“And they want me as part of that vendetta?”
He nods.
“To do what to me?”
His face pales a little, and then he pours the last of the whiskey down his throat.
I don’t think I want to know the answer to that question.2DamianMichela is blowing cigarette smoke out the window of the SUV.
“I told you I don’t want you smoking in my car or anywhere near me.” I take what’s left of the cigarette and toss it out the window. “It’s a disgusting habit.”
She looks at me with contempt in her eyes. I’m used to it, though, from her. And I don’t blame her. She has every right to hate me.
“You shouldn’t have involved the little girl.”
“That wasn’t your call to make.”
The driver pulls the car onto the road, merging with traffic. I type out a message to Tobias.
Me: Is a man in place for when she tries to run?
Tobias: Two at the front and two at the back of the building.
Me: Good. Make sure they don’t intercept her, but don’t lose her either.
Tobias: They know what they’re doing.
Me: Just make sure.
Satisfied, I tuck my phone into the pocket of my jacket and turn to Michela. She’s older than me by three years and we’ve never been particularly close. From the day my twin brother, Lucas, and I came home, she chose him. It’s strange, but she became his protector, and for some reason, that left only scorn for me.
With Michela, it’s always black or white. There’s no room for gray with her.
And like she did with Lucas, when our parents brought Annabel home, I became her protector. Annabel was the baby of the family. Two years younger than me, she even managed to make our father smile.
Until the accident in the solarium, at least. He didn’t look at her with much else than pity after that.
She was six and I was eight. We were playing in the solarium, a place we’d played a hundred times, when she took a bad fall. She wasn’t quite the same after that, not mentally or physically. But maybe the former is how she managed to hold on to that joy only children have.
I don’t like to think about what he said about Michela when Annabel died. And even given her contempt for me, I don’t want Michela to ever find out.
Not that she’d be surprised.
“How was Bennie with her?” Bennie, short for Benedict—named after my father—is Michela’s son. My nephew is five years old, and the best thing to happen to the Di Santo family in a very long time.
“Sweet. And she was sweet to him.” She shakes her head. “It was wrong, Damian. You have to know that.”
The thing is, I do. “Sometimes, we have to do things we don’t like or agree with for the good of the family.”
“You sound more and more like him every day, you know that?”
She means our father.
I turn away and take a deep breath as we head out of the city and toward the hotel where Michela has been staying.
She places her hand over mine. “You don’t have to be, Damian.”
I look down at her hand, at the strangeness of it. A gentle touch. A caring one?
No, I won’t be fooled by that.
“And what is the alternative?” I ask, pulling away.
She draws back. She’s scared of me. To her, I’m a monster. And I deserve her hate for what I did to her. I no longer say what I was made to do. No, I own it now. It’s a part of the transition, this metamorphosis from human to monster. Owning the shit you do to others.
“Do you like how you live, Michela?”
Her jaw tightens.
“Do you like that Bennie isn’t hungry or cold at night? Isn’t on the street begging with his mother?” Not that I’d ever let my nephew suffer like that now that I know of his existence.
“Don’t.”
“Do you like having a roof over your head? A very comfortable one at that.”
“Stop.”
“Do you like money? Unlimited amounts of it to pay for your closet full of designer clothes, shoes, bags—”
“I paid dearly for all of it. You know that better than anyone. Or don’t you remember?”
Now it’s my turn to grit my teeth. I remember. How could I forget the horror of what I did?
I force back any emotion that tries to make its way into my heart. I lock it all back up nice and tight in its box of unpleasant but necessary evils and bury it so deep, I hope to never see it again.
“I remember well, Sister. And I thought you’d have learned your lesson. I hoped you wouldn’t need another.”
That quiets her.
I draw a breath, exhale, and repeat until I’m calm. “How’s our brother?” I ask her casually, shifting my gaze out the front window.
“How would I know? Smartest thing he did was getting the hell away from this fucked-up family.”