Chapter One

Twelve years old

I was only a young girl, dressed in my favorite tutu, when I came to the realization that the men in my family were like the monsters in the scary movies that Nevio loved to watch.

And a piece of my heart broke.

Screams and laughter rang out, filling our backyard, and the lingering smell of charcoal tickled my nose.

Mom caught my eye where she lounged on a sunchair next to our huge pool landscape where my twin Nevio, and cousins Alessio and Massimo had a water battle with Fabiano’s son Davide and my uncle Savio. The women of the family lounged on the sunchairs around them, having drinks. Only Aurora who was three years younger than me stood at the edge of the pool watching the fight as if she might want to join in. I sat on our patio, needing space, but even here the sounds became too much. It had been a long day filled with presents, cake, singing and hugs as Nevio and I celebrated our twelfth birthday.

If it was just my birthday, I wouldn’t have celebrated at all, but it was also Nevio’s day and so I braved the excitement.

I sent Mom an apologetic smile and rose from the chair. She nodded, a few blond strands falling out of her messy bun. She knew I had to leave and find peace in my room for the rest of the evening. I glanced around, looking for Dad to say good night as I always did. I found him, Nino and Fabiano in the common area of our mansion. It was a place that was busy most days. With three families living under this roof, everyone always used this area to gather—to celebrate and to argue alike. And Fabiano, who was like a brother to my dad and uncles, though he wasn’t blood, was over often too.

They were talking in quiet voices. I could tell something was up. A nervous energy was in the air, one that made my skin prickle in a way that made me long for a dark corner to hide. Dad fell silent when he spotted me. For a moment his dark eyes—the same dark brown as mine—held a gleam I couldn’t read before they became tender. I went over to him and briefly hugged his middle. “I’m off to bed.”

“Do that.” He kissed the top of my head before I pulled away and gave Nino and Fabiano a smile that felt a little tight from overuse today, then I headed into my family’s wing and into my room.

Until a couple of years ago, Nevio and I had shared a room but when I got overwhelmed by events, I often sought absolute quiet and Nevio wasn’t the quiet type. His room was a zone of war while mine was organized and spotlessly clean. Yet, our rooms were joined by a door so we could easily visit the other.

I got ready for bed despite it being only eight, but I felt tired and preferred to read in bed.

It was nearing eleven when I realized my mind and body wouldn’t find peace any time soon. I was still too overwhelmed by the day. Outside it had gotten quieter.

I got out of bed and put on my favorite white leotard, tights, tutu and ballet shoes before I headed downstairs. Through the French doors I could see that Mom, Nino’s wife Kiara, Savio’s wife Gemma and Fabiano’s wife Leona were still talking and drinking wine. Farther down, I could also make out movement, probably the other kids.

I decided against my ballet room in the small garden house. I didn’t like to dance there when so many people were in the garden.

Instead, I headed for the basement. Dad didn’t want me to be down there. But since Nevio had figured out the code for the steel door, I often went there when I couldn’t find solitude anywhere else.

I’d always loved the dark. I sought the nooks and crevices of our mansion to hide when the world around me became too much, when the sounds and smells crowded in my brain like an avalanche, threatening to bury me beneath. On countless nights I’d roamed the sprawling tunnels and rooms beneath our mansion and the two neighboring houses. One of them belonged to Fabiano and his family and the other was mostly vacant. Dad had bought it because he didn’t want direct neighbors. My uncle Adamo and his family lived there whenever they visited Las Vegas.

Tonight, something felt different about the basement. It took my eyes a moment to get accustomed to the dark, and that’s when I realized that light was coming from somewhere farther down the hall. I followed it until I reached the first corridor below the neighbor mansion. It was illuminated. My brows puckered when I heard low voices from behind one of the doors.

Shuffling, like shoes being dragged over stone, sounded further down the corridor and I slipped into the room beside the cell. It wasn’t dark either and when I turned, I saw why. The room had a floor length window looking into the neighboring cell. Dad and Nevio were inside but they didn’t seem to see me. This was like a one-way window. I moved closer, wondering what was happening. Nevio’s hair was still wet and he was barefoot. The door to the cell opened, and Nino and Fabiano entered, dragging along a very tall but skinny man.

