Chapter 22

TWENTY-TWO

“Holy shit, looks like I really am a matchmaker,” the sadistic woman cackles, robbing us of our moment. “I have to tell you both, when I woke up this morning, I knew it’d be a good day. I just knew that having you two here would be fun, but this?” the anonymous woman drags as she throws her leather gloved hand up in the air, as if she’s signaling for something behind her. “This is fucking gold. It’s not every day you witness two people whose fate actually aligns with their own desire. It’s incredible. I just hope you two are prepared to fully comprehend what your fate entails.”

Raiden’s ass pokes at my groin before she breaks my hold, increasing the space between us. “Please, enlighten us,” she probes.

“Very well,” the woman bows her head in acknowledgment. “Now, what you’re about to see is a little…bloody.” The woman must find her warning amusing, because as the doors open behind her, revealing two giant, masked men, her laughter reaches a deafening crescendo.

“Remember you two, as long as you follow the rules, I won’t hurt a single hair on either of your heads. However, I can’t say the same for him.”

Muffled cries sound from the other side of the glass. Both of our attention is glued to whatever is being dragged between the two men.

“Bring him over here,” the woman instructs, pointing.

A lump lodges itself in my throat as my brother’s bound body fills my gaze as the woman’s two associates drop him to the ground. The gag stuffed in his mouth does little to stifle his moaning. His bruised, bloodied body flails as one man kicks him in the ribs, with the other one following suit until they find a sick rhythm, taking turns driving harsh kicks into his body.

The dryness in my throat is exacerbated by my racing heart as I watch my brother get the shit beat out of him. Even from what my peripheral allows me to see of Raiden near my side, she stands uncertain of what to say or do as the two men take turns inflicting pain on him. However, it’s not lost on me that neither of us yelp out for them to stop or try to grab the woman’s attention and berate her with questions. We both know that my brother, though perpetually poised and always presenting himself like the good guy, isn’t. Call it a hunch or the byproduct of what happens when you live in someone’s shadow for as long as I have, but either way, this scene before me–which should ignite a level of compassion for my own flesh and blood–does nothing but add to the growing suspicion I’ve had since Brett took over Cromwell Corp. that he’s up to something that’s responsible for why we’re here.

“Enough,” the woman exclaims, her gloved hand lifted, signaling them to stop. And immediately they do, taking their places in the corner of the room.

The woman races over to Brett and, with an undeniable amount of strength, lifts his bound body up, throwing him against the glass. Her gloved hand slithers to his mouth, ripping the gag out as he gasps, trying to catch his breath.

“Brett?” His name is a question on my lips.

“Crazy fucking bitch,” he spits, but he’s not talking to the woman who has him in her clutches. He’s looking at Raiden. “This is all your fucking fault. I should’ve killed you when I had the chance.” He spits, saliva dripping down the glass.

Raiden chuckles. “Oh, please, as if you’re capable of killing someone. You don’t have the stamina for it,” her scoff quickly blossoms into a challenge.

Flustered, Brett mutters inaudibly to himself, unable to formulate a response.

“My point exactly. You don’t have the stamina to last more than a fucking minute, just like you don’t know how to think on your feet to even respond to my insult. What’s the matter, Brett? Can’t think for yourself if daddy isn’t here to boss you around like the pathetic fucking minion you are?” Raiden spews.

“Oh boy” the woman interjects, lowering her mouth to Brett’s ear. “Are you going to tell them, or do I have to?”

“Yeah, yeah,” my brother begrudgingly mumbles before shooting his blue irises my way. “What’s the matter, brother? She put a spell on your dick, so you don’t know how to fight for me?” The venom in his voice is just as palpable as the audacity of his question to me.

Resentment settling in my veins, intensifying the rage that has been marinating within me. Ha, fight for him? Why? When did he ever fight for me when our father used to beat the shit out of me for simply being in his way? Where was he when I tried standing up to our sorry excuse of a sperm donor, begging him to stop hurting our mom? Where the fuck was he then? He was nowhere. Too damn busy living on the pedestal dad gave him simply because he was the firstborn.

“Damn, she’s really got you so whipped that you can’t even talk to me?” Every word leaking out of him is not only provoking me but summoning something that I’ve spent years repressing in the fear that I’ll say something that I can’t come back from. So, with every smug remark that I’m shocked he’s able to still spew from his battered body, he’s tempting me more to unleash on him like I’ve wanted to for so long. “You do know that she was sent to kill you. Or were you too busy daydreaming about the pussy that belonged to me, to realize that.”

“Liar!” Raiden shouts. “You’re fucking lying and you know it.”

“Ah, ah, ah,” the woman reprimands Raiden. “Let the man finish.”

My jaw tenses as I stare at my brother, feeling nothing but disdain for him. I know he’s lying because he can’t wipe that Cheshire grin from his face. Mom used to scold him constantly for it when we were younger.

