Fall With Me

FALL WITH ME GODS OF HAZELWOOD: ICARUS 2 LUCY SMOKE CONTENTS Prologue: Isaac 1. Isaac 2. Aurora 3. Aurora 4. Isaac 5. Aurora 6. Aurora 7. Isaac 8. Aurora 9. Aurora 10. Aurora 11. Isaac 12. Isaac 13. Isaac 14. Aurora 15. Aurora 16. Aurora 17. Aurora 18. Isaac 19. Aurora 20. Aurora 21. Aurora 22. Aurora 23. Isaac 24. Aurora 25. Aurora 26. Aurora 27. Aurora 28. Aurora 29. Isaac 30. Aurora 31. Aurora 32. Isaac 33. Aurora 34. Isaac 35. Aurora 36. Isaac 37. Aurora 38. Isaac 39. Aurora 40. Isaac Epilogue: Aurora Thank you for reading! About the Author Also by Lucy Smoke Watch me. I will go to my own Sun. And if I am burned by its fire, I will fly on scorched wings. — Segovia Amil, Warrior PROLOGUE: ISAAC 15 years old… “Again.” Panting and sweating, with disgust curdling in my gut, I follow my father’s orders and slam the already bruised points of my knuckles into the man beneath me. My victim turns his cheek away, coughing out blood as he spits a solid tooth straight onto the cold, concrete floor. I pause and look up, waiting. My father appears unconcerned and certainly not in any position to stop me now. I grit my teeth and follow through on another punch. Just pretend you’re at the gym, I urge myself. Closing my eyes, I do it again and again until I can’t even feel the skin of my knuckles, and the fleshy feel of my punching bag disappears in my mind. The grunting ceases. The pleading is gone. I keep going until there’s no other sound but my own breathing and the hissing sound of my father inhaling his cigar. Finally, his shoes scrape against the ground and I pause, my fist lifted. Opening my eyes, I lower it. I don’t even recognize the man beneath me anymore as human. His face is a mass of bruises and blood and broken teeth. His eyes are so swollen, there’s no way he could see me even if he was conscious. I’ve shattered bone, I know it. My father’s expensive Italian loafers come into view right next to the man’s head, and metal pings on concrete as he drops a pocketknife right next to me. “Finish it,” he orders. Inside, I balk. On the outside, however, I don’t even blink as I reach for the knife and flick it open. It gleams in the light as I twist it first one way and then the other. My head pounds, my brain throbbing inside my skull like enough pain will make me pass out before it’s too late. It won’t help, though. Like how some parents refuse to let their kids get away with not eating what’s made for them, my father is the same. Passing out. Leaving. Refusing. None of it is an option. This man and his life will be waiting here for me. Killing him now is a mercy to making him starve as I fight with myself whether or not to take his life. I can feel my father’s eyes on me, watching and waiting. As if he expects me to shy away or disappoint him. Doing so wouldn’t help anyone—certainly not the man beneath me. He had already signed his own death warrant the second he’d pissed off Damien Icari. Pressing the sharp end of the blade into the man’s throat, I shove down and slit sideways. Blood squirts up, arching into my face as it sprays down my throat and chest, soaking the once dark gray t-shirt. For a split second, the man’s body bows upward and I can almost see where his eyes try to open beneath the swelling as his hand reaches up to try and stop the flow of blood. It’s too late. “Very good.” Once, perhaps, when I was a child, my father’s praise might have meant something to me, but now all it does is roll over the ice of my emotions as I stand up, still holding the knife in my fist. “Take this as a lesson, Son,” Damien says. “Icaris are gods. All powerful. We can give life as much as we can take it, but never for traitors. To betray a god is to wish for death.” I twist the blade in my hand, gazing down as blood drips from the sharpest edge. Even a god can die, I think to myself. As if he senses my thoughts, my father takes a step forward and captures my attention. Keeping my fingers firmly around the knife, I look up at him as he arches a brow at me and removes his cigar from between his lips. “Something to say?” It’s a test, I know. Tightening my jaw, I shake my head. “No, sir.” “Then go get yourself washed up,” he orders, offering me his back as he calls for his men to come clean up this mess. That one movement, the signal of turning his back on me, makes my whole body go colder than ever before. It’s almost as if he’s showing me how unimportant I am, and how much of a threat I’m not. I’m standing here with a knife in hand after having killed a man, and he’s not even concerned. Bastard. I close the knife and tuck it into my pocket before moving away from the body beneath me—no longer a man but an empty vessel. As men enter the room, carting tarps and buckets of a liquid that smells harshly of chemicals, I skirt the edges of the room until I hit the exit. Keeping my head up, I don’t regard any of my father’s minions with so much as a look as I stride through them. Considering I’m covered in blood, they step out of the way as I walk past, carefully avoiding my presence. It isn’t until I’m out of the warehouse that the shaking starts. It begins in my fingers, and I have to clench