22. Chapter Twenty-Two — Rome
Chapter Twenty-Two — Rome
Thump. Thump. Thump.
I drive my fists faster, pummeling the leather punching bag with everything I’ve got, until sweat runs down my temples, making my eyes sting.
Stopping momentarily to scrub my face with a towel, I start up again, silently counting in my head.
Once I reach a hundred, I count back to one.
My arms ache, my trapezius muscles bunching up so high around my ears I know for sure I’m going to be suffering the consequences of painful muscles spasms later on, but right now I don’t care.
I’ve already ran a couple of miles on the treadmill and bench pressed; all in hopes of clearing my mind and silencing the voice there, but I think it’s obvious with the way I’m punching the shit out of the rice filled bag, that my usual routine isn’t working.
My legs feel like Jello beneath me, but I don’t stop. I can’t.
Because if I do, I’ll lose it.
The past three days have been nothing short of torture.
I knew as soon as I saw the wild look in Carlotta’s eyes, the tremor in her hand and the pools of vomit on the basement floor, that something was wrong.
Something was… more… than I’d thought.
Steadying the bag with my fists, I lean forward, resting my damp forehead on the cool leather and close my eyes. Except every time I do, all I can see is Carlotta’s tear-stricken face and Cassiel’s disappointed one, staring back at me.
Both make me feel sick to my stomach in equal parts.
I’ve mentally ran through Carlotta’s initiation task a thousand times since it happened.
I was so sure everything was going to be fine.
I had to act like a bit of an asshole towards her so the other men wouldn’t get suspicious, but I gave her every bit of help I could; communicating in the mother tongue Italian all us Mafia children learn so she knew what was to come, locking Cassiel in with her for protection, giving her a gun so she didn’t have to use her bare hands to kill.
Even the prisoner, I kept him tied up too, so he couldn’t give Carlotta any chase.
Unlike my own initiation task…
It was my father’s wish, that even as his successor to the empire of The Thirteen, I was to complete a task.
The sick bastard had me running through an outdoor maze situated at the end of our garden, the hedges grown so high and so densely packed with greenery it was impossible to see over the top of them, just as twilight set, in the middle of winter, while the man I had to kill in order to pass, ran after me.
I recall vividly the way the icy cold air bite into my skin.
I was dressed nothing in a T-shirt and trousers, barefoot because I had been dragged from the clutches of sleep and the warmth of my bed to complete my task.
My breath had bubbled up in front of me, large opaque whisps, while my heart pounded so loudly in my chest cavity I couldn’t tell if it was my own pulse or the beating thrum of my opponents’ feet on the solid ground getting closer and closer.
Both of us we’re slipping and sliding across the ice slicked grass by the time we got ahold of one another, grabbling like a pair of wild animals.
Unlike Carlotta, my father hadn’t allowed me a weapon. I was faced with no choice but to kill with my hands.
I’d been twelve years old.
The boy I’d killed even younger than that.
Blinking away the tears wetting my waterline, I force myself to stand up straight, a bolt of pain bursting through my neck as I do.
I haven’t thought of that boy in years.
It used to keep me up at night; wondering what he would be doing with his life if I hadn’t taken it away from him. I prayed for his soul nightly, until my father overhead me whispering one night and beat me for it.
I never said another prayer after that.
Not until Carlotta Bellucci walked back into my life. I’ve prayed nightly ever since; for her safety, for her forgiveness, for her to return back to me.
The creak of the door to Cass and I’s home gym drags me from my thoughts. I glance up, my heart jumping to the base of my throat when I see him.
“How long have you been at it?” Cass asks, tipping his head towards the limp looking punching bag.
I peer at my smart watch. “A few hours. I couldn’t sleep.”
Cass smiles softly at me, although it doesn’t quite meet the corners of his pretty hazel eyes. “Come upstairs. I’ll make us some breakfast and then we can talk, alright?”
He disappears before I can answer, leaving me to tidy away the gym equipment strewn across the floor—a frayed jump rope, boxing gloves, an extra twenty-pound weight I’d been deadlifting before I’d hopped on the treadmill instead, hoping running would help clear my mind.
It hadn’t.
Calves aching in protest, I trudge up the stairs to the ground floor, meandering towards the kitchen, using the smell of frying bacon to guide me.
I find Cassiel in his usual spot—standing at the stove, cooking while he hums a song beneath his breath. If I close my eyes, it’s like nothing is out of the usual. Me, getting up early to work out my demons, him preparing breakfast for the two of us…
But everything has changed.
The energy around us is different; charged with unanswered questions and sparks of anger.
Rounding the island, I press my hips into his.
“Can I kiss you?”
Cass nods, metal tongs still in hand to flip over the bacon as he tilts his head down an inch to accept my kiss.
My breath leaves my lungs on a whoosh when we part.
Thank fuck.
“I was worried—”
“Sit down and we’ll talk, okay?”
I do as Cass asks, grabbing the freshly made smoothie in front of me and swallowing half of it down in one gulp.
The toaster pops, revealing four bagel slices, which Cassiel spreads butter over before topping each of them with three rashers of perfectly cooked bacon.
Pushing my plate towards me, he takes the barstool across from me and rips off a corner of his own breakfast, chewing slowly.
I swallow another mouthful of smoothie while my stomach flips uneasily.
“Cass—”
“She’s never held a gun before.”
“What?”
“Lottie. She told me… well, she said she’d held a gun at the range once or twice, but then her mother found out and forbade her. She’s never had any training. I’m not even sure she’d really know what to do with a knife if you gave it to her.”