They shoved him to a stretcher in the center of the room, then proceeded to cuff him to it.

“Enjoy your birthday present,” Fabiano said with a shake of his head, his smile a little wrong, and left.

Nevio glanced between Dad and Nino, licking his lips. “Present?”

I shivered at the eager note in his voice.

“He’s yours to deal with,” Dad said, motioning at the man who looked terrified as his wide eyes darted between my brother and father.

Nevio laughed darkly, bent down and pulled his knives. He always carried two in leather holsters at his calves. No shoes or socks, but weapons.

I took a step back, shaking my head. What was going on?

Nevio practically leaped at the man on the stretcher, like a cat pouncing on an injured mouse, and sliced the blades in a slashing motion across his cheek. A scream rang out and I whirled around, my heart pounding, my vision becoming blurry.

I didn’t stop running until I reached a dark corridor. My breathing was labored. I tried to process what I’d seen, to understand the meaning of it all. Dad had gifted Nevio a man to deal with…

I knew Dad was feared in Las Vegas. He was Capo of the Camorra after all, but he’d always made sure I didn’t know too much about his work. Since I didn’t go to school or had contact to people outside of our world, I’d never heard the details of the rumors.

But even with my limited knowledge, I could only assume Dad had given Nevio that man so he could hurt him badly.

I counted to seventy-five before I crept back to the cell, driven by curiosity and fear alike. Dad always said we needed to face our fears or they’d control us. I slipped into the adjoining room. Goose bumps flashed across my skin when I approached the glass. Beyond it, Nevio still knelt beside the man on the stretcher but everything else had changed drastically. Blood covered Nevio’s face, clothes and the floor around him—even his feet. The man was a gruesome mess, and at first glance I was sure he was dead but then his eyes peeled open in his bloody face with the flappy skin. He was whimpering. Nevio smiled cruelly and brought the knife down on the man’s face again. An earsplitting scream rang out. I whirled around breathing raggedly. Cold sweat broke on my skin and my heart raced so fast I was sure I might have a cardiac arrest soon. I needed to check in one of the medical books in our library if it was even possible to have a cardiac arrest as a young person if you didn’t have a heart defect.

“If you always give up control like that when you torture, then you won’t get any useful information out of them,” Dad said disapprovingly.

“And an onslaught of immense pain like this in such a short period of time isn’t as torturous as dosed amounts of agony over a longer period,” Nino drawled.

I shivered.

I needed to leave. I needed to stop this. I needed…I needed.

“What is going on here?” Mom’s shrill voice pierced my ear.

“Oh fuck,” Dad muttered.

I turned to find Mom in the other cell. She looked completely disgusted, furious and terrified. She stared at Nevio with horror-widened, blue eyes. Last time I’d seen her, she’d been happy and tipsy, nothing of that remained.

He only grinned. “Dad gave me the best birthday present ever.”

Mom swallowed, disbelief reflecting on her face as if she couldn’t believe what she was seeing. Dad stalked toward her, grabbed her arm and dragged her out of the cell despite her struggling. I quickly dashed under the desk that was pressed up against the wall and huddled in the shadow it provided, making myself as small as possible.

A moment later the door swung open and banged against the stone wall. Dad dragged Mom inside. He closed the door and pressed a button on the keypad beside the door. Suddenly the sounds from the neighboring cell ceased and I assumed Nino and Nevio wouldn’t be able to hear us anymore either.

Mom ripped away from Dad’s hold. “How could you do this?” she screamed, her skin red, and tears streaming down her face. “What is wrong with you?”

I’d never heard Mom raise her voice against Dad.

She began beating her fists against his chest. “What. Is. Wrong. With. You? How could you give a twelve-year-old boy a present like that?”

Dad grabbed Mom’s wrists, his expression scary.

I didn’t understand what was going on. I’d never seen my parents fighting. I’d never seen Mom freak out like this either. She was always so calm and understanding.

“Do you really want Nevio to become as messed up as you?”

Mom! My breath hitched and I had to force myself to stay motionless.

Dad jerked Mom against his chest, smiling in a way that made my heart beat very fast. “Maybe you are blind to the truth, Angel. But I am not. Maybe you cannot see or won’t see that our son is a monster. I don’t have to turn him into one. He’s messed up and I’m trying to channel his monster before it goes rampant in a way none of us want. For fuck’s sake, look at him.”

