☘︎ Jᴇɴɴɪғᴇʀ Rʏsᴏɴ ☘︎

Viviane is a lethal weapon forged into a human being.

It's in the delusional speed, the impossible angle at which she jabs her elbow into the abdomen of the man twice her size. The force and suddenness of her hit has the black-uniformed guard release her with a pained groan, stumbling backwards in startlement and shock. Viviane spins around, jabbing her knee up his groin making the man thump down to the floor holding his crotch in agony, while she effortlessly grabs the gun from his waistband.

The gun in her hand looks like it's always belonged there, made for the sole purpose for her to use. She doesn't give anyone a second to think what's happening before the first gunshot cuts through the air then another and another and another, each with such agility and precision it's crazy. Not even a moment later, every ten of the men who were surrounding us, lie motionless on the floor. Dead. Bullet shot right through their heads.

Viviane stares at the crimson blood pooling around the dead bodies with a pout, "I swear I didn't want to kill them. I just didn't like their uniforms."

Paul seems to be in a state of momentary stupor, unable to process what just happened in a matter of minutes, as if he can't accept the fact that he is now without a single extra protection except himself and his daughter who acts frantic at the sight of blood around her, obsessively tucking her hair behind her ears again and again.

Paul does hold up a good facade of bravado though, changing his aim from me to Viviane, realizing who is a bigger threat for him in the current situation.

Viviane doesn't bat an eye, still pouting at the corpses. Paul prepares himself to shoot and I open my mouth to warn her, but before he can even pull the trigger on his gun, a gunshot echoes hitting Paul right on his ankle. Paul falls to his knees with a considerably pathetic scream for a man who'd been singing odes a while ago about killing people.

Mia shrieks, covering her ears, her face becoming paler and her frail body trembling. She can kill people on request of the one she's dependent on but she can't see anyone being killed, especially the person she's dependent on. Is this part of her DPD?

Viviane rolls her eyes, finally shifting her gaze to the man in question, "I hate guns. They're so noisy. I rather prefer the screams of my victims over the sound of gunshots. It's sad we don't have a knife here for me to use. You know, cutting people down and stuff, I enjoy those a lot."

I think I notice a cold sweat run down Paul's temple, it makes me want to smile even in such a grim situation. He's actually afraid. He had no idea he wasn't dealing with a fragile thing, but with a more dangerous psychopath than himself. Who the fuck is Viviane?

"I really don't like meddling in other people's business." Viviane passes the dead guards, her red heels staining with redder blood. She smirks darkly as though she quite enjoys this, like she missed it, like this is her favorite kind of battlefield.

Paul still has his gun loosely clutched in his hand but he hesitates to aim, probably thinking she'd shoot him again, this time maybe to the heart or head. She's playing him, and something tells she's always been the best kind of player.

"But you had to go and make it personal by imitating the clown." Viviane reaches Paul, looming over his form on the ground, like a shadow of death preparing to take away his soul.

"You know how they say there are incidents that define a person? The clown kidnapping was that incident for me." Viviane crouches down in front of him, sitting on her heels and smiling at Paul like she's talking about sunshine and rainbows, "It made me embrace my inner monster. My parents were so proud of me, they got me the real clown as a birthday gift straight from prison. I definitely liked making the clown suffer before I killed him. I was nine years old, took me a long while to get introduced to my inner beast. But I realized I actually quite like her. That I'm a better predator than a prey. "

My hands pause on their movements of untying the ropes around my wrists, her speech striking me with a new realization. The clown kidnapping. . .she was a part of it. Ethan's words ring in my ears on a loop.

The girl we can't find information about. . .she's from a dangerous family.

Her family killed the clown.

Except not her family, she killed the clown.

"You're the fifth one who got kidnapped." I declare, finally succeeding in undoing the last hoop of the rope.

Paul's eyes widen in equal parts shock and equal parts annoyance when I throw my bindings to the side, rising carelessly from the chair I was tied to. Mia is biting her nails aggressively in a nervous gesture. I can see the skin around her nails begin to bleed, her eyes frantically moving between each of us present. But she doesn't move because Viviane still has her father under her clutch. Mia wouldn't risk doing anything that'd hurt him in return.

