“The stars will make it work if she is meant for you, nipote,” Catalina said with a hopeful smile.
Before I got a word out in a reply, a loud bang made me jerk around.
The band stopped playing and the crowd stopped dancing and everyone turned to stare at Uncle Felix as he stepped through the door he’d just kicked open. Blood splattered his clothes and a sack hung from his hand as he sauntered inside like a fucking cowboy back from a raid. Aunt Gia and Uncle Luigi strolled in behind him, equally splattered with blood and dirt.
“Happy birthday to y-” Mamma was singing but her words died in her throat as she stepped out of the kitchen doors at the far end of the patio, the cake in her hands alight with six candles, three of them going out as she exhaled in shock.
“Uncle,” I snarled, rising to my feet as some of the younger children started crying in fright. “Speak with me in the hall,” I growled, my temple pulsing as I took in their horrid state. He’d known there was a party here today and yet he still had the gall to disrespect my mother like this.
I strode forward with a warning growl and Felix looked to me with a disinterested smile. “Chill out, nipote. I’m bringing good news.”
“Perhaps you should take a shower first before you deliver it,” I snarled, electricity rolling off of me and making the crowd shrink back.
A small hand clutched onto my trouser leg and I looked down, finding Fabrizio there, gazing up at me for reassurance.
I rested my hand on the back of his head, glaring at Felix.
“Go,” I hissed at Felix and my siblings started growling their agreement as they backed my decision.
Felix ignored me once more, strolling through the crowd and heading to the buffet table. Mamma jerked back out of his way to keep the cake from touching his bloody clothes as he helped himself to a large glass of wine. He tipped it down his throat and I made a move toward him, but Fabrizio’s hands tightened on my trousers. The kid was staring up at his Alpha for reassurance and leaving him here would be like abandoning a pup in the forest.
“I said go!” I barked at Felix.
Felix released a low laugh and his companions echoed it. “The kid’s six year’s old, right Fabio?”
“It’s Fabrizio,” he corrected, leaning out from behind me and I had to admire his courage.
“Well that makes you a man in my books,” Felix said with a shrug. “Your old uncle here got you a present. Why don’t you come and get it?” He raised the sack and Fabrizio looked at it hopefully but I caught his collar to hold him back.
“Leave it with the rest of the presents.” I nodded to the table where a large stack was piled.
“As you wish.” Felix bowed his head to me, but there was a mocking to it that made my spine prickle. He headed to the table, tipping the bag up and a dull thud sounded before he stepped aside to reveal what he’d poured out of it.
A severed head stared at me, glassy-eyed, with his tongue lolling and swollen.
“Another Lunar is dead!” Felix roared in celebration.
I was on him in seconds, my fist connecting with his jaw while Mamma screamed orders to get the children off the patio.
The acrid stench of alcohol rolled from my uncle up close and he collapsed down on the ground with one blow. I pinned him down, growling in his face as pure rage raced along my spine. I was twice his size but his slim body was all muscle and he was a trained fighter. He threw hard and well-aimed punches at my ribs and I wheezed, cracking his head down against the concrete.
A few cries of distress rang our from my family and I cursed under my breath, holding myself back as I moved to pin him in place instead.
Water fell over my head, clinging to my eyes and blinding me as Felix cast it. I pressed my weight down on him but he wriggled free and his boot slammed into my side a second later. I leapt up, blind and swiping at my eyes to try and clear the water. He released a rasping laugh and I dove forward in the direction of the sound with a spike of adrenaline.
I collided with him and we crashed down on the buffet table, sending plates and glasses flying. Felix lost concentration on his magic and the water slipped from my eyes, giving me a view of his sinewy face which was smeared with tiramisu.
I grabbed his lapels, dragging him back to his feet with a roar of fury. “You’ve ruined Mamma’s dessert!”
Felix laughed coldly, wiping a line of tiramisu from his face and sucking it from his finger. “My mamma’s was better.”