Nevio was running the tip of his blade along the man’s belly with a curious expression.

“Stop it. Stop it now!” Mom whispered harshly.

Dad looked down at her for a long time, before his mouth set in a tight line. “Go upstairs. I’ll stop it. For today. You can’t stop who Nevio is becoming, who he has been all his life. It’s in his genes.”

“Maybe we can get help.”

“We are his help. He doesn’t need anything else. Now go up,” Dad growled.

He’d never ordered Mom around like that, and I shivered.

Mom ripped away from his hold and stormed outside. Dad released a harsh breath then he stalked out of the room. I crawled out from under the desk and stumbled to my feet then toward the keypad, pressing the button that Dad had. He appeared in the neighboring cell a moment later.

“The show is over,” he ordered.

Nevio shook his head, still hurting the man with his knives. “I’m not done yet.”

He sounded so eager, so…wrong.

Dad grabbed Nevio by the shoulder and jerked him to his feet. “I said it’s over. And you better remember who makes the laws in this house and in the West.”

Nevio stared back at Dad for a moment before he dropped the knives and nodded.

Nino pushed away from the glass and patted Nevio’s shoulder. “You need to learn when to stop, when to control yourself.”

“Control is no fun,” Nevio said with a grin.

Dad exchanged a look with Nino I didn’t understand, shaking his head. “You have to learn control.”

“Why? You don’t ever have to control yourself as Capo.”

“I don’t have to, but I do.”

He pushed Nevio out of the room while Nino went over to the bleeding man. “I’ll be back. This isn’t over yet.” Then he followed Dad and Nevio out.

I didn’t do anything but breathe for a while, then I forced my body to move. I walked out of the room and stood in the corridor until I’d counted to fifty-five before I felt capable of moving again. I should go back up to the mansion. Instead, I walked into the cell. I’d never felt sadder and more desperate than I did in this moment.

The floor of the cell was covered in blood and the knives and pliers lay in a blood puddle on the floor next to the badly injured man on the stretcher. My brother had done this. Dad and Nino had shown him how to do it.

I couldn’t understand how the people who protected and loved me were capable of this.

I took a step closer to the man and his eyes opened but one of them wasn’t all right.

His chapped, bloody lips parted, and he said something but I couldn’t understand his rasp. I walked closer, even as panic and nausea settled in the pit of my stomach. My ballet flats touched the blood and soaked it up as I stopped beside him.

“Help me,” he croaked.

I climbed up on the stretcher and perched on my knees, terrified. What could I do for him? I couldn’t help him escape. What if that hurt my family?

Tears pressed against my eyes.

The man looked pleading. “Help me please.” He sucked in a rattling breath. “Kill me.”

I froze, eyes widening.

His face tipped toward the knives that Nevio had dropped on the floor.

“Stab me,” he pleaded.

My brows furrowed as I hopped down and reached for the knife closer to me with a trembling hand. I curled my fingers around the bloody handle. The blade was coated with the man’s blood from the endless cuts Nevio had inflicted on him. I avoided looking too closely at the man’s body. I could not bear the proof of my family’s monstrosity. I stared at the sheer fabric of my tutu that was slowly turning red with the blood around me.

“Fast. Before they return,” the man rasped.

I looked up at his begging face, or what was left of it.

Tears streamed down my cheeks.

“Show mercy, girl, and kill me.”

How could killing someone be mercy?

I’d sworn to never hurt a living creature, didn’t eat meat, dairy or eggs, and here this man was asking me to end his life.

My fingers around the knife handle tightened but I could not move. Despite my revulsion, I reached out with my other hand and touched the man’s shoulder very gently. I never touched people I didn’t know. But this man needed comfort and so I had to get over my anxiety. “I can’t.” The words were broken. I moved my hand back again.

The man tried to roll over, closer to me but the cuffs held him in place. He groaned and lay back on his back.

“Then give me the knife. Don’t let me suffer.”

“I can talk to my father. He’ll spare you.”

The man cackled, and blood spilled out of his mouth. “Your father and his brothers do this every day. They torture people for business and for fun. They know no mercy.”

