𝚂𝙾𝙱𝚁𝙸𝙴𝚃𝚈 𝚆𝙾𝙽𝚃 𝚃𝙴𝙰𝙲𝙷 𝙺𝙸𝙳𝚂 𝚃𝙾 𝙳𝙰𝙽𝙲𝙴 ,, j. b routledge

11| i hear them clawing at the gates, i hear them calling out my name

Chapter Eleven

Empire (Bring Me The Horizon)

"i hear them clawing at the gates...i hear them calling out my name"

"You two need to run. Now."

I shook my head, pink tendrils of hair whipping in the wind. "Barry, no. I can't ask you to do that. My family brought this on."

"They brought this on themselves when they broke into my pawn shop."

"Give us the Barba girl and nobody gets hurt!"

"Not in my fucking pawn shop!" Barry shouted, pushing the filing cabinet away from the door

"Give Vittoria my regards. If I save her baby sister from the Italian mob, she'll be falling at my feet."

Suddenly I had a very messed up image of Barry and Vittoria on the living room couch. Not on my watch, drug dealer.

"Rafe, buddy, we have to get out of here. I'm not letting him die for me." I spoke, turning to face the blonde from my past.

"You always were like that, weren't you?" The Cameron boy shook his head "SO high and mighty even after your family fell from grace."

"Our fall from grace in Charleston has nothing to do with wanting to fight my own battles!"

"Listen!" Rafe shouted, effectively cutting me off. "I've known Barry a lot longer than you have, so trust me when I say that he's gonna be fine. Us, however, will not."

I exhaled a breath, flattening my puffed cheeks. Shoving a chequebook off the desk under the window, I stepped up and tried to open the window. Cursing, I slapped my palms against my sides. The window was painted shut and there was jack that I could do to get the window open.

I shook my head "If I cut through the paint, I could damage the window and I do not want to be here when Barry finds out it was us."

I closed my eyes, desperately trying to tune out the shouts and gunfire from the main shop area. "Fine, Cameron. But you're going to help."

Rafe grabbed a letter opener for the desk drawer and the two of us started scratching at the black paint holding the window shut. Together, the two of us managed to pry the window open and I clambered out the small space, ungracefully falling to the grass, my former lover behind me. Covered in dirt and streaks of green grass stains, I helped the older boy stumble to his feet before we set off for the front of the shop.

Ducking behind my own beat up car, I stared at the pristine black Volvo parked next to my car. Not very Italian of them, that's for sure. I don't know what I expected. Maybe to see my father's Porsche Carerra and have proof that the entire ordeal was his fault.

I took my phone out of my pocket and snapped a picture of the license plates. If my dad was going to be in Kildare, I might as well use his status to find out who the plates belong to. Better yet, maybe we strong Barba women can make Favio tell us what's up. Because Lord knows he owes us an explanation.

"Cameron,get in the back. Prop that leg up, I don't want blood all over my car." I said, slightly out of breath as I opened the drivers side. "Come back for the truck, I'll take you back to Kooklandia. I need to be on that side of the island anyways."

"What are you doing on Figure Eight?"

I sighed, pulling open my car door "Kelce needs his brakes fixing again. I have half a mind to cut the lines so that the idiot drives off a cliff or something. I wanna do that to Topper too. And you, ya big idiot." My life would have been so much easier if I had never kissed you in the first place.

I put the key in the ignition, jumping out of my seat when my stereo starting screaming at me. I had forgotten that Sempiternal was in the CD player. Turning the volume down, I quickly pulled out of the lot, not wanting to spend one more moment wondering what the hell was going on in there.

My entire body ached from the fall I'd taken out the window. My pink hair was now tangled with grass and twigs. My legs were scratched up and my palms leaked red blood like the ichor of the gods. To make matters worse, the chime of a text from Favio read like the four horsemen.

"Rafe, I'm taking you to Kelce's. You know how to fix brakes?"

The blonde nodded "Yeah, you need a hand, Sie?"

"Don't call me that." I said quietly. "You lost the ability to call me that when cocaine became a priority."

shame in needing my help, I won't even ask for a cut of the money."

"Generous." I sneered "Favio's here, so I'm trying to put off going back. Kelce's mom is a nurse, she can fix up that bullet wound of yours, no questions asked."

Rafe laughed "I know your grandmother. She's gonna gross that man back to Charleston if she tells him the story of her affair with Steven Tyler."

I laughed, thinking about my Nonna's (detailed) shenanigans with the Aerosmith singer in the seventies. "She almost sent you running with that one."

"That's a story I needed holy water to remove form my ears."

I pulled into Kelce's driveway behind the red Volvo his dad drove. The boy's Range Rover was propped up on a jack, and Kelce was arguing with a well-dressed blonde. It looked like the beginnings of a breakup. I could tell from personal experience with a certain Cameron boy.

"Come on, Cameron." I smiled. "You're gonna have to help me out of this car, because once I sit down again, I'm not getting up."