Kiss Of Death: A Dark Mafia Romance

9

Una

“Hello.” The small voice comes over the line, and my heart lets out a stuttered thump. So many times I imagined what I would say if I ever found her, and yet right now, I’ve got nothing. Not one word. My mouth opens and closes a few more times as I grapple with foreign emotions.

“Hey,” I finally manage.

Silence. I wonder if this is as hard for her as it is for me. But honestly, I hate this because I know what she went through. My life was no cakewalk, but Nicholai was right about one thing. He did make me strong. Anna was relegated to a life where she was continuously made to feel weak, day after day. Month after month. Year after year.

“Thank you for helping me,” she says.

“I…you’re my sister.” And I owe her an explanation, a reason for her suffering. “I looked for you.”

“I know. Rafael told me.”

“I will get you out of Mexico. I will. It’s just not safe right now.” I hate that I’ve managed to save her, but for what? So she can be a pawn to my enemies.

“I’m safe with Rafael.” There’s a softness to her voice, a fondness. I want to ask her if she’s okay, but of course she’s not. Anna will never be okay. This entire exchange is awkward because in reality we are complete strangers to one another.

“Okay. Well, I love you.” The words feel strange and cold on my tongue. Words I haven’t spoken since I pointed a gun at Alex’s head and pulled the trigger.

She says nothing, and then the line clicks off. I sit at the very desk I killed Alberto at and grip the arms of the chair hard enough that my fingers start to throb. Raw emotions bubble over and a single tear tracks down my cheek. I let it. A single tear for my sister, for all that we lost, all that was taken from us. A tear for the fact that sheer fate put me here and her there, and what if our roles had been reversed? The irony is that I would never have survived her fate, and she might have ended up in the exact same place anyway. Because had I not fought that very fate so hard, Nicholai never would have pulled me out for training. I want to scream and cry at the world for being so cruel, for stripping us of family and a sense of belonging and making us nothing more than objects. Anna, a possession for nothing more than pleasure, and me, a weapon. We once were a family. We once had each other, loved each other unconditionally. I look down, resting my hand on my stomach. Unconditional love. What would that feel like? What would it look like? The unwarranted adoration of a child. That blinkered ability for someone so innocent to see you through rose-tinted glasses. Isn’t that the way I used to see Nicholai, as a savior? Until one day, I suddenly realized that my knight in shining armor was in fact the very monster I needed saving from. For a second, I picture Nero with a tiny baby in his arms, and then, in an instant, that image changes to a teenage boy, his father putting a gun in his hand and forcing him to shoot a boy chained to a wall in a cold, concrete room.

“Una.”

I blink and look up at Nero who’s standing right across from me. My senses are getting sloppy as my emotions run amuck on me. His eyes drop to my hand on my stomach, and his lips press into a hard line. “You okay?”

I swipe at the tear clinging to my jaw and push to my feet. “Of course.” I’m always okay. I can’t afford not to be. Especially not now.