Chapter 18

Corrin

Sitting in a car seat I rest my gun between my knees, pointing it into the footwell. It requires an immense amount of strength to hold a weapon that takes lives in a blink, but there’s nothing I can do to avoid it. Even worse is wearing clothes, resembling what I wore on… that night.

“So this is what we are? A delivery service for mafia?” For the whole day, Terrel and I have been driving in a medium-sized green van, delivering packages from one contact to the other.

“What did you expect?” Terrel keeps his vigil on the street. “Action on the first day?”

“I did, I suppose.” This whole thing is strange and… unruffled. I sit in the passenger’s seat, gun at the ready in case, while Terrel collects the stuff from some man who arrives at the predetermined location. Packages vary, from bigger boxes to smaller containers or envelopes. For all we know we might be driving explosives in our back. Legitimate delivery services or drones could be hacked after all. Us— no questions asked, no papers filled— an incognito delivery service. And these mafia men rely on us to deliver it, which we do. Each and every package, precisely on time and place, to the face described or a trigger movement mentioned.

I tense when a patrol car pulls into the alleyway. “Don’t do nothing.” Terrel pushes the button for the window to slide open. An old balding officer exits the patrol vehicle and unlike the other men, who wait for us to come to them, crosses the street.

“Evening.” He flashes a smug grin, stopping by Terrel’s window. “Got those smokes I asked for?”

“Yeah.” From under his seat Terrel pulls a block of cigarettes. It appears Terrel knows most of the faces, which would mean we have to be working for more or less same mob families. One of them could be mine.

The officer takes the block. “It has what I ordered?” Terrel nods, and the man throws me a look. “New partner, huh? What happened to the girl?” I saw Aida leave with the other men this morning.

“None of your business, officer.” Terrel pushes the button and the window begins sliding up.

The officer grins as he pivots away. “You just keep coming. And tell your partner to buckle up.”

I lower the gun on my lap, my fingers shaking. I couldn’t buckle up, because the moment I did I felt restrained and my panic would rise. I’m thankful Terrel allowed it as we weren’t driving fast. “Weren’t those smokes?”

“Cocaine, probably.” Terrel starts the van.

“Cocaine? How did you get it? And why would he need it?” Terrel’s sideways look is a mix of wariness and skepticism. I shouldn’t have asked. “It was an unintelligent question. I mean…uh, dumb question.” My speech is betraying me.

Terrel must be wondering what on earth is wrong with me. He saw me train Sevina, but I’m certain it hadn’t slipped past him that when it comes to this life— I’m a moron. The only thing that must’ve stopped him blaming me a rat is the fact that he helped me on the streets and that I technically saved Quint.

“It was sent to him by someone.” After a pause Terrel bothers to explain. “Maybe he’s setting someone up or using it himself.” The cop was someone like Will, someone surviving.

“Does always only one of us goes to take the package?” I ask as we drive the crowded street to the next location. Apart from the officer, with each man we meet Terrel exits and goes alone while I stay in the car.

“Yes.”

How am I ever going to bring Sevina to look into their eyes? The only way is to work in a pair and even then I would have to send her alone to cross the street and accept the package. She’d have to near all those vile men, steal those three seconds, stay poker-faced without arousing suspicion or losing her calm until she’s back in the van. She’ll never agree to this. And who would ever let us two go on a run?

She did manage to withstand some lives in the hideout, but Terrel and I encountered at least forty men already. Forty lives a day!

How?

Terrel stops the van in a narrow street and checks his watch. “We’re early. This man is always on time. You can get out for a few minutes.”

“Why?”

Terrel disappears in the back to search for the package. “Just get out.” He noticed me fidget restlessly with a gun— the van and sitting still for hours made me sick. I vault outside, breathing the fumes and absorbing the vast street at the mouth of the alley. Intuitively, I wipe my hands into my chest together with an imaginary feeling of Quint’s blood, warming my hands through the coarse gloves I wore when I taped his wound.

I lift my head at the rising buildings, recalling the evening on the roof and when my world seemed the brightest— my mother, the kite I flew, and Sevina…

“You always work in pairs, right?” I ask Terrel once he’s back in the driver’s seat.

“Yeah.” He fills in something in his tablet.

“How long since I can with Sevina?”

Terrel frowns. “Why?”

“Just wondering. She doesn’t want to be left out.”

Terrel’s attention falls back to the tablet. “Sevina’s far from ready.”

