ONE WEEK AFTER

"Don't look at me like that."

I stand, facing the window that overlooks the city. My secret apartment downtown. One I kept hidden from Anise.

Once, I wanted to go to university. To travel around the world, competing in tournaments. To play chess against the best of the best.

To be the best of the best.

But my sister made sure I'd never be able to. Not anymore.

"I'm serious," I snap. "Don't look at me like that."

Cloudy lets out a whine.

My arms cross, a chill snaking up my back. I can't stop pacing the apartment. Stalking up down and the length of the window.

Where could she possibly be?

After I told her to run, to get out of here, she disappeared.

Now, I dial Derek's number on my phone.

"Hello?" His gruff voice.

"Have you found her?" I growl.

"I'm doing my best, but I━"

"Seven days," I snarl softly into the phone. "You've had seven days. You still haven't found her."

"All I know is the Saints don't have her━"

The Saints don't have her. It should be good news.

"I want to know where she is," I say roughly. "Not who doesn't have her."

Before he can say more, I hang up.

Cloudy nips at my leg, scratching at me with tiny teeth. "Stop it," I snap, shaking him off. But he only comes back. Sad, pitiful eyes.

Damn it. Damn it.

It's almost as if he's asking where she is.

"I don't know," I mutter. "I don't know, and it's my fault."

I didn't mean for it to happen. Any of it.

Somehow, I find myself at the edge of the water.

A small, hidden lake in New Orleans. Who would have thought?

I found it when I was younger. After Anise inherited the role of the Alpha, and our parents abandoned us, and it was really just me and Tommy.

Crouching down next to the lake, I look back at my reflection. The muddy-brown eyes. The sharp jaw. High cheekbones.

I know I don't need them anymore, but I still hesitate. My fingertips lingering just above my lashes.

Jude whispered, All in?

But I've always been all in. I've always loved her.

I've never stopped loving her.

Then my fingertips slide over the surface of my pupil, gently enough to tug the contacts out. Brown eyes━I've almost forgotten what I really look like.

You're her.

You're the little girl.

I'm not a little girl anymore, but somehow . . . somehow, she knows. She remembers.

I need to go back to the Underground soon, but I still linger.

That day, the day of the battle, when Jude launched herself at the Saints right from the heart of their own defense, my heart stopped.

It wasn't just that I had taken out my contacts before we'd left━in order to see clearly━and it wasn't just that she had disobeyed my direct orders, because I had assumed she would in some way.

But it was that she was right in the heart of enemy gunfire.

She had walked straight into the centre of Saint territory.

I knew better than anyone that while the Saints may have been named after the holy will of God, they were much closer to hell than even me.

I had a made a deal with them, after all.

A deal with the devil.

In third grade, Angela Wilkman was getting bullied by a group of fourth-graders.

It was recess, and what exactly those ten-year-olds saw in Angel's shy, whimpering demeanor that infuriated them, I have no idea.

But I remember the bell had just rung.

There was Angela, cowering against the fence. Right in the blindspot of the supervising teacher━who either didn't notice or deliberately looked away.

A group of fourth-graders, standing above red-haired Angela, whose lisp wasn't letting her say, "Stop━thop!"

I had been the daughter of the Alpha for a long time. It took a lot, even then, for me to snap. There wasn't much that could anger me, and there was even less that could make me start a fight. I knew I would win, it was just a matter of deciding . . . is it worth it?

But that day, it was worth it.

I don't remember walking over. I just remember the hush that fell over the playground. Five of the largest, meanest fourth-graders, and I was the only one brave enough to saunter right up to them.

"Hello," I said calmly.

"Oh, look," said one of the fourth graders. Reese. "If it isn't Daddy's little girl."

I didn't know how they knew. I didn't even care.

"Is Daddy going to get you out of this one?" said another. "Stay back, or Daddy might just put you on a leash."

Even at eight, I got that one. Leash━wolves━and it still wasn't even that good.

"One chance," I said coldly. I had seen Anise do this, and it scared people half to death. "I'm going to count to three."

I counted to three. No one moved.

No, it didn't take much for me to snap, but when I did?

Two of them were already on the ground and I was in the process of breaking a third one's arm when Jude came running over.

"No!" I said. "You'll get hurt."

She only gave me a look, as though it was a challenge.

Then she hit the last fourth-grader with a beautiful, nose-breaking punch.

I was so distracted I didn't even notice the boy in front of me launching himself at her until she turned around. Beaming at me.

She began, "Did you see━?"

The boy grappled for her, knocking her to the asphalt.

As soon as Jude cried out, I was on him.

At eight, I had never beat someone within an inch of their life. I had only seen Anise do it. But that would be the first time, and it wasn't by far the last.

But that day in the playground, I had completely lost control when I heard Jude crying out.

I just snapped.

By the time I was done, he had three broken ribs. A broken leg. A shattered kneecap. Four broken fingers. And a concussion.

But Jude was okay. And that made it worth it.