I snarled at him, grabbing hold of his arm. “Go home, Uncle. And don’t show your face here until you’re ready to apologise to my entire family.”
Felix lifted a hand to pat my shoulder and I released my grip on him. I was a fucking idiot for it because a second later his other hand came up encased in ice and smashed into my cheek. I crashed to the ground and Felix swiped a bottle of wine from the table, dropping over me and raising it above his head to attack me with.
I threw a solid punch to his gut as my pack descended, but the first to get there was Rosalie, ripping the bottle from Felix’s grip and smashing it over his head. Glass and wine crashed over me as Felix slumped forward unconscious and I shoved him off of me with a grunt of effort.
I nodded to Rosalie, rising to my feet as my family grouped around me, checking me for wounds and whimpering softly.
“Throw him somewhere to sober up,” I ordered, spotting Luigi and Gia held back by two of my brothers. They hauled them away and my eyes fell on my little cousin Fabrizio as Aunt Catalina tried to tow him inside.
He threw his head back and howled to the sky, the sound quickly echoed by everyone in my family. I dropped my head back too, following suit and the ringing note filled the air, uniting us all as one.
Breaking into Gareth’s online banking had taken longer than getting into his Atlas. I had the account information for the payments Gabriel had made to him, but I knew that wasn’t his normal account. He’d obviously opened one just to receive that money and to conceal his own identity, but it had taken me over a week to track down which bank it was with then I’d had to get into his account to trace the money.
In the end it had actually been easy. Turned out when someone died their money went to the next of kin specified in their will - AKA me. So once I’d figured out what bank he’d used I’d only had to head down to one of their branches with a copy of Gareth’s death certificate and some ID to take ownership of it. He’d set it up under an alias but he’d still had to provide real ID to do that so once the bank confirmed it had belonged to him, it became mine.
I sat in a side room of the branch as I looked over the statements since the account had been opened.
Every month for the last seventeen aside from those since he’d died, Gareth had received one thousand Auras from a Mr G Nox. And during most of those months that entire sum had been withdrawn in cash within a few days of it being paid in. He’d never collected it on the same day of the month twice and he’d never used the same branch to take it out either. My brother wasn’t stupid; he’d covered his tracks well and constantly changed his routine.
The last three payments had never been taken out of the account. I was now the sole beneficiary of three thousand auras which Gareth had blackmailed from Gabriel Nox. I wasn’t really sure what to think about that so I was focusing on the months when the money had been used instead.
Each month the cash had been withdrawn. Except one. There was one month where he hadn’t taken it from the account; he’d transferred it straight to a Mrs S Nudos. Old Sal.
I frowned at the transaction. The single clue I had to where that money was going every month. He’d been paying my mom’s old employer. But why?
I headed out of the bank and started down the street. The day was warm and I enjoyed the breeze which ran through my hair as I chewed on a piece of cherry gum and tried to figure out why the hell Gareth would have been giving Old Sal so much money. But I was coming up with nothing.
It took me half an hour to walk to The Sparkling Uranus. I could
have done it a lot faster with my Vampire speed but I chose not to, using the time to try and figure out this money trail but I was still coming up blank by the time I made it to the strip club.
I pushed the back door open, finding it wedged that way with a brick as always. Sal was nothing if not a creature of habit. I’d spent more evenings and weekends hanging out here than I’d like to remember and the smell of sweat, money and sex gave me the most pathetic feeling of home. Hell, I didn’t even have a home anymore. I’d given up the lease on the apartment we’d lived in my whole life when I’d sent Mom off to stay in the wellness centre. I hadn’t even bothered to pack up half of our crap. The centre had let Mom bring four cases with her which I’d filled with what she needed and most of Gareth’s stuff, not wanting to part with it. When I graduated from the academy, I’d be officially homeless. Presuming I wasn’t in Darkmore Penitentiary for murder. Or dead. And as both of those possibilities were pretty damn likely, I wasn’t going to worry about it.
