Cruel Summer

I hear the bathroom door open behind me and my shoulders tighten. I know without turning around who it is and I can already feel my anger rising, my fists aching to hit something, no someone.

“What the hell is going on here?”

It happens so quick that I don’t even register it, the control I keep on my temper shattering into pieces. I smash my fist right into Maximos’ face, the force ricocheting down my arm.

His head snaps to the side and it’s just turning back around when I hit him again. My skin is on fire, my chest aching. Already, his cheek is turning red, my knuckles leaving an imprint.

Maximo doesn’t bother to put his hands up to defend himself and that pisses me off even more.

I grab him by the collar of his shirt, shoving him into one of the sinks. His head goes snapping back, crashing into the mirror above the sink. Glass shatters down, but still it's not enough to make me want to let go.

“You fucked up!” I roar at him.

His dark eyes flicker up to mine, but otherwise he doesn’t move. I already know he isn’t going to fucking raise a fist at me. It’d be too much like right, to defend himself when he should. Instead he stares me down, anger mixed with disgust and determination in his eyes. It's the same look he’d give our father when he’d beat him to the point that he couldn’t walk on his own volition.

It’s the same look he gives me any time I hurt him.

The reminder that I’m nothing but a knock off the old block, that I’m not just Vincenzo Costa’s son in blood and name, but in cruelness as well.

That I’m no longer my brother’s protector but the one he needs protecting from.

A click comes from behind me and I recognise the sound. I turn my head, finding two guns being pointed. One at my head and another pointed at Enzo’s.

Despite the gun at his head, Enzo’s grip on his doesn’t waver as he keeps it pointed right at me.

I’m not sure if I’m thankful for the fact that he’s the reason I’ll never go too far, never accidentally kill my little brother, or pissed at the blatant disrespect.

I never question Enzo’s loyalty, I know exactly where it lies and that’s with my brother first. It’s not the way it should be and if one of the old heads ever caught wind, they’d put him down. But I know the monster I keep chained to me.

He’d do anything for my brother.

Including blowing my head off moments before Vito does the same to him.

“Put the fucking gun down, Enzo,” Vito says firmly, his jaw clenching. He presses the barrel of his gun right to Enzo’s temple, but still the man doesn’t waver.

“I’m okay, soldier boy,” I can feel the vibrations of Maximo’s voice run up my arms, reminding me of my grip on him. I turn my head to look at him and despite all the loaded guns being pointed and the blood not only dripping from his lip, but the back of his head now, he has a small smile on his face.

He keeps his gaze leveled on Enzo, his breathing even and steady, his voice calm. “Gio isn’t going to hurt me,” he says despite the fact that I can feel my knuckles aching from smashing them into his face. He continues to talk like a trainer trying to calm a wild animal. “This is all just a little horseplay, a little rough housing of brothers.”

Enzo’s chest is visibly moving faster and harder, his eyes wild. For a second, I think he doesn’t even hear Maixmo talking to him but then he relaxes and slowly, he lowers the gun.

Vito’s eyes flicker to mine and I know what he’s asking. He wants permission to kill Enzo.

If this were anyone else, he would have already killed him, would have blown his brains out the second his hand inches toward his gun.

But we’re all in this fucked up game, with clear rules.

No matter what he does, Vito can’t kill Maximo. Maximo can’t kill Vito, even though he pisses him off and challenges his hand as my second. I can’t kill my little brother, as much as I want to, and vice versa. And Vito can’t kill Enzo, even with his gun pointed at my head.

I consider it for a moment, consider letting him kill him. But then my gaze flickers back to my brother. He’s watching me calmly now and he hasn’t tried to break my grip, even though we both know he could.

Despite the caged wildness he’s displaying now, he’d snap if Enzo squeezed that trigger. He’d snap and destroy every fucking person in this room.

In this building.

My grip tightens on him for a moment before I let go and give a shake of my head.

Vito lowers his gun.

“We’re wasting time,” I say, rubbing my hands on my pants. Blood drips from my split knuckles but the bite of pain only helps in grounding me. “There will be repercussions for this later,” I say, letting my gaze flicker back and forth between Enzo and Maximo. “But first, we need to find Winter.”

Because God forbid something actually happens to her, if it does I just may finally break the rules of this game and allow Vito to put bullets in the skulls of the motherfuckers who were off fucking while she was being kidnapped.