That wasn't the last time I beat someone up for Jude.

Over the years, I became excellent at the craft of blackmail and threatening. Jude was the hot-headed one━I was the negotiator. It must have been come with being born into the Mafia, but I was a little too good at scaring people with only a deadly look.

But when all else failed, a couple broken ribs never hurt. And I was good at that, too.

One thing I couldn't do, though? Math.

Now, as I patiently wait for the elevator to glide down, I think of what I will say to my sister.

Will she suspect me?

But before I can plan out all my responses, someone wrangles the doors open. Heaving the metal panels apart.

Gianina. Warm, brown-skinned, lovely Gianina, with her deep red lips and her curvy body. I had considered fucking her once, but she wasn't my type.

"Where is she?" Gianina gasps.

"Who?" I ask, even though I know.

Her eyes narrow. "You know who I'm talking about! How could you━how could you━"

I harden. Is she accusing me?

Interesting, that Jude has friends here. Friends who care so deeply about her.

I'm not surprised, though. Everyone who knew Jude loved her. She was━is━a firecracker.

Even as Gianina glares at me, I feel myself soften.

"I . . ." Need a better story.

"Where?" Gianina says, and this time there is real worry in her voice.

She's afraid of me. That is interesting, too.

"I don't know."

"How can you not know?" she demands, but the elevator doors are closing, and this time she isn't fast enough to stop them.

When the elevator plummets again, I let out a breath.

It has been one week, and this is the first time I have returned since the Saints attack. They didn't hurt anyone down here━that was a part of the deal I made━but what they did was enough to rattle the Wolves. To sow the seed of real fear.

I don't care who wins this war. As long as it's not Anise.

The doors open, and I stop onto the 49th floor. Ready to face my sister, the Alpha.

Here is the truth.

There are 100 floors in the Underground.

Not 49. Not 50.

One hundred.

The majority of Wolves will never know about the bottom half. Only the oldest, the most powerful, will ever glimpse what lies beneath what most here call home.

The truth, of what we are.

Of how we have this money.

Even Tommy doesn't know, but I do. And I'm not supposed to.

"Anise," I say. Calm.

"You've been missing, sister," she says, picking at her teeth with a long gold-tipped acrylic nail. She is one of the few who surgically modified her canines to be longer, sharper. A metaphor, I'm sure, for ripping out throats. I'm hoping she's never had the chance.

"A week," I say. "You've gone longer."

It's true. Sometimes Anise will vanish altogether for weeks, and although I don't know where, I have the faintest, coldest suspicion she has left the country.

That is how she does business, after all. Internationally.

And although I only found out a month ago━just before Jude's arrival━I can't help but shudder at what I know she now does.

I should have wondered. I should have asked myself, Where does she get the money to run the Underground? To run a pack full of Wolves?

But maybe that my naivety. Maybe that was me hoping Anise hadn't changed━that she was still the sister who had once let me sneak up an entire cake to my room.

"Because of the girl," Anise says smoothly.

My sister has always had a way of words.

"The girl," I say stiffly.

Anise knows━has known, from the very beginning, who Jude was.

She knew Jude was never a spy from the Saints. Although she does know there is a rat, an informant, among the Wolves, she doesn't know it is me.

"Yes, the girl," Anise purrs. "She disappeared the night of the surprise attack, didn't she?"

Noncommittally, I make a low noise in my throat.

"Yes," Anise hums. "She disappeared. A coward. Running away when we were in real danger."

My fists clench at my sides.

Don't let her push you, Hunter.

It will take more than this for me to break.

"It seems perhaps she couldn't stomach this life after all. I told you, Hunter. I always told you, she wasn't cut out for this."

"You don't know anything about her."

"I know you."

"Then you should know that for the first time since I've been in this godforsaken hellhole, I've been happy. But you wouldn't like that, would you?"

Anise's eyes begin to burn, but I don't back down.

Maybe I've pushed her too far. I don't care.

She's trying to play me the same way she plays all the other Mafia lords. With honeyed words and poisoned barbs.

But if this is a game of chess, then I've already won.

"I hope you find her," Anise whispers, her eyes glittering darkly. Her sharp nails dance against the marble desk, a clicking sound like the shuttling of a spider. Her voice becomes soft. Too soft. "Because I'll be looking for her, too."

Everything in me freezes. My blood. My mind.

I'll be looking for her, too.

Jude is in real danger now, and it will be my fault.

If I thought it would make this any better, I would get on my knees and beg her. But I know Anise too well━she would only enjoy the sight of me pleading for Jude's life. Showing weakness.

I have to find Jude. Fast.

With a renewed sense of urgency, I back away from Anise. As soon as I am out of her office, my phone is in my hand.

But it's not Derek I call this time.

"Maria," I say, the moment the ringing stops. "I need your help."

A dark, graceful voice with an Italian accent purrs, "It would be my pleasure."

>>>

A little violent, aren't we?

From the moon and back,
Sarai