Total pages in book: 85
Estimated words: 81887 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 409(@200wpm)___ 328(@250wpm)___ 273(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 81887 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 409(@200wpm)___ 328(@250wpm)___ 273(@300wpm)
I grab a broken branch from the ground and swing it at Viktor’s head with all my strength. It connects with a dull thud, but he barely flinches. Instead, he swings his arm backward without looking, his fist catching me square in the face.
Pain explodes through my skull as I’m knocked to the ground. My vision blurs, the taste of blood filling my mouth. I hear Damiano’s strangled cry as he sees me fall.
That momentary distraction costs him. Viktor tightens his grip on Damiano’s throat, his massive hands squeezing mercilessly.
“I’m going to finish what I should have done years ago,” Viktor snarls. “Then I’ll deal with your little girlfriend. And finally Flint.”
Damiano’s struggles weaken, his face turning from red to purple. I try to get up, to help him, but my limbs won’t cooperate. The world tilts and spins around me.
“Damiano,” I manage to choke out, reaching toward him uselessly.
His eyes find mine, and I see something there—regret, apology, goodbye.
Then, suddenly, a dark blur bursts into the clearing. Flint appears like a demon summoned from the shadows, a garden statue clutched in his hands. Without hesitation, he brings it down on Viktor’s head with terrible force.
The sound is sickening—a wet crack that echoes through the maze. Viktor’s grip on Damiano loosens immediately. He sways, turning toward Flint with confusion in his eyes, blood already streaming down his face.
Flint doesn’t give him a chance to recover. He swings the statue again, catching Viktor on the temple. This time, Viktor crumples to the ground like a puppet with cut strings.
Damiano rolls away, gasping for air, his hands going to his bruised throat. Flint stands over Viktor’s body, the bloody statue still gripped in his hands, his chest heaving.
“Is he...?” I whisper, my question barely audible.
Flint kneels, pressing his fingers against Viktor’s neck. After a long moment, he looks up, his expression grim in the moonlight.
“He’s dead.”
The three of us stare at each other across Viktor’s body, the reality of what just happened sinking in. Another Bastian brother dead. Another body to hide.
Chapter 30
Flint
Death has a particular stench. Not just the metallic tang of blood painting the moonlight silver-black, but something deeper. Older. A reminder that we’re all just walking meat sacks with expiration dates.
Viktor Bastian’s expiration date came about twenty years too late, in my opinion.
I stand over his body, the garden statue still clutched in my hands, its smooth stone surface now slick with blood and matter. My chest heaves as I try to catch my breath, adrenaline making my vision too sharp, too focused.
“Is he...” Briar’s voice comes from somewhere to my left, barely more than a whisper.
I force myself to kneel beside Viktor, pressing my fingers against his neck where a pulse should be. Nothing. Just cooling flesh and the unmistakable stillness of death. A moment ago, this man was breathing, thinking, threatening.
Now he’s just... meat.
“He’s dead.” I sound strangely calm to my own ears.
I look up at Damiano, still struggling to breathe after nearly having his windpipe crushed, then at Briar huddled against the stone bench, blood trickling from her split lip where Viktor struck her. The moonlight makes her nightgown glow unnaturally white, like some kind of fucked-up ghost bride. And between us lies Viktor, a spreading pool of darkness seeping from his shattered skull.
Three dead Bastian brothers. One for each of us to carry.
“We need to move.” I drop the statue with a soft thud on the gravel beside Viktor’s body. “Now.”
Damiano nods, rubbing his bruised throat. “Same place,” he manages to rasp.
“Jesus Christ.” A hysterical laugh bubbles up from somewhere deep inside me. “Why not? It’s already turning into a fucking family plot.”
“Stop.” Briar comes across stronger than I expect. She rises unsteadily to her feet, but there’s something hard in her eyes when she looks at Viktor’s body. “We need to think this through first.”
“What’s there to think about?” I gesture to the corpse between us. “Another Bastian brother, another grave. Tradition at this point.”
“Flint,” Damiano says in a broken whisper, but it stops me cold. “She’s right. This is different.”
“How?” I demand, anger surging through me, hot and welcome after the cold shock of what I’ve done. “This piece of shit was going to rape her. Would have killed you. Probably me next. What’s different?”
“There’s a high chance people know he’s here,” Briar says quietly. “At the party, he was talking to Locke. People saw him put on the mask and leave. We can assume people knew he was coming after me.”
The truth of her words hits me like a second blow. Shit. She’s right. Viktor wasn’t some random partygoer like Liam, disappearing into the night unnoticed. He’s the head of security at The Vault. Everyone saw him tonight.
“Fuck.” I exhale, running a blood-streaked hand through my hair. “Fuck!”
“We stick with the truth,” Damiano says, his voice still raw. “As much as we can.”