Unholy Intent

by Natasha Knight

  “I haven’t been.”

  “And you know what else? I’d have done what you did to Michela too if he’d told me to. Probably worse than you did, if I’m honest. I know what I’m capable of.”

  “What he made you capable of.”

  We sit in silence for a long minute, the only sound the beat of music beyond the door.

  “Can I ask you something?” he asks, surprising me.

  “Yeah.”

  “Do you love her?”

  I’m caught off guard. I don’t expect that.

  He studies me while I absorb his question. I try to figure out when it happened, when I fell in love with her. When she went from being the object of my vengeance to becoming something—someone—I took care of.

  Someone I care for.

  Hell, maybe it was a decade in the making.

  I meant what I said to her. I won’t let anyone hurt her. I will protect her. And it’s not for what she can give me. Because I have what I want. Her.

  “Not going to answer?” He takes a swig of tequila. “I have a request.”

  “What’s that?”

  “You be the one to do it. You pull the trigger.”

  Fuck.

  Christ.

  Fuck.

  “I thought you’d found some peace when you stayed away so long after Annabel,” I say.

  He shakes his head. “Not even close.” His shoulders are slumped, and I’m not sure if it’s tequila or life that has him looking like he does. “You?” he asks, surprising me when he turns to look at me.

  I smile. “Peace? In the Di Santo house? Not even close.”

  He smiles a sad smile. “I’m ready. I want this. I want it over. I’ve wanted it over for a long time.”

  I look at my twin brother. The brother I don’t recognize anymore and not just because of the scars. Hell, maybe I haven’t recognized him in a long time. Since we were kids.

  I stand. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

  He looks up at me, eyebrows furrowing together.

  “Disappear, Lucas. Don’t let me see you again. Just disappear and find some peace.” I walk to the door, push the curtain aside, then begin to step through.

  Tobias stands aside. I know he’ll disapprove. He knows Lucas and doesn’t have any of the attachments I do. In a way, I wish Lucas were to me what Tobias is. A friend. A man I trust.

  “Hey!” Lucas calls out.

  I keep moving.

  “Wait,” Lucas says.

  I turn back to find him on his feet.

  “Find some peace?” he asks, disbelief on his face. “You think there’s peace for me? You think I want to go back out there and find fucking peace?”

  “I don’t know what you want from me.” I take a step out.

  “You owe me this,” he yells at my back.

  I turn to study him. My brother. He doesn’t hide his hate for me, and I realize at that moment that he’s far past finding peace.

  And I understand something about him that scares me more than anything else ever could.

  “You fucking owe me,” he repeats a little more calmly.

  He wants to die. My brother wants to die.

  And he wants me to be the one to do it.

  “I don’t owe you that.”

  26

  Cristina

  Because I love you.

  The words won’t stop repeating.

  After I take a shower, I’m lying on the bed in the dark, wanting to sleep but wide-awake. It’s the middle of the night and my brain is whirling. After what he told me, how he told me, and what I saw in his eyes, I’m baffled.

  Damian is a monster. He warned me long ago and I never doubted it. Not even in the moments I took shelter in his arms. But he’s more than that.

  The thing about the beatings, I can’t begin to wrap my mind around that. His family is fucked up, their relationships enmeshed and unhealthy. But that? A father having one son beat the other? A father turning brother against brother and in that way? I just can’t understand. I can’t process.

  But it’s what he said last that I keep coming back to.

  Because I love you.

  He loves me. And I feel a strange joy knowing it.

  Without thinking, I reach to scratch my arm. It’s itchy and painful, and I think Damian may be right that it’s infected. But it’s not a spider bite.

  Because I love you.

  My phone buzzes under my pillow. He left in such a hurry he must not have remembered to take it from me. I’m sure he will tomorrow, but for now, I sit up, squinting my eyes as they adjust so I can read the text.

  Liam: Put on the news.

  Me: What?

  Liam: Just turn on the TV.

  I look around for the remote and see it on the nightstand on the opposite side of the bed. Reaching over, I grab it and push the power button.

  CNN comes on and I watch as a news anchor speaks while the headline ticker scrolls across the bottom of the screen. Red lights flash and the aerial image shifts as the helicopter with the camera circles the fire fighters battling the fire on a loaded container ship.

  The TV is muted so I switch on the lamp beside the bed in order to find the volume button and turn it up.

  The scene has changed to a different location where a fire rages on board another ship.

  I drop the remote and call Liam who picks up on the first ring.

  “What’s going on?”

  “Those are Damian’s ships. Three different ports.”

  Something on the TV explodes and I gasp.

  “Philadelphia, New York, and Miami were hit. I’m guessing Genoa’s hit too. Possibly Rotterdam.”

  I hear him typing madly.

  “I don’t understand. His ships?”

  “His whole fleet is under attack.”

  Just then, the door smashes open, and a soldier I don’t recognize enters.

  I let out a little scream, dropping my phone as he rushes into the room, machine gun slung over his shoulder. He holds out his phone to me.

  “Cristina.”

  I hear Damian’s voice.