I weaved my way through the back corridors and dressing rooms in the club, nodding to the dancers who were working the early shift and accepting their warm or pitying looks with a hard smile. I didn’t want to talk to any of them about Gareth or Mom. I just needed information on this money.
I knocked on Old Sal’s door and it swung open to reveal her sitting in her tall, leather chair, puffing on a cigarette as always and looking up like she didn’t want any interruptions.
The irritation slipped from her gaze as she spotted me and a wide smile lit her face.
“Elise! Baby, look how much you’ve grown. And that hair! So exotic…you could make a fortune on the pole you know,” she said wistfully.
I snorted a laugh as I dropped into the chair opposite her.
“But strippers are always smiling and I’m really not cut out for too much of that,” I teased.
“We can work with sultry,” she said hopefully. “You’d be a star out there. I could pay top whack.”
I laughed like she was joking though I didn’t think she was. But fuck that. This life had ruined our mom. Or at least it had ruined what was left of her after my dad and Gareth’s had broken her heart. Nope. Stripping wasn’t for me. At least not in public.
“I’m actually here about something strange I discovered since…Gareth’s death,” I forced out. It was hard to say it out loud. I never saw anyone who knew who I was or what I’d lost. It fucking hurt. But it was a weird kind of relief too, especially as a hint of grief shone in her eyes. Perhaps Miss Nightshade had a point about me opening up about my grief, bottling it up wasn’t good for me. But I’d made my bed so I’d lie in it.
“I’m so sorry, Elise,” Sal said in a low voice, reaching across her desk to squeeze my hand. “But I don’t understand what it is you think I can help you with…”
“I’ve just been given an inheritance and the bank statements show some strange activity…it looks like Gareth paid you a thousand auras from it once. And possibly more than that as he withdrew the same amount of cash during other months too. Why was he paying you that kind of money?”
Sal shifted uncomfortably and for a moment I wasn’t sure if she was even going to tell me. When she spoke, her voice held a little regret but no falseness that I could detect.
“I presumed you knew about the arrangement I struck with him and your momma?” she asked hesitantly.
“Obviously not,” I replied slowly. “But I’d appreciate your honesty in what was going on. He’s gone now and I can’t ask anyone else. I don’t want questions hanging over me as well as everything else.”
Old Sal released a slow breath and nodded. “Very well. Around eighteen months ago, your momma got into some gambling debts with me. You know how she suffered with that addiction?”
I nodded. I also know how you never once tried to stop her from placing a bet and indebting herself to you, knowing you’d always own her so long as she owed you.
“Well she’d accrued a very large sum. Seventeen thousand auras to be precise-”
“What?” I gasped. How the hell could she have done something so stupid?
Sal nodded sadly. “She was desperate, unable to keep up with the payments and knowing that her performances in the club weren’t as popular as they’d once been… But I’m not a charity, Elise. I’ve always done good by her and you kids, but there was no way I could just forget about a debt that size. So she suggested a deal to pay her debt off. A deal I assumed you knew all about?”
I frowned, having no idea what she was talking about. “What deal?”
“She offered you up as a new dancer,” Sal explained and a weight filled with lead and poison dropped into the pit of my gut.
“What?” I gasped.
“I told her you were too young but she insisted, said you wanted to help and that you’d always dreamed of dancing for me. She said you could dance on the stage until you turned eighteen and then start on the lap dances once you’d built your confidence…” Sal looked uncomfortable as she realised I had no idea about any of this and I could only stare at her in horror. My own mom had tried to buy herself out of debt with my body? She knew that this place was more than just a strip club, the patrons here paid for whatever they wanted from the dancers. And though I’d never judged Mom for what she’d had to do to survive she’d known I never wanted this life. I thought she wanted to keep me away from it too. I’d never once suspected that she’d planned to sell me into it to save her own ass.