“¿Por qué te ríes cada vez que mientes hijo?” she would say. My Spanish may be horrible, but I had that memorized because she said it all the time. And like the arrogant fuck he’s always been, he never listened and continued to laugh only when he lied.

“You’re lying,” I proclaim.

“Last chance,” the woman spews, rattling him within her grip. “You tell him, or I do.”

Brett hangs his head now laughing, making me want to break through the glass and punch him.

“Tell me fucking what?” I roar, cueing Brett’s laughter to increase.

“Very well,” the woman says, exasperated. Brett’s gag is reinstated. His groaning beneath the thick, dirtied cloth is a nuisance to my ears, but I’ll take it over hearing him talk in circles. She motions to one of her henchmen to get a chair for Brett, and he’s forcefully placed in it as her heels click, moving herself out of immediate view.

“I know you two have questions and these flash drives that you stole for Mr. Moretti hold not only the final piece to this fucked-up puzzle you two have stumbled into—” the anonymous woman walks back to face us through the glass but is cut off by Raiden grumbling.

“That we were kidnapped into,” Raiden interjects to correct.

I reach for her hand, the delicate pad of her palm frigid to my touch. I latch on, muttering beneath my breath. “Let her finish,” I instruct, to which she scoffs–as I expected–but the subtle smirk that falls from her lips is undeniable and even better…she listens to me.

“As I was saying, these flash drives contain important documents. Ones that Alistair Cromwell—” the woman stops, doing the sign of the cross in mockery, “may he rot in the hundred fucking pieces we had him chopped into—wanted hidden when he went to jail. Problem was, his secret wasn’t that much of a secret at all, and once Brett over here got wind of that, he couldn’t let it come out. Isn’t that, right?” she asks in jest, fully aware that Brett’s gagged mouth can’t respond.

“What’s that, Brett? I can’t hear you. Take the gag out,” she shouts back as one of the men in the corner charges Brett and yanks the cloth from between his lips.

He gasps. “She’s fucking lying!” Brett yelps, rocking back and forth in the chair he’s tied to.

“Go ahead, Bretty boy, shake that shit all you want, you aren’t going anywhere,” the woman laughs, reaching for something at her waist.

His words are clipped by one of the masked helpers lunging toward him with a silencer screwed onto the barrel now pressed against his temple. The disdain and hatred vanishes, and in its place come the hollow whimpers of a man–that I was forced to call my family–pleading for his life. “Please,” he begs, Adam’s apple bobbing frantically at the column of his throat, but all his words do is earn him another barrel, this one sans silencer, grazing his other temple.

“Jealousy doesn’t suit you,” the woman shouts, lowering herself to his ear. He winces. “Neither does hiring a hitman to do your dirty work,” she adds, swinging her head back to the man that took the flash drive. “Play it.”

The beam of a projector appears behind Brett and the woman. Grainy footage of our house shows first before it speeds up, filtering through every room, until the dining room appears. Raiden, or Sally as I knew her then, sits at the table, her blonde wig on, next to Brett as he gets up to excuse himself on a phone call. All I can do is stare at the look in Raiden’s eyes as she shoots her seductive stare my way. But it’s not our heated interaction that fills the speakers. It’s Brett’s voice. “He needs to go away. No, I mean permanently go away. I’m not sharing the fortune that’s meant for Cromwell blood with a fucking bastard. I’ll pay you whatever you want, but I want Colson Demonio in the ground. Reunite him with his father and that cheating whore of a mother of ours.”

Fate slaps me in the face as the betrayal sinks in, and as I keep my focus on the documents projected before us, I notice a small emblem on the header. Goosebumps invade my skin, thinking back to the last time I sat with my mother in her library. She had her pendant on that she always wore but hid beneath her shirt whenever my father was around. But that day she was playing with it in her hand. Tears lined her eyes, but I didn’t ask her why. I just sat with her and watched her lament over whatever was upsetting her.

But her pendant. Oval with diamonds surrounding the etching of a cross in the middle of a field of hibiscus flowers, or as my mother called them, flor de maga – the flower of Puerto Rico.

The emblem before me matches my mother’s necklace. The only difference is that there’s a half devil’s mask draped over the cross and the name ‘Demonio’ across the image.

It’s a family crest.

I look at Brett, who looks like he has seen a ghost, but the footage and audio go away. All that remains are two documents. A birth certificate, with my birth date and Demonio in the last name space…not Cromwell. And an agreement between Gregor Demonio and Victor Ramos promising Raiden Ramos to Colson Demonio–Gregor’s only child and heir to the Demonio fortune and crime family.

The etching on the mask from before assaults my mind.

C. Demonio.

And what Raiden said, before, that I’m the key.

C. Demonio.

Colson Demonio…her devil…her curse…her fate.

She was promised to me.

Always meant to be mine.