by J. J. McAvoy
“Grandpapa!”
At the sound of her angry voice, he jumped slightly; we both turned to see the little tyrant, with her hands on her hips and her hair in a sloppy pigtail glaring up at him.
“Yes, munchkin?” my father asked.
“I’m mad,” she said bluntly and lifted a lump of Play-Doh. “You stepped on it!”
“What?” My father gasped, kneeling in front of her. “I did not.”
She pointed to his foot, and when I looked, a small trace of yellow Play-Doh was on the sole of his shoe. My father looked down at it, then back at my daughter’s furious little face. “Oops, sorry. Munchkin, I didn’t see it.”
“Mommy says sorry won’t fix it,” she replied, handing him the lump of Play-Doh.
“Munchkin, I’ll fix it if you bring your father to play with us.” He snickered.
Gigi’s head whipped toward me. My eyebrow raised at the look in her eyes, and she relaxed a bit and turned back to her grandfather. Moving, she whispered something very quickly into his ear and then backed away.
They shared a look, and he nodded, outstretching his hand. “Deal, Munchkin.”
Gigi nodded and grinned, shaking it.
“What deal, Gigi?” I asked her.
“It’s a secret.” Father grinned, taking her hand.
Gigi smiled up at me. “Yeah, a secret, Papa.”
Kneeling down, I opened my arms, and she let go of him, coming to me and hugging me.
“So petty,” my father muttered, but I ignored him.
I brushed the hair from her face. “Gigi, be careful who you make deals with, okay? Not everyone keeps their promises.”
“But family, Papa?” she asked, tilting her face.
I nodded, cupping her cheek. “You can trust family more…but still be careful. Families sometimes mess up, too.”
“What do you do if they mess up?” she asked.
I pretended to think and lifted my hand. “Smack them? I’m not sure what else. Papa hasn’t learned that yet.” I tickled her, making her wiggle around in front of me. Smiling, I let her go, pushing her to my father. “Go have fun with your secret.”
She kissed the side of my face before running off to jump onto my father. He caught her easily and looked at me. He didn’t get to say anything because the little tyrant in his hands demanded he go onward.
As they walked away, I looked back in on Calliope and my mother as she helped her stretch out her wound. Calliope’s face was covered in sweat and pain.
Stubborn.
But so was I.
Everything she was…so was I.
MELODY
She’d held back.
The first time we’d fought, back at the manor, at their wedding, I knew she was good. But I also knew I was stronger. I was sure that without her tricks and games, I was stronger one-on-one, but now as she ducked and brought her fist so close to my nose that I barely had time to back up, I knew for a fact, she was holding back then.
In hindsight, it made sense.
She wasn’t trying to defeat me. She was trying to draw me into her trap. We needed it to look like she’d put up a good fight and taken a few good hits, as well as give us enough time to escape. We couldn’t do so if we were beaten up too badly. I wondered how Liam had missed her head, how I had missed her head. We had both fired. And now I knew why. Her pretty gray eyes weren’t just decorations for her face. Her eyes were faster than her hands, and her hands were bloody fucking fast. All of her senses were sharper than even mine were at her age. It was like she watched us fight from above; not only that, but she also knew my combat style.
The first week I had knocked her down to the mat daily. This week, it was like I just kept missing her. I spent more time blocking her kicks, her jabs, than actually aiming to take her back down to the ground. This wasn’t just skill. This was a memory. That was how her body could keep going, even though I knew she wasn’t at all healed. It knew what to do even if it wasn’t at full capacity.
I barely had a second to breathe, to catch my footing, to protect my sides and then my face…what would happen between us if she were at her full capacity. What would have happened if I were twenty-eight still? Who would win?
Me.
The second I thought that was the second I threw my fist at her first opening in the last hour, right dead on her wound
She gasped, stumbling back, hunched over as the pain ran through her.
It was dirty, but who gave a shit. Dirty hits were a way of life.
“That’s enough for today,” I said to her.
However, she stumbled to the side of the ring and puked, gasping for air. Before cleaning her mouth, she turned back to me with her fist held back up.
“I’m fine.”
With her smiling face and witty comebacks, that fake woman, who entered my son’s life, was gone. Right now, her eyes and face were harder than stone. Her eyes were so cold they looked dead. She’d taken off her mask ever since I’d come to her, and all I saw on her face was the desire to kill. The passion was so strong that she didn’t care about anything else, not even her own face. She’d even pushed her daughter away so she could focus on getting back up to fight.
“You’re going to overwork your muscles,” I said as I unwrapped the cloth on my fist, ignoring the soreness in them as well.
“My muscles are fine; are yours?”
She still had a way to get under my goddamn skin, though.
“Careful,” I said to her. “You piss off your teacher. You won’t get any more classes. We are not doing another round.”
“Fine,” she said and walked past me, facing the wall where Ethan had been sitting, watching us for the last hour unflinching. It was only to him that her face softened, and her smile returned. “Come fight me, boss.”
“Your teacher called it a day,” he said back to her.
“She can stop me from fighting her, but she never said I couldn’t engage with someone else.”
