Not letting him change the subject, I tried again. “When they took me … when you were left lying there, bleeding …” My blood flowed faster. “How badly did they—”
“They should never have been able to get inside and take you.” His face twisted. “I swear on my life, I’ll make it right.”
“That wasn’t what I meant. I need to know if you’re okay.”
Tell me!
My heart picked up its pace with a worried staccato.
Something happened. Something he’s not telling me.
“Arthur, if you’re not well, we need to—”
A hand landed on my head gently, breaking the moment and tearing me away from the lies Arthur was about to sprout.
Grasshopper came into focus, a soft smile on his lips. “Glad to see you’re awake. You don’t want to miss the best part.” He glanced at Arthur. “By the way, got the car. It’s ready to go.”
Arthur grunted; the sound threaded from his chest to mine. “Good.” He turned and Dagger Rose sprawled before me. The houses, the Clubhouse, the scuffed and blackened circle with a singed mattress and dirt.
What on earth happened here?
I tried to remember, but this time I had no memories being blocked by a stubborn wall. I’d been out cold and never witnessed a thing.
Arthur said, “We’ll wait to see the first spark, then we’ll go.”
I didn’t know if he was talking to me or Grasshopper.
Gingerly, I inspected the bruise on the side of my temple. It was more like an egg-shaped bump than a bruise. And it hurt—a lot. I flinched, sucking air between my teeth as I prodded it. “What exactly are we waiting for?”
As much as I appreciated Arthur holding me, I wanted to get down—to test my legs and hurry along my recovery.
“You’ll see.” Arthur cocked his chin at Dagger Rose. A few lights had been turned on in houses with broken doors and smashed windows, but that was the only illumination in the dark. Pure Corruption members dashed around, pouring rivers of gasoline from one house to another.
My heart panged to think of my childhood once again going up in flames.
Arthur hugged me harder. “Tonight, we take back what was stolen from us. Tonight, we begin our true vengeance.”
I didn’t say a word as men continued to tip any combustible liquid they could find into small trenches kicked into the mud, all leading to a center point where a small beehive of jerry cans, turpentine bottles, and half-empty spirits rested. The reek of chemicals and petrol swirled around us on the intermittent breeze.
Arthur didn’t move or put me down as we watched the commotion before us. It didn’t take long—the men worked efficiently, rigging the entire place to disintegrate.
A biker I didn’t know with greying hair and a large belly came toward Arthur and presented a tequila bottle with a rag already drenched hanging from the mouth. With the pomp of ceremony, the biker lit the dripping rag and held it away as the flames gusted into being.
He made eye contact first with me, then Arthur. “All yours, Kill.”
Arthur shifted me in his arms, somehow balancing me to take the bottle all while protecting me. He held the flaming Molotov cocktail reverently, almost as if he were about to give last rights to something sacred.
The glisten of rainbow oil on the dirt a couple of meters away beckoned for someone to start the catastrophe waiting to happen. The houses poised—as if they knew their existence was at an end.
“Ready to say goodbye?” Arthur murmured.
A twist of emotions filled me. This place had held so much love and family. So many happy memories. But all that happiness had vanished the night Rubix tried to destroy me.
Anger boiled in my stomach. “Fire already ended my world once. Let it burn this one, too.”
Arthur smiled, then … he handed me the bottle. “Burn it, Cleo. Put an end to this place.”
I gasped, accepting the volatile torch uncomfortably. “I don’t think …” Stretching out my arm, I did my best to keep the fiery rag from getting too close. “This is your closure, your triumph.”
With a soft but dangerous look, he said, “It’s both of ours. I want you to be the one to do it.”
I held eye contact for a long moment. This was his retribution—not mine. He needed this to find an ending.
Arthur held me firm. “Do it.”
The fervor in his voice forced me to obey. My blood flowed faster.
With a pathetic swing and an arm that didn’t completely remember how to throw, I tossed the tequila bottle toward the liquid fuse.
I jumped in Arthur’s embrace as the bottle bounced. It didn’t shatter against the soft dirt, but the fire didn’t care.
We held our breath as it rolled the remaining distance, spitting out liquor and flames until it hopped straight from the rag to the path laid before it. It took a second … one second and that was it. Almost as if the universe held its breath with us, waiting to see what would happen.
In a blink, an electrifying yellow and blue whip tore up the center of the compound, devouring the road set before it and branching off seamlessly into each abode.
For a minute, there was no noise. Just the gentle hissing of fire devouring gasoline. It lulled me into a false sense of anticlimactic apprehension.