"I'll let Jennifer handle you." Patting Paul's face with the gun like he's a little kid, Viviane stands up from her kneeling position, but not before shooting his uninjured leg, "Oops, accidental."

Mia starts crying in a way that conveys she's having a panic attack. Paul glares at Viviane and me, yelping as he clutches his bleeding wound. We both ignore him. He really is just all talk. To think I'd let him manipulate me the last two months. My mind really must've had a vacation to the offshore.

Viviane approaches me, grinning in a way that makes me doubt whether the girl who killed people like they were a flock of birds was even the same.

But the deadly glint in her eyes is still present, taking my doubt away, "For saving my life eleven years ago, I saved yours today." Viviane holds out both of her hands to me, a gun in one and the other simply extended, "My debt is cleared. We're even now."

I take the gun from her and give her other free hand a firm shake, a genuine smile stretching up my mouth, finding this entire situation ironic. There's still one question tugging at my conscience, "But who are you really?"

A flicker of guilt envelops her features for the briefest second, before a coy half-smile takes over her bloodred lips. She retorts, her tone velvety yet so dangerous, "I'm Juliette Romano. Daughter of the Russian Mafia Don."

***

☘︎ Lʏᴋᴀs Vɪᴛᴀʟʟɪs ☘︎

I can't think straight, can't move. Dazedly staring at the boisterous traffic from the passenger seat, my mind spins with the negative possibilities of what may happen.

Fuck fuck fuck.

This is all my mistake. I shouldn't have let anyone be around Jennifer knowing we couldn't trust anyone. Yet I'd given a one-way ticket to the very person who was behind all of this, by asking Mia to accompany Jennifer. If something happens to her because of my stupidity. . .

I shove my hands through my hair, keeping them there and tugging at the roots to remind myself to keep it together. She'll be fine. She's Jennifer Ryson. She can handle herself. She can, can't she?

My throat tightens, fear sinking it's claws into my soul. Please be okay.

"Stop letting your emotions turn you into a fool." Romeo's biting comment is a slap on my face.

"You don't understand." I glare at the traffic, my voice constricting, "I can't handle anything happening to her."

"I keep telling you to be smarter and yet you always end up yourself in such situations. What benefit did you gain by pining after your father's approval all these years? What will you gain now?" Romeo is meaner than his usually mean self.

"It's different with Jenna!" I half-yell, half-scream, my eyes stinging, "I love her!"

Romeo is quite for a minute too long. His eagle-like gaze studies me from the corner of his eyes before he lets out a sigh, "We'll find her." He assures, his voice uncharacteristically soft.

Romeo swivels the car with a sharp turn, successfully getting us out of the traffic and speeding his way down the street where the warehouse is situated, where Thana told Mia took Jennifer and Viviane after hacking the CCTV systems.

"What's your problem with Viviane?" I continue talking to him in a trance, fearing that if I stay quiet, I might return to a dark place. I just want to reach Jenna.

Romeo's signature blank expression hardens, "She's not Viviane. She's Juliette Romano. Russia's killing machine." He grits the words through his teeth.

I blink, my mind gnawing at me for Jennifer but still processing what he just said, "You mean the Russian mafia. . .?"

"Yes, them. Juliette is my fiancé." I notice the way his knuckles grow white with how hard he grips the steering wheel, but his face is still void of any emotion, "Her family killed my entire family. My family killed hers. They both killed each other until no one was alive except me, Juliette and her younger brother Nikolai."

My eyes widen, "Wha-"

"There's a blood feud. I want Juliette and her brother dead. They want me dead." Romeo concludes as if he's speaking of the freaking weather. Like the words he just spoke weren't fifty shades of fucked.

But before I can ask him anything, Romeo halts his Rolls Royce in front of the warehouse. It's a shabby one-storey building, nothing but cemented bricks, the entire structure on the verge of collapsing.

I'm out of the car prior to Romeo even turning off his car's engine. I let my best friend be and venture straight inside the shabby warehouse's entrance, all my thoughts flying out the window when I hear a gunshot firing.

