The Syndicater: A Dangerous Dark Romance (Dark Verse Book 6)

She was going to call herself Lyna if she made it out alive.

Malini had told her once that Lyna meant light while Lyla meant night. She had always felt like the night, and most of the time, she still did. But she also felt like the moon now, alight but with light it borrowed and stole from the ball of fire near it. A combination of both her names, it also felt like a good thing to do in honor of her friend’s memory, the only friend she’d had in that hell. It still hurt imagining the girl who had helped her through so much dying just as she’d almost escaped after finding love. There was so much injustice in it. She wished she could’ve seen her on the other side, met her and her man Vin, who had been Amara’s best friend, so they could have been a part of the group she had begun to think of as family.

She had been thinking a lot about who she felt like lately. Lyla was the broken girl who had somehow survived, and Luna had been the innocent girl her brother had mourned. After the last few days, spending time with a family she fell in love with and a man who had shown her what the word meant, she realized she was both the girls and she would always be. And so, she claimed her power, became something new, even if it was the end.

She would rather die with her fire than end with the ashes.

‘We will become ashes before we are apart.’

His words came back to her, along with the memory. The memory of being in his arms, feeling the safest she had felt, so whole she never questioned where she was hollow.

She watched the man on the screen, the monster of her nightmares, come to life before her eyes again and grit her teeth. He wouldn’t break her again, not this time. She had been a child alone when he’d gotten his claws into her. She was a woman who belonged now.

She looked at Morana, so feisty and protective, willing to take the brunt of their wrath on herself to save her. She looked at her brother, bleeding but not broken, forced to make a choice that had traumatized him and made his life hell twenty-plus years ago, yet still willing to die instead of choosing.

But she needed him to. She needed him to live, needed Morana to live, so they could be happy together. So they could get married and adopt a dog and take care of Xander for the rest of their lives. Her son needed them and their love more than he needed her. She would never be able to give him the stability, the love he deserved, not with the demons she battled every day. She would love to be a part of his life though, and she didn’t think Tristan and Morana would ever refuse that. But though she had been a mother to him, she didn’t think she could be a mom. Not like Amara was with Tempest or Zephyr was with her unborn child. Not like Morana already was with him.

She remembered getting that photo of Morana, all strung up in chains, unconscious, and the message that came with it. Take her place—alone—or die.

Alpha and Zephyr had gone back to Los Fortis after the shocking news, and then Dante and Amara had gone to get the bodies. Vin and Malini, once lovers and now just random bodies washed up on the river in Tenebrae. They’d both gone to take care of things and make arrangements, all of them gone before she could have told any of them. All but her brother by her side and her lover on the phone.

Lyla—Lyna, she promised herself, if she made it—hadn’t even thought. She had told Dainn and told her brother, showed him the message, and saw how her brother was when he lost it.

Dainn, her Dainn, had simply said three words to her.

‘Trust me still?’

She would trust him till the end of her time, trust herself to make that choice.

‘Yes.’

‘Then go.’

She hadn’t even questioned it. With him at her back—her mind reminding her of that time he’d stood behind her in the mirror and told her he was always behind her—she would walk into the depths of hell, knowing she wouldn’t be burned.

Tristan had not thought the same. He’d told her husband to ‘fuck off’ and accompanied her.

And though she didn’t have a number to contact him, she had tucked her phone under her left foot, between her sock and her shoe. She knew it was a matter of time—she hoped—before he found her.

And he would find her, because he always had.

Whether she would be dead or alive was a matter for debate at the pace at which things were devolving.

But hanging there from her chains, she surprisingly felt at peace. She had lived a good life in the last few months, the best she could have dreamed of, with her husband and her brother and her son, a trifecta of men completing her soul. And if this was the way she had to go, she was going to at least make sure it meant something.

‘Choose her,’ she begged her brother again. Her brother, who wasn’t her biological brother, but she couldn’t have cared less. He was the brother of her heart and that heart loved him so deeply in just a few days, she was grateful for him. She hoped knowing she wasn’t his blood sister didn’t change anything on his end. ‘Get out of here. For Xander. He needs you both.’

She could see the toll it was taking on him, chipping away at pieces of his soul as he looked between the both of them, a knife stuck to his side. She didn’t even think he was feeling it.

Morana saw it too, probably better than her, and told her, ‘We won’t leave you alone.’

They were both so incredible. She was lucky to have had them. But they had to get out and she was going to lie if need be. ‘I won’t be alone. He’ll come for me.’

When was the question.

‘Who?’ the other bitch—a sister she didn’t want if that’s what she was like—asked, speaking for the first time in a while.

And then, the voice of death spoke from the screen. ‘Me.’

Lyla swiveled her head and started, at the silhouette that moved behind the monster. A bigger devil. Her devil.

‘You came,’ the words escaped her lips, unbidden, a memory of all the times the words had come from her wracking her entire frame.

