by Chloe Walsh
"Then why not kill me and get it over with?" I demanded brokenly.
"He may have lost interest in playing a leading role in torturing you, but you can be sure that Cal still took pleasure in watching you suffer, Jacob," was my father's answer. "Just a little bit. Every day. Enough to satisfy the hatred festering inside of him."
Every inch of my body rattled and shook.
He was telling the truth.
I could feel it.
And still, I couldn’t take it in.
I couldn’t let myself remember.
"He reveled in your misfortune, Jacob," he told me. "In knowing that he had everything that was rightfully yours and there wasn't a damn thing you could do about it."
"And Romi." Her name spilled from my lips before I had a chance to register what any of this meant. "He took Romi."
"And Romi," Dad confirmed sadly. "He dangled her like a carrot in front of you and then snatched her back time and again."
"I loved her," I croaked out. "I still love her."
"I know, and it's not your fault that you could never see beyond the girl, Jacob. You were programed to worship her. She was your intended before your father's fall from power."
"When you say intended," Presley began to say, looking green. "You don't mean…"
"Betrothed," my father filled in.
"Yep," Pres whimpered. "He went there."
"Two powerful Catalinian families were to become one when he took her as his bride. It took seven days of negotiation before Raffaele agreed to the pairing."
"Arranged marriage?" Presley gaped in horror. "In twenty-first century America? Between babies?"
"No, not America; Italy. And not babies. They were to marry on Jacob's sixteenth birthday," Dad replied. "He is two months younger than Romi. And it was a good match, too. As close to perfect as I've ever seen. It would have been a prosperous partnership."
"Goddammit, Chris Capaldi junior, you're a good-looking S.O.B, but your entire family is nuts," Presley muttered to himself with a shake of his head. "You've sure left me in one hell of a pickle buddy. Thanks a bunch."
"I did my best to protect you – to raise my cousin's son as my own." Coughing violently, Dad licked the blood from his lips before adding, "To protect both you and Chris while still giving you some semblance of a normal life. A family. I know it wasn't easy for you growing up, Jacob, not with Cal watching your every move and my wife's constant condemnation, but I tried." He exhaled raggedly. "In the end, it looks like I failed you both."
"You let Cal take her from me," I squeezed out, feeling woozy and faint. It was too much to take. All of it. I couldn’t process. "Romi." Breathing hard, I tried to find the words I needed to make sense of my thoughts. "You let him give her to Chris when you knew that I was the one who was in love with her." Rage. It was coming hard and hot now. "You watched Cal give my brother his blessing to be with my girl, and you never once stepped in. You didn’t stand up for me, Dad. You just… let him take her away from me. Romi. My Ro. The only thing I ever had –"
"Believe me, I wanted to," he hissed, sounding pained. "But I couldn’t."
"Why the hell not?"
"Because I was trying to protect you –"
"Oh, would you give it a damn rest with the 'I tried to protect you' bullshit," Pres growled, tone dripping with disgust. "You didn’t protect Sketch and you didn’t protect Chris! One was shot and the other is dead! It's official; you suck at protecting people, dude, so just own it!"
"You know, my wife never liked you, Quinton."
"Oh really? Well, that's a shame because your son really liked my dick."
"Another reason Cal gave Christopher his blessing and not you, Jacob," Dad replied calmly. "What?" he added, turning his attention back to Presley. "You don’t think I know that my son was gay? And as for you two being secret lovers? I've known for years, Quinton."
"Stop!" Presley's entire frame grew rigid and then he was on the move; jerking out of his seat and pacing the warehouse like a madman. "Don’t go there."
"My son loved you very much." My father's tone was mild and laced with melancholy. "I can see why. Loyalty. You have it in spades." He offered him a sad smile. "You were, as a romantic might say, the love of Christopher's life."
7
Sketch
Looking physically wounded from my father's words, Presley staggered backwards and pressed a hand to his chest.
Dad had struck a nerve deep inside of him and he was trying not to hemorrhage.
I knew how he felt.
I was bleeding out, too.