  “What’s going on?” I ask, taking the phone.

  “We’re under attack. You need to leave the penthouse now. No time to pack anything. Just go. Now.”

  “What? Where? And where are you?”

  “I’ll call you as soon as I can.” I hear sirens in the background as he disconnects the call.

  “We need to go,” the soldier says and stands at the door.

  “I need to get dressed.”

  “No time.”

  He pushes the covers off. I’m wearing a tank top that comes to the tops of my thighs. That’s all.

  I grab the robe as he looks down and sees that I’m barefoot.

  “There,” I say, pointing at my boots. He hands them to me, and I slip my sockless feet inside. I’ve barely tied the robe when he takes my arm and rushes me through the hall, into another room where more soldiers wait.

  We climb into what appears to be a service elevator and I ride down with three heavily armed men.

  “I forgot my phone!” I say, realizing it only after the elevator starts moving.

  “We can’t go back,” he says.

  He takes hold of my arm again and, when the elevator doors open, we’re not in the elegant front lobby but at the back of the building. We rush through what must be storage units. I shudder when we step outside because the thin robe and nightie offer no protection against the cold.

  The soldier hurries me out onto a receiving area where a dark SUV waits, engine running. Another soldier steps forward as we near the end of the raised platform. I’m handed off from one to the other as if I’m a thing and lifted off my feet to be placed into the back of the SUV. We leave the soldier who brought me down and another one climbs in beside me. The driver takes off before he’s even closed the door.

  “I need your phone. I need to call Damian.”

  “Damian’s busy. He’ll call you when he can.”

 
“Where are we going?” I ask frantically.

  “Safehouse.”

  “Where?”

  He doesn’t answer, but when I shiver, he takes off his jacket and puts it over my shoulders.

  “Thank you.”

  He nods.

  I watch out the window as we drive out of the city and head north. I think for a minute he’s taking me back to the main house Upstate, but then we take a turn, and I realize where we’re going.

  I’m surprised.

  Shocked, actually.

  My guess is confirmed not twenty minutes later as we drive through the gates of the house I lived in for the first ten years of my life.

  It takes me a moment to process the emotions that come up as I look around the gardens and the large brick mansion, while the driver navigates the circular drive. It’s well maintained. The shrubs in the garden, which my mother kept in an English style, are bigger, but almost the same as when I was little. I can just see our swing set and the treehouse our father had built for Scott and me. The last time I climbed into it was just after the accident.

  This neighborhood on Staten Island is absolutely still compared to Damian’s penthouse in the city.

  When the SUV comes to a stop, the three men file out.

  Someone opens the front door. Another soldier.

  This is Damian’s safe house? Is that why he didn’t want me to tell Lucas?

  One of the men opens my door and I slip out. It’s so quiet here. You never realize how much you miss the quiet until you hear it again. Feel it again. It’s the strangest thing.

  The man gestures for me to go to the front entrance.

  I look at it for a moment.

  The house was never as still when I was growing up as it is now. Scott and I were always running around and creating a commotion.

  My heartbeat isn’t frantic, but it has picked up. I haven’t been here in over eight years. Not since after the funeral luncheon my uncle organized for my father. That day, I was like a ghost in my own home.

  Liam had come. He was around eight years old then. I wouldn’t go near the study. It was off-limits anyway. My uncle had locked the door, but even being near it, down the hall from it, it upset me.

  I knew my father hadn’t killed himself. I knew those men had killed him. And I hadn’t told a soul. I couldn’t.

  Liam and I had sat in my room for most of that afternoon. He’d even helped me pack some toys to bring with me to his house. My new home.

  “Mrs. Di Santo?”

  I blink, looking at the man in confusion when he repeats it.

  Mrs. Di Santo. That’s me.

  “We need to get you inside.”

  I nod and follow him toward the front door. Taking the three steps, I look up at the tall lampposts outside. They’d still been on that night. They must have only cut the power inside the house.

  A gust of wind chills me as I get to the front door. I hug my borrowed jacket closer. Emotion and memory collide the instant I step into the foyer. It’s like walking into a ghost room. Although it’s clean, most of the furniture is covered with dust cloths. Those pieces that aren’t, that the soldiers are obviously using, like the sofa in the living room and the dining room table and chairs, I recognize. It’s all the same. He hasn’t changed anything. Even the smell of the place is the same.

  The door closes behind me and I jump.

  Looking back, I see the man who gave me his jacket, so I slip it off and hand it back to him. “Thanks again.”

  “No problem.”

  “How long will we be here?”

  “Until we get the all clear. Kitchen is stocked if you need anything. You’re free to go to your old room. Please let me know where you will be at all times.”

  “What’s your name?”

  “Joseph.”

  “Joseph. Okay. How many men are here?”

  “Just three. But you’re safe. No one knows this location and the gates are locked.”

  “Do you know what’s going on?”

  “There were explosions on four of the shipping yards that house Di Santo ships.”

  “Was anyone hurt?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Is Damian hurt?”

  “No, ma’am.”

  “Can I use a phone?”