And he said the words he’d always said to her. ‘I’ll always come for you.’ The power of those words, backed by the evidence of years, made her melt. Her heart beat a staccato, resending new life into her veins.

The monster on the screen smiled, unfazed. ‘Shadow Man, at last.’ That felt odd. Why was he not scared?

Dainn stayed behind him, nothing but a silhouette. ‘The Syndicater. Or should I say, sperm donor?’

That was his father? Lyla—Lyna, she reminded herself—gaped.

‘I always knew you were going to be smart,’ the monster, his father, said almost pridefully. ‘I was waiting for this day.’

‘So I could kill you?’ Dainn asked, his voice almost lazy, as if he wasn’t perturbed by the situation at all. Knowing him, he probably wasn’t.

‘So you could become my best creation.’ That was an odd phrasing. What did he mean?

Dainn stayed silent for long moments, letting the tension build. She realized both Morana and her brother were watching the telecast, along with the two ladies and one fat guard in the room. Her brother was slowly, steadily moving his hands, using the distraction to try and get free.

‘I was the restart of your project. After it was shut down. You restarted Project Ouroboros with me.’

She had no idea what he meant or what the project was, but Morana did because a gasp left her as she gaped at the screen.

Whatever the context, the monster laughed. ‘Yes. A worthy adversary. An enemy worth having. Built from scratch.’

Morana looked slightly green in the face, as if she was in pain or knew what they were talking about. It could be both.

‘Are there any others left?’ Dainn asked, with a finality in his tone. ‘Like me?’

‘That’s for you to find out.’ The monster just grinned. ‘Is her pussy still as tight?’

Before Lyla could retch, Dainn stepped out of the shadows, his face visible to everyone, and looked straight into the camera.

‘For you, flamma.‘

And with those words, he vindicated her again. He flicked a lighter open, throwing it on the table. Lyla watched, in awe to the sound of stunned gasps, as her monster sat in a circle of flames, fire all around him as he stayed inside, not fighting, not moving, looking almost proud in a way that made her sick. Dainn stood behind him like the devil she’d thought of him as the fire illuminated his frame, the hues of orange burnishing into his dark skin, being absorbed by the darkness like a black hole.

The fire roared, almost covering half the screen.

He exited the frame then, leaving the monster to burn and rot as the flames engulfed him, the sight of it making her eyes moist. Memories of the monster, the way he had touched her, the way he had done things to her, the way he had forced her—all of them burned with him, vengeance, vindication, validation speaking the truth into her new existence. It felt like a cleansing. Her monsters, the last of them, were gone. Killed by the devil who belonged to her, just like every single one of them had been.

A sudden commotion drew her eye to see her brother flip the chair, his hands totally free, one hand pulling the knife out of his side. Blood began pouring out of the wound immediately as it opened, but he didn’t care, plunging the knife into the guard’s neck before bending and taking out a gun from his boot. The younger redhead woman ran up the stairs, disappearing from view before there was a loud scream that suddenly stopped.

The older woman, her biological mother, watched with widened eyes at the barrel of the gun in her face.

‘Tristan…’ she began.

Her brother flipped some kind of a button and lowered his gun slightly. ‘This is for my sister.’ A loud bang and her chest recoiled, blood pouring out and mixing into the red of her suit, making the fabric darker but the same color.

The woman held her chest, reeling, and looked in shock.

‘And this,’ her brother raised his gun again, ‘is for me.’

He shot her between the eyebrows, just as she knew he’d shot their father. A fitting end to both the monsters.

Lyla stared as her mother’s eyes stared up, her body crumpling to the ground, another demon in the guise of her mother dead.

The door to the basement opened, and Dainn appeared at the top. He jogged down and her entire frame relaxed. Evidently, the monster had been stupid—or suicidal; she remembered his stillness and lack of fight—enough to be in the same place as them.

Dainn headed straight toward her, but before he could get to her, he was suddenly stopped by her brother.

Tristan, completely enraged, punched him in the face. Dainn’s head swiveled to the side, and he straightened, cracking his jaw, his eyes the way they always were—without emotional reaction.

Tristan pulled his hand back again, and this time, Dainn raised one gloved finger. ‘One. That’s all you get.’

Tristan’s fist hovered in the air and Dainn stood tall, unfazed, with one finger up. Both men stared each other down and it was such a weird thing for her to witness. Before they could actually do something, she made a deliberate noise, and just as she’d hoped, Dainn broke the silence.

‘Now, do you want to take off their chains or have a standoff with me?’

Lyla saw her brother’s jaw tighten, his entire body shaking with rage. ‘Fucker.’

Dainn ignored him—angering her brother even more in his extra emotional state—and came straight to her.

He raised his arms, loosening her chains and unshackling her. Her arms felt numb as she fell into his body, and he pulled her into his arms, breathing in her scent. She did the same, inhaling his dark, musky scent that immediately soothed her.