“Doesn’t Aida ever go to take the packages?”

“She does, but she has experience. And contacts generally take better to men. Despite a few women. Why are you asking me this?” Now he’s really suspicious.

“Well, I’m trying to learn,” I keep my voice casual.

“Learn? Why do you need Sevina then?”

“She just wants to go out into the field too.”

Terrel’s face clouds, untrusting. “Yeah?”

I have to break the tension. “She said so to me.” Damn, now he’ll suspect Sevina. “She doesn’t want to be useless.” I doubt she cares about her uselessness.

Terrel motions for me to sit inside. Refreshed but no less worried I grasp the gun. Minutes later a rusty car pulls into the street. It parks on the side of the road and a man climbs out. Terrel takes a little box he had on his lap before he exits and strides across the road.

This one is forty-third, I think.

We return late at night. Despite being pulled to my roof like a magnet I force myself to visit Sevina. I haven’t seen her since yesterday evening. Today, when Terrel woke me on the roof, she wasn’t there and I assume that once I fell asleep with her hand in my hair, she went back to her room.

I find her in the empty kitchen, half of her body gone in the oven, scrubbing it.

An open pack of ice cream stands on the ground next to her feet.

“Sev?” I began calling her by her short name a few weeks ago, well, she asked me since I kept correcting myself from Sev to Sevina and it was irritating.

She leaps to her feet as if she’s been waiting years for me to come, spoon sticking out of her mouth. For a moment, I think she’ll ask if I’m alright, if nothing dangerous has happened—

“What did you learn?” She plucks a spoon from her mouth as she stops short in front of me, her greasy hands clutching the sponge and the utensil. I sigh, not knowing where to begin. Impatiently, her eyes flit to mine every split second. “Look at me.” She demands for the first time.

I meet her eyes. She takes a deep breath and turns away, biting her lip and thinking.

“Shit.” She throws the sponge into the sink, her voice quivers, but in no time she shifts to the problem. “Over forty men. How am I gonna do it?” She’s immediately accepting the fact she’ll have face them, but something else doesn’t compute.

I stare at her. I am quite drowsy, but she’s the complete opposite. Shouldn’t she feel drowsy as well? And then worn a little afterward. “Sev?” I whisper. “How do you feel?”

She’s deep in thought, eyes cast to the floor and head bowed. “Fine, why?” It’s as if only now she notices me and my state.

Amusement overtakes her expression. “But how?”

“What were you doing while you were waiting for me?”

“Chores, but I was thinking of the day on your job, that I’ll have to find and check this day all throughout.”

“You focused on it before you looked. You knew what you wanted!” I throw my palms out.

“And that’s what I saw.” Her lips curl into a smile that reminds me of her on the roof. “Even the first time, unconsciously, I had the intention to get all the exits from Aida’s life, and it was easier. Then with Quint, I looked for positive memories and the negative stuff didn’t affect me that much,” Oh, she looked at Quint. All right, I think. “The focus is the key!” She throws her arms wide, her accent even crispier when excited. I’ve never seen her display this much emotion before.

“Now all that’s left is to learn to keep your head high and be confident and you got it.”

She nods sharply and raises her head a little higher, her gold eyes jumping around my face with raw enthusiasm… and hope. “I would’ve never noticed. But how do I learn confidence? I mean… it scares me. I’m still a pushover.”

I sigh. I don’t know how I can help her achieve confidence. “Just remember that your eyes are your own… and that you’re the only person who controls them, I suppose.”

“Same goes for your fears,” she retorts in a soft way.

“Yes, but eyes, it’s like a muscle, like a hand.” I clench my fist. “Just because I’m paranoid doesn’t mean I can’t control my hand.”

“But you couldn’t. You hit people, attacked me.”

“When it’s too much, I couldn’t, just like you fainted, but bit by bit you get accustomed to it, you know.” I run my hand over my elbow. “But with focus for you it shouldn’t be too much.”

“Makes sense.” She shrugs, then ads in a mellow voice that makes my troubles scatter away. “Thank you.” I glance down at the ice cream box and she sniffs. “I, uh, found it… it’s about to expire.”

“It’s not the best if you’re trying to get in shape.” Apparently, even kids know better.

She takes the box from the floor, rather protectively, and scoops another spoonful. Eats it, scoops again and offers me. I let out a laugh. “I don’t like ice cream.”

With a smirk she swallows it. “Good.”