“I know you did it for yourself, but still, thank you for being there for her. She…she at least got a chance to speak to… someone.” He looked away as his voice cracked again.
And for some reason, my th
roat ached.
Was this why no matter what he said, or how angry he was, Ethan couldn’t let go of them? He always said Gigi and I were his family. But at the end of the day, he always thought of his family, even when they disappointed him or misjudged him or betrayed him. He was harsh, but he never wanted them to die. Killian betrayed him. He said to beat him up; if it were anyone else, it would have been death. Helen, Wyatt, all of them…even when he sometimes wanted to kill them, he couldn’t bring himself to do it.
Was this the reason why?
I didn’t understand it, and I didn’t care to anymore. I was wrong about them. And I hoped I was wrong about Luca, that he wasn’t the best. That somehow, this family was smarter…stronger.
Even I was allowed to hope, right?
19
“…the gates of dark Death stand wide...”
~Virgil
ETHAN
I held my waist, trying to keep the blood in, but it kept pouring anyway. What kind of bad luck or good shooting let her hit me right under my damn vest.
“Ethan!” My father pushed himself off the ground. My mother pinned him down as we took on the gunfire. She fired above at the madwoman on the staircase.
We were far too fucking close for me to give up now. Sitting up, I inhaled through my nose before rising off the staircase.
“Ethan, no! Fall back!” he screamed at me.
But I ignored them, running up the side. I had one good shot and took it, my bullet hitting her throat, sending her rolling down the stairs.
“Boss!”
“Dino, get them out of here!” I yelled, gripping the railing with one hand and my side with my other. The monster who was Mary, who was not bleeding out at the bottom of the stairs, had gone full-blown Scarface on us. We’d managed to take out Luca, the son of bitch swearing that he had some surprise for me, too. But it didn’t matter. None of this mattered unless I got to the madwoman at the center.
I had memorized the house.
Every horror story Calli had told me seemed to make every other room more familiar. Outside I saw a well, and I wondered, so that was what they threw her into? The basement was like a medieval torture chamber. Had they done things to her there? The greenhouse, I was sure, was where she’d learn the poison trade.
This place had built her.
Pushing open the doors to the bedroom with the best view, sitting high by the window, was an older woman with long, gray hair, a round face, and a pulpy body. Nothing about her said dangerous or mastermind. She looked like a grandmother, and on her little table, sat Italian pastries and a glass of milk.
“Who are you? How did you get into my room?” She frowned, looking around. “Are you a nurse?”
I chuckled.
Generations of strife and blood for this? A blood feud that fucking ended in this? An old woman who could barely recognize the world around her. She should have cut her losses. But then again, when the losses are children, there is no other way this could.
“I am not a nurse,” I said replied, wobbling over to her. “I’m Calliope’s husband.”
“Calliope’s husband? Impossible, Calliope just turned sixteen. She isn’t married; I won’t allow it! Where is she? Bring her to me! Right now!”
“Don’t bark at me, lady. Besides, you can’t reach her anymore.”
She laughed, shaking her head. “Who are you to talk to me? Go get Calliope, and she better have a good excuse for having you here, or I will—”
“You will what?” I asked, pulling up a chair to sit in front of her. “Or what?”