My footsteps thud along the desolate corridors with chipped-off paint and nearly falling ceilings. There's so much silence. All I can hear is the aggressive beating of my heart trying to catch any flicker of sound and Romeo's footsteps following me. Then I hear it, as I near the last room in the never-ending corridor.

"I'm Juliette Romano. Daughter of the Russian Mafia Don." The voice is familiar, and I don't need confirmation to know whose it is after my conversation with Romeo.

I dive straight into the cemented room. Before I can even release a breath of relief upon seeing Jenna completely intact, I notice something. While Jennifer and Juliette are distracted by shaking hands, the man who must be the clown has his gun raised towards Jenna's head.

I see the gleam in his eyes and my breathing stills, knowing what he's going to do. Out of sheer instinct, I rush towards the her, "Jenna!"

Jennifer blinks, turning to me but I reach her and throw my arms around her protectively. Using my body, I pin her to the floor just as a gunshot fires.

I wait for the pain to hit, for blood to leak, but nothing happens.

Chancing a glance at the gunman, he's immobilized to the ground, face down. The Juliette girl has him plastered to the floor, locking his arms behind his back with one hand while her heels dig into his spine, "This is why amateurs shouldn't use guns."

Romeo is next to her, pointing his gun right at the clown's throat, his eyes like daggers aimed at the man or whether it's intended for Juliette, I can't really tell. Juliette looks equally lethal, staring right back at Romeo with the same level of hatred, if not more. They're both predators waiting to kill each other. I hope they don't do that right now.

I look down at Jenna. She stares at me with a raise of her brow as if asking me whether I've lost it by how I got into her way of getting shot. Gosh I missed her. I don't think twice before ducking in and capturing those tempting lips in a hard, desperate kiss. Jennifer sighs into it, her hands tangling in my hair, her thumb stroking my cheekbones.

A clearing of throat jolts us apart. I still rest my forehead against Jenna's, caging her to the ground between my arms. We both really don't care who's looking. But for the sake of decency, I get off the floor, pulling Jennifer along with me. Grabbing her left hand, I link our fingers assuring myself she's here and she's fine.

"Mia, shoot the Vitallis kid and Jennifer!" The man held at gunpoint yells, more like commands.

Mia raises her gun as if in a trance, staring glazedly at us. Her eyes are tear-strained and she looks really really terrified. Her form trembles even when she seems fully determined, almost possessed to do what the man told her. She aims the gun at me first.

"If you touch him, I won't be responsible for my actions." Jennifer warns, stepping in front of me.

I desperately try to push her back again or swat her out of harm's way. But she gives me one ice-cold glare and shoves me behind her. Jennifer raises the gun I hadn't noticed she had, aiming it right at Mia.

For an onlooker, Jennifer might look confident but I see the way she grips the gun a bit too hard, the way her facial expressions shut down so that no one can figure out her emotions. She doesn't want to shoot Mia. Mia might've betrayed her, but Jenna has always loved Mia more than anything. It would break Jennifer to hurt Mia despite everything and she still does it for my sake.

God I couldn't love the woman less if I wanted. But I'm not going to let her take this emotional scar because of me.

I inch closer to Jennifer, with the intent to take the gun from her. But before anyone can make a move, Mia's gun thuds to the floor as she collapses in partial consciousness. Her body writhes violently as if she's having a seizure. What is happening?

Jennifer's gun changes direction in a swish of a second, shooting the clown directly in his right arm then the left, "This is all because of you." She says icily, satisfaction replacing her features at his screams of pain.

Jennifer tries to rush towards Mia then. But I grab her around the waist, holding her close as police sirens echo around us, indicating Ethan is here with his team, "The help is here. She'll be fine."

For the sake of everything that's happened, I hope it's true. Even if things will never be the same again, atleast I have Jenna to hold onto. And she has me.

I'll be the lighthouse to her dark storms.

--------᪥♔︎᪥-------

I've changed my mind, there's gonna be a small chapter after this and then the epilogue😭

I still can't process this book has almost come to an end. I really LOVEDDDD writing this one. But atleast we have another book in queue👀

Lemme know if there's anything you want for me to clear out before the story ends <3

Also lemme know your thoughts on Romeo and Juliette (the Shakespearen names are very much intentional, btw)😗💅