“You’re welcome,” I say.
“I wasn’t thanking you.”
I smile. I like her spirit.
“I remember you from before. From that night,” she says to me like it’s some sort of accusation.
“I made an impression, then.”
She wasn’t supposed to come out of her room that night. When I’d heard the sound and stepped out of Joseph Valentina’s study, a child wasn’t what I’d expected to find. I had my gun cocked in my hand ready to meet a man still loyal to Valentina, but I’d found her instead. A barefoot little girl in her nightie holding her stuffed rabbit.
I still wonder how much she’d overheard. Wonder what she’d thought. She’d looked terrified but had acted so brave.
Her gaze drops to my right hand. She remembers that too. Does she think it might have healed in these years? Melted skin doesn’t grow back.
When she looks back up at me, her expression is confused, then angry. “You were there the night my father died.”
“The night he hanged himself,” I clarify.
“No.” She shakes her head. “Never. He’d never have done that.”
“Cristina.” It’s her uncle.
“I’m sure it’s hard for you to accept, but the autopsy proved it,” I add.
Her hands fist and her eyes narrow. “Who else was in that room?” she demands.
“Cristina,” her uncle’s reproach is sharper, and she turns to him.
“What’s going on?” Cristina asks her uncle. “Why was Simona crying?”
He doesn’t answer her.
“Adam?” I say.
He looks at me.
“Would you like to explain? I am getting the impression you’ve kept her in the dark. It’s not what we agreed, is it? Tomorrow is her eighteenth birthday. I thought she’d be expecting me.”
“You fucking bastard.” He makes a move to stand but Tobias doesn’t let him.
I stand, turning to Cristina because she’s the only one who matters. When I approach her, she takes a single step backward but stops. I wonder what it takes for her to do that. To stop.
Anxiety creeps into her pretty violet eyes, and her forehead wrinkles. She’s afraid of me.
Tall as she is, the top of her head doesn’t quite clear my chin, and when I step even closer, she has to tilt her head backward to look up at me.
I reach out to touch her, to feel that scar, and I see in her eyes what it takes for her to not pull away. To not show fear. When I touch my knuckles to her chin, there’s a momentary jolt. Like a spark of electricity that doesn’t quite hurt but shocks. I know she feels it too. I see it when she winces.
Ignoring the strange phenomenon, I tilt her face up toward mine. There are multiple shades of violet and blue in her eyes, I realize, and her thick, dark lashes create a dramatic effect even with the minimal makeup she’s wearing.
I lower my gaze to her mouth. Through the slight parting of her lips, I see white teeth in a perfect row. She’s been well cared for. I’m glad to see my money wasn’t squandered.
I trace my thumb along the line that marks her lower lip to her chin. The scar curves over her neck and disappears beneath the collar of her shirt. The groove was deeper and angrier when she was younger. She’s grown into the scar.
She remains perfectly still, watching me. I don’t think she’s breathing, but the pulse at her neck tells me her heart is going a thousand beats a minute.
I think back to the night of the accident. Think about her in the car.
She lost, too.
An unexpected and foreign emotion tugs at something inside my chest. It’s momentary. I’ve felt this before, this weakness, and I don’t like it. But it only takes one thought to banish this particular emotion.
Yes, she lost.
But we lost more.
When I release her, she steps backward, her trembling intake of breath audible.
Her eyes search mine and what she sees makes them grow just a little wider.
I think back to what she asked me that night at her house. The night I took her back to her room after getting her a glass of water.
She’d been afraid of the dark. Of the storm. When I told her monsters don’t hide in the dark, she’d asked me a question I wouldn’t have thought a child could think up. But then again, they say kids instinctively know.
She’d asked me if I was a monster.
She’ll soon learn I’m more than that. I’m her worst nightmare about to come true.
6
Cristina
Damian Di Santo.
I still remember his name.
I try to mask my expression. I won’t let him see what him being this close is doing to me.
When he touched me a moment ago, I couldn’t breathe. And even though there are three other men in the room with us, he’s the only one I see.
The way he traced that scar, I know he knows what it’s from. When it happened. How.
Does he know what I lost that night? What I’ve lost since?
My chest aches at the thought. It’s familiar, that tenderness. And it never heals. Never gets easier no matter how many years pass. I still miss Scott and my parents so much. Still think of them whenever anything good or bad happens. Still catch myself thinking I can’t wait to get home and tell them.
I shake my head to dislodge the thought.
“It’s almost your birthday,” Damian says, stepping to the side and gesturing to the coffin-like box on the table. It’s the biggest one yet. I know without having to look inside that it holds eight roses.
The final delivery.
When I turn back to him, he’s watching me with cold eyes. Icy like steel. And they seem to penetrate right through any defenses.
This man knows me, knows my past, even as he’s a stranger to me.
“I brought your gift early.”
“Why?”
“I was in the neighborhood,” he says lightly. He’s laughing at me.
“I don’t want it.” My throat is so dry I have to pause to swallow before continuing. “I don’t want anything from you.”