“No, but I implied it,” I shouted over to her. “Go rest, Calliope.”
She waved me off. “Christmas is in two days, Ethan. Let’s wager, consider it my gift to you and your gift to me.”
“And what is this wager?” he questioned.
“If you win, I’ll do what you asked and stay behind. If I win, you stop watching me like a mother hen and accept that I’m going.”
He frowned, rising from his place on the ground. “When I win, you will say it is because you were worn out fighting your teacher.”
“I’m not that petty.” She was exactly that petty. “Besides, I was holding back with her.”
I scoffed. This little bitch.
Stepping out of the ring, I walked over to my son. “Beat the shit out of her.”
He unbuttoned his shirt and tossed it to the side. Watching Calliope’s gaze go over his chest muscles made me want to both pluck out my eyes and puke. At least she wasn’t all war machine.
“If I win, you will also give me all the details. No holding back,” Ethan said, slowly wrapping his fist.
“Cross my heart,” she said with a smile.
I didn’t understand what made her so cocky right now, especially as we had just witnessed her nearly keel over in pain from my hit. Something was off. I looked at Ethan, and his eyes narrowed on her.
“No poison, Calliope.”
“Me? I would never.” She giggled.
He rolled his eyes, stepping into the ring. “Liar. But I’m ready for that as well. That drug you kept dropping on my head, do you have more?”
She did what?
“Are your headaches coming back?” she asked, casually moving to the center of the middle of the room.
He had headaches? “What headaches?”
They both looked to me as if I were intruding on their conversation, and maybe I was, but I didn’t care.
“What headaches?” I asked again.
“Stress headaches. It’s nothing serious,” she said.
However, I didn’t believe h
er.
“Are we starting?” he asked her, lifting his fist.
“Yes, boss.”
These two…they lived in their own world.
Then again, wasn’t that the case for all lovers?
Liam and I did, too…like eclipses intersecting but still separate entities, and because of that, we’d part again.
When this was all over, Liam and I would return to the shadows, and they’d be the sun and the moon.
Taking orders from Mommy and Daddy because Mommy and Daddy regret retiring…that’s what you betrayed me for.
He’d said that Wyatt and I didn’t bother thinking about it then.
Now, as I was forced to wait and follow their damn instructions, I couldn’t help but wonder, was that really it? Was that what brought us all here?
My regret?
“Ah!” She hissed as he punched her so hard that she flew to the other side of the ring.
“You aren’t strong enough to fight me right now,” he said to her, relaxed.
“Duh.” She smiled, pushing herself off the ground. Rising, she wiped the blood from her mouth. “But the fist isn’t the only way to fight, Ethan. I can just make you give up.”
“Why would you give up?”
“Because if not, you’ll end up killing me here,” she said, lifting her fist back up. “I’ll fight you until you accept or kill me. Do or die, boss.”
That was her game.
She knew she couldn’t win right now. But she also knew Ethan wouldn’t keep punching her. She knew he didn’t want her to be hurt. His reason for not wanting her to come along was because he was trying to protect her. What was the point of protecting her if he beat her to death here?
“You’re fucking ridiculous,” he snapped, moving to get out the ring, but she charged him.
Taking them both to the mat and punching his face over and over again. He took the punches for a moment until he found a way to flip her off him and toss her to the side. Ethan was far too gentle. He could have just punched into her side.
“Do or die,” Calliope repeated as she got off the ground. “I mean that. So, don’t hold back anymore, Ethan, let’s go!”
He stood there…completely fed up and defeated. His shoulders slumped, and almost looked like he was beating himself for getting in the damn ring. They both seemed so ridiculous that I couldn’t but smile.
“Are you laughing at me?” Ethan glared at me.
“Focus on our fight!” Calliope hollered, punching into his back.
“You fucking madwoman! Fine! Fuck! Fine!” he hollered at her. “You fucking win! Deal!”
Grinning, Calliope let go of him and laid on the mat, trying to breathe. “Two days,…it’s over.”
She really was a madwoman. I thought, smirking and moving, leave them alone.
“Hey, teach!”
“What?”
“You’re good for your age,” she said, clearly trying to provoke me.
Rolling my eyes, I pulled open the door. “No, I’m just good.”
She laughed, and for some strange, stupid reason, I smiled.
CALLIOPE
I was the first one up in the morning, and while I wanted to work out, I tried to save my energy. Instead, I focused on making breakfast and the plan of attack, creating the map on the computer with a profile for each other.
“What smells so good?” Liam came in, glancing around the kitchen. His green eyes went wide as he looked over the bacon slices, sausages, fried eggs, baked beans, mushrooms, tomatoes, and hash browns. He looked back at me when I handed him a plate. “You made a full Irish breakfast?”
“Well, I’m missing black pudding, but it’s close, right?”
“It’s a bit more than close.” He chuckled, grabbing one of the sausages and threw it into his mouth. “And it’s good.”
“Of course, it’s good. I made it.”
He happily stacked his plate. “Cocky. But Mel told me that. Celebrating Ethan’s loss yesterday?”
