Sinful

ROMAIN

Five Years Later

Sometimes, the first rush of fucking love, the desire for someone—it crushes you, mind, body, and soul until you can’t breathe without them.

She breathed life into me.

And then she took it away, carving my heart right out for everyone to see.

Bella.

I haven’t thought about her in years, but every so often, I get a reminder. Usually, when I visit my sister and there’s a cat called fucking Ravenclaw waiting for me, asking for her fucking owner.

Zane was the one who took Bella’s cat. I found her in his room when I decided the fucker had to have some evidence of what he was telling me. I found the goddam camera in her room too, and traced it back to his laptop. Looking back, I should have looked for it the moment Carter took her bag. It took me minutes to burn the fucking laptop. Then, I took her cat and dumped it on my sister. Odette was the cat person. Not me. I hate cats, any animal, to be precise.

And now, I need to feed the damn thing.

Odette’s apartment in Paris is neat as a fucking pin. I know something’s not right when I open the door, and Ravenclaw is nowhere to be seen.

Raven and I have this understanding. I’m not the person to come to for cuddles. I’ll feed her if she’s hungry, and I’ll let her sit on my bloody lap occasionally. But only when I’m not wearing an expensive shirt and her claws are tucked away. Can’t have cat hair on my fucking clothes. And I’m not into my blood being drawn.

Anyway, Raven isn’t waiting for me.

I take out my gun, a grin plastered on my face. The adrenaline is kicking in now, and I fucking love it when it does.

“Don’t bloody move,” she says. A dark-haired girl with a bow in her hair and lips that could make cupid want to cry steps out of hiding.

I bare my teeth at her. “Pearl Darlington, what do I owe this pleasure.”

She glares, gun cocked at me. “You lied, you freaky son of a bitch.”

I tilt my head with a shrug. I’m always lying. “Lovely to see you too, little mouse.”

“Odette. You told me you dealt with her.” Fear radiates off her when she says my twin’s name. I can almost taste it in the air.

I stare her down. “I have dealt with her.”

Pearl frowns as she steps into the room, gun still aimed at my head. “She’s in a sanatorium. What if she gets out?” Her hands are trembling. She was always such a crap shot.

It’s my turn to sigh. This conversation is boring me. “She won’t,” I say. I make a choice and sheath my gun. If she shoots me, she fucking shoots me. I take a seat in Odette’s reading armchair.

Pearl glares, coming right up to stand in front of me. “Tell me which one.”

I chuckle. “Just give me the file Seth found.” I outstretch my palm.

She stares at me, unmoving. “I would love to shoot you, lettuce boy, after what you did to my family.”

I’m no longer smiling. I hate that nickname. “It was Marcel. I told you what he did to Nicole. Now we’re even. Hand it over,” I grit out, still waiting for her to hand me the file.

After a sigh, she lowers her gun slightly to dig the file out of her pocket. She tosses it at me. “Who is she anyway?”

“Someone I thought I’d lost.”

I was livid when I found out she’d betrayed me like that, but I ended up reading her journal cover to cover, just to be close to her again. I got to understand why she did it, and it hurt to read there were complications with the abortion. The fact that she wanted to end it after finding she couldn’t have children afterward was the final stab in the gut. She was fragile, and I screwed up. Holding a grudge against her for what she did seemed insignificant….

But it was too fucking late.

Marcel had already given Bella a new identity. She wanted to start fresh without me, without the fear of what happened between us all those years ago coming back to haunt us both. Marcel wouldn’t give me her new name, even though I fucking begged him to. He held it over me, getting me to do his dirty work. And I did every fucking thing he tasked me with without hesitation or remorse. Until Pearl offered me a way out, a way to take Marcel down and find Bella.