He simply studies me, expression unchanging, and I wish I could read past the barrier of his eyes. Wish I knew what he was thinking.
“Why don’t you take your gift and your goons and get out,” I say, sounding braver than I feel.
A smile stretches across his face. “That’s not very gracious, is it? Considering all I’ve done for you.”
“What have you done for me?”
Without changing position, he slides his gaze to my uncle and raises an eyebrow. One corner of his mouth rises into a small grin, telling me how much he’s enjoying this. He checks his watch and bends to pick up the box.
“You can ask your uncle after I’m gone. You have a few hours yet. I assume you’ll want to spend them with your family.”
“What does that mean?”
“Open your gift and I’ll be on my way.” He holds the box out to me.
“I don’t accept your gift. I’m not interested in opening it. I want you to leave.”
“Did I give you the impression this was a choice?”
“I already know what’s inside, and I don’t want it. I never wanted any of them.” I shove at the box, hoping he’ll step away because I need space. I don’t want to be the one to back up. But he captures my wrist instead and I look down at his hand, big and powerful and damaged.
He’d held my hand in his that first night, too, but he’d been gentle then. He hadn’t wanted to hurt me or scare me.
Now, it’s different.
When I shift my gaze up again, I find him studying me.
“This one is special, Cristina. This is the most important one.” He squeezes my wrist. “Don’t make me ask again.”
I tug myself free, knowing I only manage because he allows it. I look beyond him to the men standing over my uncle, then look at my uncle. I’ve never seen him like this. We’ve never been close, but he’s always been a man I could lean on. I did a lot
of leaning in the years following my family’s deaths. Now, though, as much as he’s seething, as much as he so obviously hates this man, he also appears smaller, weaker.
“You don’t need his permission,” Damian says.
I turn my gaze to his.
“Only mine,” he adds. “Open the box, Cristina.”
Damian. I remember thinking how much it sounded like demon that first night eight years ago.
I never told anyone that he was there that night. Never told anyone about the others in the study. But I knew all along that I’d see him again. This monster.
I’ve known I’d have a chance to look into his eyes. To know the evil that lies beneath the cool, handsome exterior.
The only ugliness is his hand.
And what’s on the inside.
Taking the box, I move to sit down because my legs are beginning to tremble beneath me.
Damian watches as I set the box on my lap and undo the ribbon.
I pull the lid off and set it aside. The familiar smell makes my stomach turn. It grows stronger when I unwrap the tissue paper that blankets the dead roses. I take care not to prick my finger on a thorn because they always have thorns.
I peel the last layer away to see the lifeless flowers nestled in black paper. This time, there isn’t a card with the number scrawled on it. In its place is a yellowed scroll of paper tucked between the flowers.
I look up at him, and his expression has gone deadly serious.
He meets my eyes, gesturing for me to go on.
I reach for the sheet, my hand trembling. I have to look. I don’t have a choice.
The paper is old, and when I unroll it, it wants to curl back up.
I hold it open. My eyes fall instantly to my father’s scrawled, drunk signature. He was drunk a lot after the accident. I think he may have been drunk during it. He and my mom had been fighting so much by the end.
I look up at him, confused.
“Read it,” he commands, voice tight, eyes locked on that sheet of paper.
It’s a contract of sorts. One that would hold up in no court of law. One that buys…No, this makes no sense.
I keep reading. The script it’s written in is that of someone from another generation. But what it says, it can’t be.
There’s an exchange. My father’s life for my childhood.
But that’s not all. There’s a promise that on my eighteenth birthday, the day I am no longer considered a child, I become fair game.
“This can’t…”
I look up at Damian.
“Did you know it was my sister’s wedding day?” he asks me.
I want to ask what the hell he’s talking about. What this means. But my throat is as dry as a desert and I can’t speak.
“A candlelit wedding. Her dream.” His words sound sad, but then his face hardens, and his pupils become pinpoints as he focuses on me. “She never made it, though. None of us did.” He turns his hand just a little, and I see the scarred flesh.
I think about the accident that stole my mother and brother from me. I don’t remember it. I don’t remember much, but the one thing I wish I could forget is my brother’s face just before he went through the windshield.
I shake my head, momentarily close my eyes to block it. I can’t think about that now. Not in front of him.
When I look up at Damian the sorrow I’d heard in his words doesn’t show in his eyes. I get the feeling that sorrow has festered over time and turned into this. Because what I see is the monster he warned me about eight years ago.
I see hate inside him.
Hate for me.
The box and roses spill onto the marble floor when I rise, crushing the contract in my hand.
“This can’t be,” I whisper.
“But it is.” He steps closer, looming over me, and all I can do is stare up at him. “Enjoy your last few hours of freedom, Cristina, because come midnight, you belong to me.”
Unholy Union
1
Cristina
I was born one minute past midnight not quite a full year after my brother. My mother said we were inseparable from the beginning. Even sharing a room right up until he was gone.