I didn’t know who the real me was and it killed me.
"Then why didn't you say something when it mattered?" Presley demanded, visibly shaking. "Why didn’t you stop all of this from happening!"
"Tell me how I could have stopped any of this?" was my father's weary response.
"You could have stopped Cal Dillon from sentencing your son to death, for one!" Presley snarled.
"I didn’t expect Cal to shoot Jacob in the fucking chest!" Nostrils flaring, my father's breathing quickened as his outrage grew. "I did everything I could to save his life," he added. "Everything! He's here right now because of my quick thinking."
"Not Sketch, you incessant prick. Chris!" Presley screamed, voice cracking as he threw his hands in the air. "You let it happen! You let him kill Chris and you did nothing to –" His voice cracked and he dragged in a long, pained breath before hissing, "How could you do that, huh? How could you sit back and let that mob bastard have your son whacked!"
"You're mistaken," my father replied with a shake of his head. "Chris's death was an accident."
"Oh my fucking God!" Slapping the palm of his hand against his forehead, Presley barked out a humorless laugh. "You're unbelievable. After all he's done, you're still covering for him."
"Quinton, I don’t know who you've been speaking to, or where you're getting your information, but Chris's death was an accident –"
"He was assassinated!" Presley snarled, throwing my brother's journal at my father. When it fell to the floor at my father's feet, Pres stalked over and snatched it up. "It's all in here," he told my dad, hands visibly shaking as he flipped through page after page of Chris's thoughts – of his warnings. "He wrote it all down. Every threat doled out and every dirty damn attempt on his life."
"I don’t understand," my father whispered, eyes laced with confusion.
"Oh, you don’t?" Presley's tone dripped with sarcasm. "Well, let me spell it out for you so that there is no more confusion on the matter. Your son was murdered. As in slew, slain, executed, slaughtered! He was massacred; slowly, painfully, and in the cruelest of ways, by a bunch of goons on the orders of your ole' buddy Cal."
"No." Dad shook his head, turning a deathly shade of white. "You're wrong. His death was an accident. That, I am absolutely certain of. I read the autopsy report. There was a car accident. Romi was driving –"
"He was killed and it was no accident," Presley seethed. "Who did y'all pay to cover it up, huh? Must've cost a pretty penny to bribe the Sheriff and the coroner all in one night. Filing false police and autopsy reports, not to mention concealing bullet holes on a mangled corpse had to have been pricey. Although, what am I saying," he laughed humorlessly, "money's never been much of an issue for y'all, has it?" He shook his head in disgust. "Did Cal hire the same crew to take us out at that diner in El Paso, too? Get a two-for-one deal? Pay for one son's death and get the other one free. Did they throw in mine and Romi's deaths for free, too, or did y'all pay extra for those intended bullets?"
Silent, my father remained completely motionless, eyes glued to the journal in Presley's hand.
A beat passed and still he didn’t respond.
"Nothing to say?" Presley sneered. "Hmm? Is there nothing you would like to add to this delightfully depressing equation?"
"He can't," I replied, awareness dawning on me as I studied my father's stone-like expression. "Because he didn’t know."
"Don�
�t be naïve, Sketch," Pres shot back impatiently. "Of course he knew –"
"Look at him, Pres!" I snapped, gesturing to the shock on my dad's face. "He didn’t fucking know!"
"He killed Chris," Dad whispered, more to himself than anyone else. "Cal killed my son."
"Okay, if you really didn’t know then I am terribly sorry for my inconsiderate drop of that particular bombshell," Presley groaned, slapping a hand over his eyes. "But yeah, he totally fucking did, dude. And he had Romi terrorized into covering it up."
It was at that exact moment that a loud knock erupted outside of the warehouse, drawing everyone's attention to the locked door.
"Oh, I'm so sorry. Are y'all expecting visitors?" Presley flicked his outraged gaze to Gonzalez who was occupying himself with a line of coke. "Perhaps another shipment of nose-gangrene, or how about another criminal to join this joyous reunion?"
