These Violent Delights
—have violent ends—
Prologue
It wasn't supposed to happen like this.
Captured and trapped in the darkness, handcuffed hands hanging above her head and body stiff against the rough concrete, unable to make anything out but the palpable fury of a boy who just might kill her.
His hands were wrapped around her neck, tightening to the point that black spots began to appear behind her eyes. With her gun lying far out of reach, and her partner unconscious and bleeding, any chance Massie had of making it out alive was slim. Impossible, even, as his eyes, once filled with an all consuming love, now held nothing but contempt, anger and worst of all, hatred. After all, he'd only been a kid and she was the one who came crashing into his life, ruining everything.
Life is made up of choices. Big ones, small ones, simple, complex—easy, hard. So many choices, we seem to forget we even have them after awhile. Everything blurring into one, boiling down until you see the only two that matter. Before and after. How and why. Beginning and end.
In her twenty-five years, Massie Block's choices have always been easy. Leave home and move to Washington to join the FBI or stay with her rigid, xenophobic father? Leave, obviously. Work hard and earn the respect of those twenty years her senior or blend into the background and ease her way up? Working hard wouldn't hurt. Take a case she could do in her sleep because the director personally asked her to or wait for the next mass murder? Take the easy glory, it was the only way to stay on the directors radar.
Massie was all about doing, believing life waits for no one. So she threw herself head first into the Harrington case, learning everything possible there was to know about New York's most dangerous family and how on earth she was going to get the eldest son to turn. She eventually became so involved, she began neglecting her own life, and everything she'd left waiting for her when the case was over.
And when the inevitable came, and Massie was forced to choose between the Harrington's and her job.
She chose wrong.
The broad shoulders of the figure standing before Massie blurred into a mess of fuzzy, oblong shapes as finally, the hands around her neck began to loosen their hold. The boy, six years her junior, glared mercilessly as she coughed, her body futilely attempting to compensate for the restricted oxygen, now a stark contrast to the sweet boy who once upon a time had slid right through her defences.
As her spluttering began to subside, he reached for Landon's bloody gun and held it in the palm of his hand, as if contemplating the weight of it.
"You know," he said in a calm voice that startled Massie, "You aren't getting out of here alive." And she fought whatever it was in her that wanted to scream; how could you? "So you might as well save yourself the prolonged misery and give me what I want. Whadda ya say?"
She wanted to ask why—how, what could've caused him to flip on her just like that? All the love he'd once claimed to feel for her disappearing within one blink. But she doesn't—she can't, not when she can't even stand to acknowledge her own part in everything. "Just kill me."
He tsked. "It'd be such a shame to lose that goregous face. Ah, well." He clocked the gun at the spot between her eyes. "Gotta reap what you sow and all that."
She can't keep the next words from flying out of her mouth. "Please don't do this." Massie begged. "Please." The once strong Massie Block is gone and here she was, a shell of the girl who graduated Quantico top of her class, eyes tearing up, trying to appeal to whatever scrap of heart the enemy had left so he wouldn't kill her.
He laughed darkly, a loud incredulous chuckle. "Are those actual tears, Massie?"
Dropping the gun, he stepped toward her, hand reaching out to inflict what seemed like a slap. Massie flinched, closing her eyes, but then his palm was pressing into her skin, feeling familiar and warm and soft against her. She exhaled, eyes opening, and found his face leaning toward her, mere inches from her lips. Her breathing stilled, and her eyes shut involuntarily, awaiting the familiarity of his lips on her own.
Instead, in the few seconds she allowed herself to believe he really couldn't do this to her, his big hands wrap around her neck again, closing in on her windpipe. He isn't soft this time, ruthless in his attempt, watching as she struggled and tried to fight back but not once releasing his hold.
Massie could feel the end coming and with the last bit of air left in her lungs, she managed to rasp, "I picked you."
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