I could only stare at Sal, dumbfounded as the last of my faith in the only family member I had left came crashing down around me. Was this really true? Would she have really done that to me?
“Gareth overheard us discussing the contract I was going to offer you. He said you wouldn’t want that life and offered to take on your momma’s debt instead. We struck a deal. He even offered to pay interest.”
“So he started paying you a thousand auras a month?” I asked, trying to cling to the facts while pain sliced deep into my gut.
“Two thousand. I’m not entirely sure where he was getting it…he said he was working for some of the rich kids at that fancy academy of his but I’m afraid I never got any more of the details…” Sal’s voice was trembling a little and I knew it was in reaction to the grief pouring from me. As a Siren, she could feel it and this pain was sharp enough to cut me to ribbons so it couldn’t have been a walk in the park for her.
“Okay. Thanks.” I got to my feet before I could fall apart and shot out of the club using my Vampire speed.
I kept going until I was several miles away from Old Sal and the club and anything and everything to do with my old life.
I leaned against the cold brick wall of the final building I had to visit today and fought as hard as I could against the agony rocketing through my blood.
I couldn’t face it now. I couldn’t deal with any of this now. There was something I’d been putting off and I needed it over with. And once it was, I’d never come back to this part of Alestria again. I was done. It was over. I didn’t want to walk the streets I’d promised to escape with Gareth or remember the life we’d always wanted to leave behind. The only good thing I’d ever had here was gone forever now. It was time for me to leave it behind.
I headed into the Fae Investigation Bureau precinct at a fast pace.
The officer behind the seat looked up at me as I approached.
“Are you here to report a crime or confess to one?” she asked.
“Neither. I’m here to collect my brother’s belongings. His name was Gareth Tempa.”
***
By the time I got back to campus it was dark and my soul felt hollow. I didn’t want to face anyone and I wasn’t sure I could even bring myself to return to my dorm at all tonight. I needed to be alone. Somewhere I could fall apart and no one would ask me any questions about it.
Dante had told me he was going back home to see his Mom and siblings today, no doubt working on some gang nonsense too. But that left me with somewhere to go. Somewhere I cou
ld be free and alone for a while.
I paused as I made it to the jetty outside the huge boathouse, listening to the sound of the water lapping against the shore for a moment, savouring the peace before I made the phone call I’d been dreading.
It was nearly nine, but they’d answer. There was always someone on the desk.
It took six rings before I got a response.
“White Haven Retreat, Linda speaking, how can I help?”
“Hi Linda, it’s Elise Callisto,” I said, holding back the emotion that was brimming to the surface in me. “Is my mom, Tanya Callisto, up for talking to me yet?”
The line was quiet for a long moment before she replied. “I’m afraid not, Elise. Tanya has made it clear she doesn’t want to take any calls.”
Something shattered deep within me. I had one family member left in this world. One person who knew the pain that was tearing me apart just as keenly as I did. And she didn’t even care about me enough to talk to me when I needed her. When I needed to hear whether or not she’d been making a deal with Old Sal to sell me for her debts. I needed to know if I had anyone left in this world who loved me at all or if I truly was as alone as I felt.
“Right,” I said, steeling myself against the tears which were trying to surface. “Well perhaps you could ask her a question for me and tell me the answer?”
Another long pause. “Okay, sweety,” Linda replied. “I’ll ask. What is it you need to know?” The sound of her footsteps came as she headed down the corridor to my mom’s suite.
“I want to know… Ask her if she was making a deal with Old Sal to pay off her gambling debts. Ask her if she was arranging for me to work at the club.” My heart was pounding and my teeth dug into my bottom lip hard enough to draw blood.
“Okay. Gimme a sec.”
Piano music assaulted me as I was put on hold and I released a shaky breath as I looked up at the stars.
Savage Fae (Ruthless Boys of the Zodiac Book 2) Page 19