A loud cry of pain from the side had them both stiffening and immediately turning as Morana’s arms came down, her eyes red with agony. Her brother immediately held her, holding her by the neck and staring into her eyes, looking so deep, like he would examine her pain through sheer eye contact. ‘Where?’

‘Left arm,’ Morana gritted out, clenching her teeth.

Tristan picked her up in his arms, not behaving like he had a stab wound of his own, and headed to the stairs. Dainn turned to her, doing the same. ‘You okay?’

Lyla nodded. She was okay. She would be okay.

And for the first time, they stepped out into the light.

***

Lyla didn’t know hospital rooms could be like this, so spacious and warm and well-furnished. The kinds she’d seen in the movies had always been so clinical and cold.

She lay in bed, just being kept overnight for a checkup. Thankfully, the scratches on her face would heal, and so was the pain in her shoulders. Not for Morana, though. She’d already had nerve damage from her shooting, bad enough that she should have immediately had it checked, but it was too late now. Her left shoulder, the entirety of her left arm, was disabled. She still had it since the damage was localized to it, but aside from some very minor movements for just a few minutes, she had no sensations in her arm.

Morana had broken down when the doctors had told her, sobbing so hard it had drawn Lyla from the next room to go check on her. She’d halted at the door, looking at the woman she was bonded to for life and it had broken her heart. Morana had been clutching onto her shirtless, scarred, bandaged brother and blubbering something about a tie, which didn’t make sense to Lyla, but it was something because his brother immediately kissed the side of her head so tenderly it made Lyla tear up watching.

Lyla had stood outside, watching her brother kiss her softly on the head, on her cheek, on her lips, over and over, making sure she lay down and calmed down as he sat by her side.

And then, wordlessly, he had picked up her left hand, the one she couldn’t feel anything in, and slid a ring onto her finger, pressing a kiss onto it, keeping his eyes on her.

Lyla had cried standing outside, never having seen such a beautiful declaration of love, such a profound proposal of a partnership, in sickness and in health, for life.

It was such a deep, heartwrenching proposal, and so them. She left them alone then, giving them privacy as she went back to her room.

From the updates she got, Alpha and Zephyr landed in Los Fortis and got her mother out on bail. Zephyr had to be rushed to the hospital because of the stress, causing her to have early contractions. Thankfully, their baby was safe, but they hadn’t heard any more news about her father’s involvement yet, and if she wanted to have a healthy baby, she couldn’t take any more stress.

Dante and Amara had been the rocks for everyone through the whole ordeal, taking care of everything, making sure everyone was looked after, and coordinating the crisis and death that had fallen upon them.

Lyla lay staring at her ceiling, so bone tired, so homesick. She missed the open glass ceiling of her bedroom, sleeping under the stars. She was tired of looking at ceilings that closed her in, no matter how pretty they were, reminding her of the times she wanted to move forward from.

Suddenly, she felt a presence at the door and swiveled her eyes, her breath catching as it set on the young boy standing there, right in front of the man she loved.

Xander.

Her baby boy.

So close to her for the first time.

Her throat clogged up as she watched him enter, his eyes taking her in curiously before setting on the machines around her. ‘Hi.’

He had such a beautiful voice. She had heard it before, but it was the first time she had heard it directed at herself.

She swallowed, nervous, her gaze going to Dainn before returning to Xander. ‘Hi.’

He looked at her briefly before his eyes skittered away again. ‘D told me about you.’

D.

Dainn.

She knew he’d had a relationship with Xander, but she had no idea what. He’d never talked to her about it, but clearly, they knew each other better than she’d expected.

‘What did he tell you?’ she asked, curiosity evident in her tone.

‘That you ran to save me when I was a baby,’ he dropped on her so casually, without realizing how her heart thundered. ‘That you got lost your way, and he was going to find you.’

Her eyes tinged with moisture, locking with the man she’d met that fateful night that started it all. ‘That’s right,’ she murmured to him, her lips trembling, her gaze returning to her son.

‘Are you still lost?’

She shook her head. She wasn’t.

‘I want to live with Tristan and Morana.’ His words made her heart full. ‘I love them. But I’d like to get to know you.’

She stared at him, at the articulate way he spoke to her, which reminded her so much of Dainn’s articulations. Maybe that’s where he’d learned.

‘Okay,’ she whispered before clearing her throat. ‘I’d like that too.’

He looked at her again, for a second, before giving her a little piece of paper and walking out the door, where Dainn stood, his hands in his pockets, watching her silently. Xander told him he was going to see Morana and left them alone.

Lyla unfolded the paper, wondering if he’d picked up writing notes from Dainn too, and read the two words written in a childish scrawl, her nose tingling as tears ran down her cheeks. She pressed it to her chest, heaving in deep, long breaths, tattooing the two words onto her heart, her eyes locking with mismatched ones, six years of something passing between them.

Two little words with the biggest meaning in the world.

Welcome home.

Lyla was finally home.