I’d feared it was like that after what I’d heard earlier. My heart beat faster and faster, and the pounding in my temples was close to unbearable by now. A distant whistling sound rang in my ears. I needed quiet. I needed dark. I needed sweet oblivion.

The man’s eye widened because of something at my back, and he began to shake, then cry.

“Greta,” Nino said in a careful voice.

I didn’t turn to him, only looked at the sheer terror in the man’s face, at his desperate crying. I’d never felt terror like his. Terror because of the men I loved with all my heart.

“Come down immediately,” Nino said. Then he appeared beside me. “You move an inch toward her and you’ll regret it,” he said in a very different tone, one he’d never used on me and wasn’t now. The man closed his eyes, his shoulders shaking with sobs. My own tears intensified seeing his anguish.

“Give me the knife, Greta.”

I tightened my hold, not taking my eyes off the man.

Nino reached for my hand with the knife but I shoved away from him, whirled around and backed up against the wall. I breathed harshly.

Nino’s brows furrowed. He raised his hands, palms facing my way. “I’m not going to hurt you. You know that. Give me the knife and come upstairs.” He took a step closer and I brought the blade up so it pressed against the spot beneath my ribs. I’d watched enough fight training to know this was where you aimed when you wanted to kill and I always listened when Nino explained anatomy.

Nino regarded the knife then nodded slowly. “All right.”

“What the fuck is it now?” Dad muttered, stepping in and freezing when he spotted me. The harshness slipped off his face, and his expression became one I couldn’t understand. Too many emotions flashed across his features.

More tears streamed down my face, shaking my body with their force.

Dad glanced at Nino, then at the knife in my fists, aiming at the soft spot beneath my ribs.

“What are you doing, mia cara?” His voice was gentle, like a caress. It was comfort and love. It was everything I loved.

He moved closer but I pressed the knife harder against my chest and he stopped. “What have you seen?”

I searched his eyes, and swallowed. Everything. Too much. I couldn’t say anything but he must have seen it in my eyes. Dad was good at reading others.

He looked at Nino once more, then at the man on the ground. “He deserved it, you know?”

I sobbed, shaking my head. I didn’t want to hear another word. I just wanted out, away. I wanted darkness and quiet. But I couldn’t leave now, not before I’d done what needed to be done.

Even though every word felt like shrapnel in my throat, I croaked, “Don’t hurt him anymore.”

“Why don’t you come upstairs?” Dad said, holding out his hand. He exchanged another glance with Nino, who shifted his weight. Maybe they thought I didn’t notice, but I did. I noticed everything, every little detail no matter how inconsequential. That was the problem, and now my salvation.

I backed farther away and pressed the knife into my flesh. The tip pierced my skin and I whimpered, not used to pain but willing to brave it.

Nino lifted his hands once more.

“Mia cara, drop the knife.”

“Show mercy.”

Dad regarded the man briefly and his eyes made it clear he wouldn’t. Dad never lied to me, and he didn’t now. “I won’t. Not even for you. This is something you can’t understand yet.”

The man opened his eyes and looked at me. He wanted death. “Kill him then. Just don’t hurt him anymore.”

Dad stared at me, then at the man, and his expression hardened once more. Nino shook his head, as if annoyed by the whole situation, and stalked over to the man, grabbed his head and twisted hard. I heard his neck breaking and the light leave his eyes, but with it the terror and anguish left too.

I dropped the knife with a clatter. Both Dad and Nino looked at me as if I was about to break.

I stormed out, evading Dad and ran faster than ever before. I knew these corridors by heart, even in the dark that cloaked them now. I’d roamed them too often at night in the last few years.

Light chased me as Dad and Nino tried to catch me and turned on the lamps hanging from the low ceiling. But I turned one corner after the other, never slowing.

Their calls echoed in the basement, hunting me.

Tears burned my eyes, blinding me. But I didn’t need them to see. I followed my memory until I reached the basement below Fabiano’s mansion and hid in the storage room in a big carton that was filled only halfway with discarded clothes.

I curled into a small ball and closed the box over my head.

I stared into the darkness, fighting nausea and trying to quiet the whooshing in my ears. Soon the dark and quiet took effect and my pulse slowed, and then later the whooshing in my ears settled down as well. Sweet oblivion.