"Not tonight," Gonzalez grunted, looking displeased. "Bolillo, you can take it for me."
"Fair enough," Lucky drawled, sliding a Glock from the waistband of his jeans before moving for the door. "But it counts as one of your dozen."
"What fucking ever," the biker grumbled, waving a dismissive hand in the air as he cut another line of coke.
"It?" Eyes bulging in his head, Pres threw his hands up in despair. "I'm sorry, but did you just refer to a human being as an it?"
Balancing a cigarette between his lips and ignoring Presley entirely, Lucky cocked the hammer on his gun and pulled back the deadbolt.
Yanking the door open, he stepped aside just as the body of an oddly familiar teenage boy was tossed inside, followed by a furious looking giant, who was colored in ink. "When I say I'm done with the underground, I mean I'm done with the fucking underground," the man-beast roared, storming into the warehouse.
"Oh, sweet mother of all things merciful," Presley groaned, sounding pained. "Sporting a sewn-on wife beater and grey sweatpants? Are you trying to kill me here, Noah?"
Moving quicker than any man should be able to, Lucky slammed the door shut behind them and pounced on the new arrival.
Pressing the barrel of the Glock against his jugular, Lucky fisted his white blond hair with his other hand and slowly dragged him to his feet. "Who's your friend, Messina?"
"I found this piece of shit creeping around my property in the dark tonight," the man Pres had just called Noah snarled, looking genuinely terrifying. "Right outside the house my wife and kids are sleeping in." Turning to Gonzalez, he hissed, "Is this your doing, G? Another fucking game? Because I thought we were done with this shit years ago. I told you I was done! What the fuck do you want from me, asshole? My resignation in blood?"
"Blond white boy has nothing to do with me," Gonzalez replied, holding his hands up. "Check the bitch for tags."
"Who sent you?" Lucky asked, tone far too gentle for someone pressing a gun to another human's throat. "Hmm? How'd you get in here, kid?" Turning to Noah, he said, "Knife."
"Do I look like your bitch boy?" Noah shot back, looking livid.
Lucky grinned. "Please and thank you."
Muttering a string of curse words under his breath, Noah relented and stalked over to his friend. "God fucking dammit, Luck," he grumbled, pulling a blade from Lucky's other boot. "If my wife gets wind of this, I wasn’t here, I know nothing whatsoever about any missing teenager, and you're a piece of shit for dragging me back into this crap a-fucking-gain."
"Shouldn’t you be saying if the cops get wind of this?" Presley queried, holding up a finger.
"You clearly don’t know my wife." Fisting the guy's shirt in his hand, Noah sliced his shirt open in one swift move. "Clean," he announced, studying his bare chest before moving to check both of the guy's arms. "Nothing. No tags. No tatts. No marks."
"Interesting," Gonzalez mused, stroking his beard almost thoughtfully.
"Looks like you've walked yourself into the lion's den, kid," Lucky mused, pressing the barrel of his gun deeper into his throat. "And we haven't eaten in days."
"You don’t scare me," the guy countered in a heavily accented voice, as he jutted his chin out defiantly. "I came here for a purpose."
"Was the purpose getting your brains blown out of your pretty yellow head?" Gonzalez quipped. "Because no one walks into my club without an invitation."
"I'm not looking for an invitation," the boy replied coldly. "I'm looking for a person."
"And who exactly might you be looking for?"
"Him," he said, pointing straight at me. His gaze flicked to my face and I didn't miss the keen interest in his brown eyes – or the oddly familiar whiskey-colored irises.
I narrowed my eyes.
He smirked in return. "You look just like him."
Whiskey colored eyes.
Hair like the sun.
No.
Fucking.
Way!
It was him.
The other twin.
It had to be.
He had her eyes.
"Giacobbe," he hissed at the same time I demanded, "Where is she?"
"Giacobbe Toretto," he repeated, watching me with the same level of hostility as I watched him. "It seems that you and I have a lot to talk about."
