Devil's Due [h.s.]

Chapter 39

Chapter 39

Friday morning rolled around much too quickly. And by much too quickly, I mean that it felt like Harry had just dropped me off at my apartment where I'd made my way upstairs for a shower and got ready for bed only to open my eyes both groggy and completely restless the next morning wondering if I'd even slept at all.

It seemed that where my mind was currently distant and had given up, my body had as well. By the time I finally managed to drag myself out of bed, after a lengthy internal battle with myself weighing the pros and cons of just texting Harry that I'd decided I wasn't going to Italy, I found that I had just about no appetite. Paired with that was the beginning of a tension headache in the lower part of my neck and the surprising revelation that my period had also evaded me at some point during my fitful sleep.

I knew that it was from the current amount of stress my body was working through – stress that I'd never before faced to do with Damien, with Italy, with the job. A job that was now happening in just over 24 hours.

Harry had been no help to soothe my anxiety when he dropped me off last night. No, he hadn't cussed me out or called me incompetent, but he also wouldn't answer any of my questions, telling me to leave it alone until the morning or I was going to worry myself sick. And that he didn't want to be cleaning up puke on a plane.

He hadn't been wrong. All this morning while I'd packed my suitcase that familiar churn of nausea in my lower stomach loomed heavily, accompanied by the worry of the unknown and the wonder of whether or not I was going to make it out of this alive. Both Morgan and Harry had assured me that I would, but then again, they wouldn't have outright told me if I was going to die.

"6 a.m.," Harry had said, catching my wrist before I fled from his car last night on shaky legs – both from anxiety and the strenuous workout that he'd put me through. "I'm going to be at your place at 6 a.m."

I'd nodded, said something stupid about how he might have to drag me out of bed, but was now pulling my suitcase into the living room a whole half hour early – 5:30 a.m. to be exact – given that I wouldn't have been able to sleep any longer even if I tried. Meatloaf was still curled up in my bedroom, providing me no company in the sullen darkness that the early hours of my apartment provided, having meowed a number of times in disapproval when I'd gotten up.

With a small huff, I straightened the suitcase at the doorway and shoved my hand deep into my pocket, my fingers grazing the passport and driver's license fronted with my fake identity. Beside them, my thumb grazed over the lighter I hadn't gotten around yesterday to throwing out. The one I'd clicked on and off a number of times while trying to fall asleep.

The flame, which I had stared at until my eyes hurt, got me thinking. Had me wondering what the harm would be if I just let it fall to the carpet. If I just set the building up in flames and fled with my cat, leaving behind my life and any thoughts of the green-eyed, cartel-owning man who seemed to take up every spare moment of my mind recently.

The idea of everyone else in the building had me quickly clicking the lighter back shut, slamming it down onto my nightstand appalled that I had even considered the very idea. I could still see the flame, feel the heat of it against my face, even after I'd squeezed my eyes shut and willed my breathing to even out enough that I could fall asleep.

A wildfire.

It was what I'd essentially been bracing myself for anyway. The spark of the agreement I'd made with Damien having heightened into a full-blown set of flames, now quickly tearing away at my life piece by piece. I had refused to let myself dwell on it, had tried to ignore these past couple of weeks, knowing that it – this drop – could either pay off in my favour or end with me six feet underground. But it was getting harder. The fire was burning too hot.