The paper I’m holding feels like it’s on fire. The lights flicker and come back on like they were waiting for him to leave. I blink, my eyes adjusting.
“Christ,” my uncle’s voice barely registers.
I drop back into the seat and drag my gaze from the contract up to him.
“What is this?” I ask.
Although my uncle has never been unkind to me, he’s never been overly affectionate either. I always got the feeling he handled me with kid gloves. He didn’t want to have much to do with me, not when I was younger and not now. I’ve had strict rules growing up, much stricter than my cousins, but he’s always given me anything I could ever want. Only a few times has he ever raised his voice to me. Although he did let the nanny raise me for the most part, so it’s not as if he had many opportunities.
And it’s not that I feel unwelcome in his home, but I know it is his home. Not mine. I know I’m a niece, not his own daughter. Not that I ever wanted to be, but he’s different with Liam and Simona. I don’t know, maybe that’s normal. Not that anything about my situation is normal.
But it’s not as though my dad and I were close. He was closer to Scott, and I was always closer to my mom.
I drop the contract onto my lap and wipe my tears with the heels of my hands.
Dead roses scatter the floor, the box turned on its side with black paper spilling out. It would be beautiful if it wasn’t so horrible.
I see Liam approach from down the hall. He looks around, anger burning in his eyes. My uncle stops him when he moves toward the front doors as if he might go after Damian.
What did Damian say before he left?
Come midnight, you belong to me.
I look at my uncle to find him watching me. He’s always done that. Sort of watched me as though I were some strange, foreign creature. It’s unnerving, not creepy, but just not right either.
Tonight though, that look in his eyes, it makes me think that whatever this is, what Damian just said about midnight, it’s true.
He pours himself a generous serving of whiskey while ignoring Liam’s questions. When he turns back, I see how the lines on his forehead and around the outsides of his eyes seem to have deepened. He swallows half the liquid in the glass, wincing with the burn.
“You knew?” Liam asks him, sounding furious. “You knew he’d come for her and you did nothing?”
What?
He steps up to his father, hands fisted at his sides. He’s almost as tall as my uncle, and from his build, I know he’ll be as big. Although, he’s not there yet and something makes me want to protect him. To tell him to back off.
“You knew and you just let it happen!”
My uncle’s jaw tightens as he finishes off his whiskey. “You don’t understand the circumstances,” he says tightly.
“What circumstances could possibly make this okay?”
“You’re here, aren’t you? Your sister’s here?”
“What?”
“Fuck.” My uncle turns his back, pouring himself another drink. He swallows it in one go before facing us again. He glances at my cousin but then focuses his attention on me.
“You need to be careful with him, Cristina. He’s a very dangerous man.”
“What are you talking about? What the hell is happening?”
“Shit.” Running his hand through his hair, he mutters another curse before straightening, taking a deep breath in. “Come with me.”
I look up at him. He’s heading toward his study, a place I’m rarely invited. I get to my feet to follow him, carrying the contract in my hand.
He stands at the open door and waits for me.
“I want to hear it too,” Liam says from inside.
We both turn to him. “This has nothing to do with you, son. You won’t have any part of it.”
/> “But I—”
“I said no.”
Just then Simona walks into the living room rubbing her eyes. “Liam?”
“Go stay with your sister. She’s scared,” My uncle tells him.
Although reluctant, Liam goes. He’s a good big brother like Scott was to me.
My uncle turns to me. “Cristina,” he says, gesturing for me to enter. I do and he closes the door.
“Sit down,” he tells me and walks to a cabinet inside which is a safe.
I sit on one of the two chairs and watch as he enters the combination. I listen to the beep and pop when the door opens. From inside, he takes a stack of papers, selects what he wants and puts the rest back, then returns to me. He sets the papers on his desk and takes his seat behind it.
“You recognized him,” he says.
“He was at our house the night my father died. I’d woken up from the storm, afraid, so I’d gone downstairs. When I got to my father’s study, I heard voices. Strangers and my dad. My dad was upset. Very upset. But then the man from tonight, Damian Di Santo, came into the hallway. He must have heard me. He got me a glass of water and took me back up to my room. But there were other men in the study too. They made him do it, Uncle Adam. They made him. He wouldn’t have killed himself.” I choke on the last part of that statement.
“Shit.” My uncle is on his feet and pouring us both a whiskey. He carries one over to me. I take it even though this is as far from normal as it can get around here. As far as he’s concerned, whiskey is a man’s drink, and besides, I’m too young for it.
“I should have told someone,” I say.
“Nothing would have changed.”
“You believe me?”
He nods.
“Why didn’t you say something? Do something?”
He doesn’t answer. He sips his drink instead and I get the feeling his answer would be the same as a moment ago. That nothing would have changed if he had.
I follow his lead and drink a sip. It burns. I’ve tried whiskey before, but I don’t like it. I like beer, wine, and sweet cocktails, but whiskey just isn’t for me.
“Did you see an older man in a wheelchair?”
Unholy Union Page 3