“Celebrating my victory,” I said, handing him the orange juice, which he happily drank before taking some of the bread for his eggs. “Do you know why I learned to cook?”
“Hmm?” he asked as he took another bite of the bacon.
“Because no matter how much a man may distrust a woman, if she puts a plate of food in front of him, he forgets everything but his hunger. So, it’s the perfect method of murder.”
He paused, looking to me.
“She’s being honest, but she didn’t do anything to the food,” Ethan said when he came out.
I laughed, taking a piece of bacon to eat. Liam’s face fell. “But she fucking killed my joy in eating it!”
“You’ll get it back with each bite.” I chuckled, giving Ethan a plate.
He took it and kissed the side of my cheek. “Stop gloating.”
“Just accept it; it’s easier.”
He made a face and walked around me to get his food from the spread. While I did, I took the portion I made for Gigi to her room, which was right beside my room in this big ass bunker of the safe house. When I walked in, she was curled up in the sheets.
All I had to do was put the food beside her face for her nose to start wiggling. Biting my lip, trying not to laugh, I watched her stir before she sat up with bedhead, confused.
“Mommy?”
“Morning, sleepyhead,” I said, taking a seat beside her. “Look what I brought.”
“Bacon.”
“No.” I stopped her before she reached for it. “You’ve been doing whatever you want the last few weeks and seem to have forgotten my rules. What do we do when we want breakfast?”
“Mommy!”
“Don’t Mommy me,” I said to her. “I heard you broke the stuff in your room, too. And you haven’t been paying attention to your homework. Should we talk about all of that now?”
She quickly got out of bed. “I need to brush my teeth and wash my face, then do my bed.”
I nodded. “Good, go.”
She quickly went and smiled. Usually, she’d have to feed and take out her dogs, but Ethan hadn’t brought them. I understood why that wasn’t his priority at the time. Even though I hadn’t left the house, I knew we were still in Chicago…well, right outside out of Chicago in Winnetka, my hometown. This safe house was just down the block from where I had stayed with my mother for the first seven years of my life. However, we weren’t at the top level of the house. We were in the safe house Ethan had built right under it. It was almost an exact replica of an ordinary house. But there were no windows, no way to see outside except for the cameras. I was sure Gigi had sort of noticed but was too distracted with everything else to really ask why she couldn’t go out.
“Mommy.”
I looked to see she’d fixed her hair a bit, too.
She pointed to the bed. “I can’t fix it with you on it.”
“Right,” I said, getting up off the mattress, holding her food. She hopped up and fixed it the best she could and even spread it out to push out the wrinkles. When she was done, I set the food down on top of the bed beside her. “Good girl. Eat all you want.”
“Thank you, Mommy,” she said excitedly and crossed her feet. “Mommy, are you better now?”
“Much better.”
“Then, can we go back home soon?” she asked.
I knew she had noticed. I nodded, putting my hand on her head. “You’ll be with everyone on Christmas, but Daddy, Mommy, and your grandparents will have to be away for a few days.”
“On Christmas?” She gasped.
“I know. But we’ll have New Year’s Day and so many other Christmases together after this.”
She pouted, so I poked her cheek. “You remember when I told you that one day Mommy was going to finish the book?”
She nodded.
“Well, that’s what I am going to do.” Tomorrow would be the end of Calliope Orsini…the long-suffering little girl. “It’s very important to Mommy, so can you forgive me for Christmas this year?”
/> “Will you tell me the story?”
“Maybe one day, when you are older.”
“How old?”
I chuckled. “Me, old.”
She gasped. “Mommy.”
“Fine, we will negotiate when I get back.”
“Okay, but do I get a present?”
“Of course,” I said, rising from the bed. “As if your papa wouldn’t get you lots of presents.”
“That’s Papa. I want something from you, Mommy.”
It was sweet, but it was also very tricky for her. I glared down, and she grinned up at me. “Mommy and Papa are one. His presents are my presents.”
She pouted again. “Stay here for a little bit. We're talking about presents, and if I catch you sneaking to listen, I’ll tell Papa to hide all of them until your birthday.”
“I won’t sneak!” she said seriously.
“Good. I’m watching. Love you,” I said, moving to the door
“Love you, too,” she said before sitting back with her tablet. Outside, I leaned on the door for a moment.
There was that feeling right before an assignment. The worry that I wouldn’t be able to keep my promises to her. That I wouldn’t make it back. But I pushed them down.
I wasn’t dying.
I wasn’t letting her die.
Neither was her father.
I was escaping all my past horrors. They were going to be the last chapter of Calliope Orsini. I’d learned a lot, and changed a lot since the first chapter. My daughter was part of that story, and so was Ethan. Bright ports in a sea of pain. I was only taking them into the new me…the free me.
The faster I got this done, the faster I could finally feel that freedom.
Straightening my shoulders, I walked into the kitchen to find all of them—Ethan and his parents—reading over the files I had left on the table.
I turned on the television and put my phone to the side still able to watch Gigi in her room. The last thing I wanted her to do was to come out and hear me planning Siena’s death. She still considered the woman her family, too.
“Let’s get started,” I said to them.
15
“If I know what love is, it is because of you.”