  “No, ma’am.” His phone rings then and he excuses himself.

  I bite my lip. I want to call Liam. He must be worried. I just dropped the phone.

  Looking down the hall toward the study door makes my heart beat faster. My breathing tightens as I remember Damian that night. I can almost picture us standing here in the hallway. I can almost feel what I felt then.

  There used to be a phone in my dad’s study. I wonder if it’s still there. I can use that to call Liam.

  I walk down the hall toward it, trying to keep the emotions that are flooding me from taking me under. I have to do this. See this.

  Family photos hang along the walls here and all over the house. It was my mom’s project. She’d add to the collections every Christmas, having us pick our favorites and helping her frame them. She took great photos. It was a hobby of hers.

  I stop to look at each one we pass.

  We’re at the beach in this one. I must be six or seven, and everyone looks so happy. Scott, my dad, and I are soaked from a swim. I have on goggles too big for my face and a snorkel. Scott is biting into a huge wedge of watermelon, his goggles on top of his head, feet still in the flippers. His hair’s almost as long as mine. He hated going to the barber.

  It’s been years since I’ve seen these. Since I’ve thought about any of this. Since I’ve wanted to remember. All these years, it was easier to block it all out. Just not think about it because it was so painful. And it’s still painful although I’m more numb now. But underneath that layer of numbness, hurt and loss still throb.

  I guess I’ve never really grieved for them. I don’t think I knew how. And after the accident, my father wasn’t capable of helping me through it when he was dealing with so much grief himself.

  But I’m not sure you ever get over the death of your family, do you? Is Damian over the loss of his sister or mother?

  “Ma’am.”

  I jump, finding Joseph standing behind me. He’s different than Cash was. He walks and talks like a trained soldier. For some reason, I know he’s loyal to Damian and it makes me feel safer.

  “Why don’t you go upstairs and get some rest. We’ll wake you if anything changes.”

  “Can I make a call?”

  “No, ma’am.”

  “I just want to let my cousin—”

  “It would compromise our location.”

  “Can you just ask Damian at least?”

  “Shall I escort you up, ma’am?”

  I press my lips together and exhale. “No, that’s fine. I know the way.”

  Without another word, I turn and head up the stairs.

  The curtains in my room are closed. I flip the light switch and the lamp beside my bed goes on, bathing the room in warm yellow light.

  I stand with my back against the door, my hands behind me, as I take it in.

  Scott’s bed is in one corner and mine stands against the other. We were so close we’d wanted to share a room. His bed is covered in a dust cloth but mine is made in bedding I recognize.

  I go to it, pull back the blanket and lean my head down to smell the sheet. It smells clean and fresh, ready for me to crawl into. Has he had it maintained all these years? Why?

  Before I walked in here, I’d peeked into my parents’ bedroom to see if I could use the phone there. But the furniture was covered over with dust cloths similar to the one that covers Scott’s bed. And the phone was gone.

  I turn to the wall of dolls and remember the one from the solarium. I shudder and look away, going to the window.

  Peeling back the curtain, I glance out into the backyard. He’s cut the huge oak tree that used to stand outside my window. It probably needed to be cut. I still remember how those branches
would tap against the glass during the storms and looked so much like long, bony fingers. It scared the hell out of me.

  Sitting on the edge of the bed, I slip off my robe and boots and lie down. I pull the blanket up. Reaching over, I turn out the light beside the bed and stare up at the ceiling. I wonder what’s happening to Damian, wonder where he is. Wonder if he’s safe.

  And as my eyelids begin to close, I wonder what would happen to me if he wasn’t. If it would free me.

  If it’s what I want.

  Because I keep hearing his words in my head. He loves me. He won’t let me go. And all I can think is I need him to call me. To let me know he’s okay.

  Because if he’s not, I don’t think I will be either.

  27

  Damian

  “It was a mistake to let him go,” Tobias says.

  “I fucking heard you the first time and I don’t need to hear it again. What I need to know is where the fuck he is.”

  My brother put on the best show of his life. I have to admit, he’s good. He had me fooled and I’ve never thought myself easily fooled.

  What had he said, though? That most men are gullible.

  Well, I guess he’s right. And hell, maybe he was trying to warn me all along.

  “Where the fuck is he?” I demand, because this time I am going to fucking kill him. It’s what I should have done instead of letting him off without punishment. What he’s done will cost me.

  I’m sure my enemies are raising their glasses in a toast as I stand here and watch my fucking fleet burn down.

  “Genoa’s under control,” Tobias says. “They managed to deactivate all but one of the explosives.”

  Bombs.

  Fucking bombs.

  I guess he went old school too.

  Clementi has disappeared. Father and sons vanished. That fucker was playing me. Adam Valentina was on his way to disappearing, but my men picked him up at his ex-wife’s house. His weakness is his kids. Or maybe it’s his wife. Predictable.

  The thought bothers me. My brother’s words coming back to me bother me.

  Cristina is my weakness. He knows it. They all do.

  Another explosion draws my attention back to the TV. I wonder if my father is watching my downfall on the news.