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8
A gunshot rang through her ears, sending her hearing rippling into loud screeches that grew into a high pitched buzz. For Ana, the ringing had become her silence, as the people around her had their mouths open to scream, with no sound pouring out. She stumbled forward through the confusion, her eyes meeting the crumpled body of Grace Shelby who rested in husband's arms.
There were people pushing against her from each side as they rushed to leave the room. Ana was being forced back by the stream of chaos, until she felt a hand rip her from the pull, her body lurching into that of her sister's. Tatiana looked calm as she dragged her to the side, watching as Tommy hugged Grace's limp figure tightly on the floor.
Grace had been shot. The realisation wavered through her like a cool shiver, lifting the hairs in her arms and labouring her breathing. The sapphire on the woman's chest was still gleaming, as if still shining new, laying beside the dark blood that looked into her dress and down onto the floor.
To her side, an Italian was preparing to take his last shaky breaths. John and his brothers had teeth bared like dogs as they smashed their firsts and blades into the man's body, no hesitation in their violent outburst. The hall was painted red, flooding with a stream of blood that would stain the doors, evening after hours of scrubbing. It would be tainted forever, by the blood of Grace Shelby, and her revenge-filled killer.
"Why did they kill her?" Ana asked, her eyes wide as she stared at the poor woman's lifeless body.
"It wasn't her that they were aiming for." Tatiana said, her voice saying everything.
Tommy was torn in two. His son was upstairs, now unknowingly motherless. He wanted to cry, scream out, murder everything in his pathway, but he remainder loyally by her side, even as John and Arthur pulled away from the Italian, faces and hands soaked in foreign blood.
Tatiana was pulling her away from the scene to the crowds that were pushing to get out of the door and spill into the large courtyard. Her had slipped, looking her sister among the waves of guests that surged onto the gravelled drive. Ana found herself edging away toward the side of the house and away from the loudness of the mess and barrelled into the body of a strange.
But, in fact, it wasn't a stranger at all. John Shelby stood, hands dripping like freshly used knives.
"You're fucking insane." He shouted, pressing his finger forward, pointing angrily to her calm face.
He wanted to hurt her. To make her pay for what he believed she had done. How else would she have known that something would happen before his sister-in-law had been shot? He wanted to hurt her for what she didn't do, and yet he called her insane. But he couldn't do it.
"Insane?"
She whispered the word to herself. Perhaps she was crazy. Perhaps it ran through her blood. It slipped off her tongue as easy as a snake would hiss. The word fitted them both. He was just as crazy as her.
Ana liked it. The word made her feel free; it made her feel as if she could do anything without consequences. Why was this supposed to be an insult when she felt so flattered? Insane. Craziness, she thought, should be a thing that is celebrated, and she knew he felt the same.
But Ana didn't voice her thoughts. She saw how his face crumbled, his hand dropping. Anastasiya didn't know John. She knew the feeling of being left out from family, of loosing someone you didn't realise you cared about, of being caught up in things much bigger than yourself.
"Perhaps you just need to talk to someone." Ana suggested, and John nodded.
They stood closely. So close that Ana could hear the rattled breaths that ripped through his throat. John could see the fleeting glances that she sent his way.
"Yeah maybe."
The words left his mouth before he even knew what he was saying. John shook his head, a thunderous glare suddenly appearing on his face.
"I'm fine." He spat. "I don't need to explain myself to you."
In turn, Ana's face darkened. She felt insulted that he thought she cared. She felt betrayed by herself that she did.
"That's not what I meant." She insisted, shaking her head harshly. "Don't blame me for something I had no hand in."
"I don't trust dirty Russians." John seethed, the words barely passing through his clenched jaw, maki my his cheeks flush as dark as the glossy, red freckles that flecked his skin.
"And I don't trust stupid English boys." Anastasiya snapped back.
They both felt like children, toying back and forward with insults worthy of a five year old. It made them feel light, like a heavy pressure had been lifted from their chests despite the turmoil that surrounded them.
"Alright." John muttered.
He pushed his hands into his trouser pockets, sending blood trickling down the dark material of the leg. He was refusing to meet her gaze. She could tell by the twitching of his right eye, watching as his lashes fluttered with it each time it jerked.