"Well, this just keeps getting better and better, doesn’t it? Sweet Sasha Fierce, I feel like I'm trapped in an episode of Doctor freaking Who!" Presley declared in dramatic fashion, turning his attention to the guy being held at gunpoint. "Okay," he said, pressing his fingers to his temples. "Going off your uncanny resemblance to a dear friend of mine, I'm going to take a wild stab in the dark here and assume that you're Seth?"
"You can take your assumptions and shove them up your ass, pretty boy."
"No thanks, it's rather difficult to give it to my – hold up!" Turning to grin at me, Pres asked, "Did he just call me pretty?"
With my adrenalin pumping, and my heart gunning wildly in my chest, I staggered to my feet, completely ignoring Presley's hormone-induced question in the process. "Do you know where she is?"
"Maybe. Call off your guard dog and I might have an easier time remembering," he answered. "You scratch my back and I'll scratch yours."
"How about you tell me what you know before I break your face?"
He smirked. "Are you always this reckless?"
"Usually. Are you always this much of an asshole?"
"Whoa, whoa, whoa, Sketch, what the hell is that?" Presley demanded, breaking the stare down between me and Seth, and looking a little mystified in the process. "How are you doing this?"
I frowned. "How am I doing what?"
"He was speaking to you in a completely different language," Pres breathed, looking rattled. "And you were answering him, man."
I stared blankly back at him. "I was?"
"Yeah, Sketch, you were."
"Not a foreign language. Not to Jacob, at least. It his mother tongue," my father said, sounding proud. "It's all coming back to him."
"Well I'll be goddammed," Presley breathed, eyes like saucers. "That's one hell of an impressive party trick."
"Let him go," I ordered with a tilt of my chin, never once taking my eyes off the male version of Romi.
"You sure about this, fullback?" Lucky asked. "This one has killer instincts."
"I'll take my chances," I replied coolly.
If it meant finding Romi…
Whistling softly to himself, Lucky slowly withdrew the gun from Seth's throat. Keeping his gun drawn, he backed all the way up to lean against the closed door.
"Now," I said, eyes locked on Seth. "Start refreshing that memory, asshole."
"Call me an asshole again and I'll put another hole in your chest," Seth countered coolly. "And unlike the man who put that bullet in you, I won't miss my target."
Bristling with tension, I forced myself to keep my temper in check, knowing that he was my best chance at finding Romi. "Where is she?" Trying to keep my tone even, I clenched my jaw when I spoke, "What did he do with her?"
"If you are referring to our piece of s
hit father, then she is no longer with him," Seth replied flatly, completely unfeeling. "He traded her life in for both his and mine several weeks ago – right along with the life of our mother."
Now my father was the one to speak. "Arabella is still alive?"
"What the fuck do you think?" With a look of pure repulsion etched on his face, Seth flicked his gaze to my father. "Of course she's not alive. He put a fucking bullet in my mother's temple. She bled out on the floor at my feet."
"What about Romi?" I demanded, not giving two shits about this Arabella woman. "Is she de–" I couldn’t say it. Feeling winded at the thought, I dragged in several steadying breaths before asking, "Is she okay?"
"She's on board the Carmella," Seth blew my world apart by saying. "With your father."
I couldn’t breathe.
I couldn’t fucking move.
"Wh-what did you say?"
"Raffaele?" Dad gasped. "He has Ramona?" He turned to look at me. "Jacob, it's okay. He would never –"
"If you are about to say that he would never hurt her, then you have not met the man who kept me captive," Seth interrupted coldly. "He will hurt her. I can promise you that. A man with nothing left to lose has everyone left to wound."
Jesus Christ.
I couldn’t take this in.
I couldn’t deal.
"Well, where the fuck is he taking her?" I demanded, clutching at my chest to stem the pain spreading through it. "What does he want?"
"You think I'm going to tell you that without getting what I came here for first?" Seth deadpanned, looking at me like I was stupid. "Raffaele wants what he has wanted for fifteen years – what I have wanted since my father closed my mother's eyes forever." His eyes darkened. "Revenge."
"Seth, where have you been all this time?" my father asked, looking like he'd seen a ghost.