, thud beneath my head. Fear sprays down my spine like a broken faucet, my body recognizing the danger before my brain has even caught up.
Goose bumps prick along the back of my neck, and I fall as still as humanly possible, hoping it’s enough. That maybe if he thinks I’m dead, he’ll leave me be.
I should know better, though.
The men my mother dates aren’t satisfied until they’ve tasted the slaughter.
A shadowy figure breaks through my hazy gaze as he looms over me, clutching a piece of broken glass in one palm.
Manic, yellow eyes glare down at me and a sinister smile stretches across his face.
His belt is unbuckled, pants undone, and crimson in the shape of desperate fingerprints paint his neck, his face, his white shirt.
My brain revolts against the image, disgust rising like a high tide in my chest, but my body doesn’t respond.
All I can do is stare.
Watch as he bends, sliding the sharp edge of the glass across my face. I feel it glide up from the corner of my lip to just below my eye, and for the briefest moment, I pray.
Pray he gouges them out, so the last thing I see before I go is darkness and not his face.
I pray he finishes me off quickly.
Worst of all, I pray my mother’s not too angry when she gets home, because there’s only one thought playing in my mind when my vision blurs again, then goes totally black.
And that thought is that there’s blood.
Everywhere.
1
My mother used to say beautiful things were wrought from the most unimaginable pain.
Then she’d put her cigarette out on my stomach, in case I needed a reminder that whatever beauty I possessed was still a work in progress.
When she died, I know people expected me to mourn her.
That’s what kids are supposed to do when they lose a parent.
Then again, most parents don’t try to sell their kids to their crime lord boyfriend, who deals almost exclusively with sex trafficking.
The only thing I mourned was that I didn’t light the match.
My brother Boyd insists that’s a good thing; he says murder changes you. Rewires your soul into something bleak and broken.
But so does trauma, and I’d much rather be haunted by the sounds of my mother’s last screams than the echoes of my own. Maybe the pain would be a bit more bearable if I’d gotten to witness her suffering, too.
When I swallow, familiar discomfort wrapping around my windpipe, the scars on my cheek and at the corner of my mouth throb. The only remaining evidence of memories I can feel, but not picture.
Besides, I certainly don’t see my brother losing any sleep over it.
In fact, watching him adjust the cuff links of his neatly pressed, dark-gray suit in the hotel bathroom, Boyd looks more rested than ever.
“Riley,” he grunts, his hazel eyes focused on their task. “Stop looking at me like that.”
I swing my legs off the king-size mattress tucked in the corner. “Like what?”
Boyd’s jaw tics, irritating the pulse in his throat—not that you can really see it beneath the tattoos. Ink spans the entirety of his body from the neck down, a plethora of images etched permanently into his skin. Standing there with his dark-blond hair slicked back and frown lines framing his lips, he looks more like a member of the Mafia than his friends who are actually made men.
Not that I’m supposed to know any of that. Boyd likes to pretend the security firm he’s an engineer at is totally legitimate, but I’ve done my homework. And I know that no one in little King’s Trace, Maine, lives outside the scope of organized crime.
He doesn’t answer my question. “I can stay another night, you know. I’ll push back my meeting, tell the company to wait until Monday for me to return.”
My eyes flicker to the massive window across from us, sweeping over bustling Fifth Avenue twenty stories below. The sun’s beginning to set just beyond the Empire State Building, a blanket of pastel orange and pink covering the sky as the city makes way for darkness.
A shiver skates across my skin, goose bumps sprouting along the surface as I think about navigating New York on my own.
Well, kind of on my own. Technically, this is a class trip, so I’m rooming with two girls—Aurora Jackson and Mellie Simmons. Boyd wasn’t supposed to be here at all, but no one says no to your requests when you have enough money to silence them.
“You can’t keep putting off work to stay here,” I say finally, dragging my gaze away from the glass. “We both know that place doesn’t function well when you’re gone.”
“I haven’t taken a vacation in a decade. They owe me.”
“Right, and we agreed you’d stay here three days, and then go home tonight.”
“No, I said I’d stay as long as I felt you needed me to.” His hazel eyes jump to mine in the mirror. “I’ve spent the last three days watching you fold into yourself, so forgive me for not exactly being confident that you’re able to handle this.”
His words sting. A little pinprick reminder that I’m not as good an actress as I think.
My fingers curl into fists, my nails digging into the flesh of my palms and burrowing until the physical pain replaces the ache in my bones. I suck in a deep breath and pull my feet up on the bed, the black polish on my toenails contrasting with the white comforter beneath.
“How will we ever know I’m ready if you don’t let me try?”
Boyd grips the edge of the counter, watching as I yank on a pair of socks. “What if I let you, and something happens?”