My heart drops past my stomach.
“But Cristiano…”
Cass shrugs his broad shoulders, making his dark henley stretch to its limits. He fishes out a piece of not-quite blended strawberry from on top of his own breakfast smoothie and pops it inside his mouth.
“I’m starting to wonder if Lottie’s home life was anything like Cristi’s at all.
They might have lived under the same roof, but did the same rules apply to each of them?
Lottie doesn’t know how to hold a gun, but she can tell you exactly how to lay a tablescape for fifteen men.
What does that say about her upbringing, hm? ”
I swallow thickly, my tongue sticking the ridged roof of my mouth.
This can’t be fucking happening.
Have I miscalculated?
I’m a Folonari, for fuck sake’s—we don’t get things wrong.
But Cass is right. Something isn’t matching up; I just can’t quite figure out what.
“How… how is she?”
“You want the honest answer?”
I nod.
“Not good, Rome.”
The fruit smoothie I’d downed threatens to come back up, but I force it back down.
This is all my fault.
“She told me she’d never killed a man before.”
Resting my elbows on the cold, marble countertop, I grasp my head in my hands, tugging tightly on my brunette strands until my scalp burns. “Shit.”
“My thoughts exactly.”
This wasn’t supposed to happen this way.
“I didn’t mean… fucking hell. What the hell have I done?”
I peer at Cass, cataloguing the pinch of his lips.
Tugging at the collar of his Henley, he wraps a hand around the back of his neck, exposing a bruised love bite at the bottom of his throat I hadn’t noticed before.
I don’t know why I’m surprised or why my stomach concaves like I’ve been punched in the gut.
I knew they’d most likely sleep together when Cass text me to say he was spending the next couple of nights.
Plus, I don’t really have a leg to stand on, seeing as I’ve been spending time with Carlotta alone within club Nameless, while Cass stood outside night after night with a serious case of blue balls.
A large hand reaches for mine across the marble countertop, intertwining our fingers.
“Look, I’m not mad at you, Rome.” Cass shakes his head.
“Not anymore, at least. I know why you did it—because you had to. I know who you are and what that means. But… Carlotta doesn’t and if you don’t tell her soon…
you’re only going to push her away further. ”
I wet my dry lips. “I know.”
“You have to tell her the truth. She deserves to know, Ro.”
“I know she does, I’m just…”
Cassiel squeezes my wrist. “I get it. I do. But the longer you leave it, the more questions she’s going to have.”
Bobbing my head in agreement, I reach for a buttered bagel half. Ripping into it with my teeth, I mumble around the dough. “How pissed is she?”
“I think this speaks for itself.” Cassiel scrubs the calloused pad of his thumb over the three lines marring my cheek. They’ve scabbed over nicely, I don’t think they’ll scar, but for now they’re serving as a reminder for Carlotta Bellucci’s anger every time I catch a glimpse of myself.
“Is she pissed at you?”
“She was. A little.” Cass smirks. “But I fucked it out of her.”
My brows raise, the first smile that has graced my lips in days dancing across my mouth. “And she let you? No biting and scratching involved?”
“I wouldn’t go that far,” Cass laughs loudly, knocking my feet from the bottommost rung of the barstool with one of his own. “I told her about the two of us, you know?”
I glance at him over the top of my glass, unable to hide my surprise. I knew one of us had to tell her eventually, but I just always pictured it being Cass and I at the same time…
“And?”
“And nothing.” Cass chows down on his last bacon rasher, sucking every inch of the grease from his fingertips.
My cock kicks within my sweatpants at the sight, wondering if the sweet taste of Carlotta still lingers there.
“She wanted to know if me and her sleeping together would cause issues with us.”
“Us?”
Cass nods, supping his smoothie slowly.
“She’s too sweet,” I say, swallowing the phantom taste of her on the back of my tongue.
“She’s the perfect amount of sweet,” Cassiel counters. “For us, anyway. And I plan on making sure Lottie stays that way. If that means staining my hands in even more blood, then so be it. Don’t you agree”
“You mean like killing Alex for her?”
Of course I fucking know he was the one to pull the final shot. As if I couldn’t tell when I walked inside the basement and saw the truth embedded into that face of his that I can read so well.
“Yeah,” Cass answers without a single hesitation, not bothering to deny it. “You’re telling me you wouldn’t have done the same thing?”
“Of course I would. I’d do anything for Carlotta, including putting my own neck on the line.”
Rising to his full height, Cass rounds the space until we’re nose to nose. “Glad to know we’re on the same page. Love you.”
“Love you too.” I press my lips to his, tangling our tongues together when Cass parts his lips on a whimper. He tastes of fresh berries, bacon, and our girl all wrapped in one and I can’t get enough.
“I can taste her on your tongue. Did you eat her out before you left her bed this morning?”
Cass pulls away to laugh. “What do you think?”
“I think you’re a lucky son of a bitch…”
Smirking, Cassiel nips at the base of my throat, laving his hot tongue over the spot he just bit.
“The quicker you say sorry, and she accepts your apology, the quicker we can share her. Together. God, just the thought has me fucking rock hard.” I watch him reach down to squeeze himself, feeling my own dick thicken, balls drawing upwards.
Shaking my head, I bump him out of the way to take our empty dishes to the sink. “I can’t believe you even left her bed.”
“She had to go to work.”
I glance at him over my shoulder as I fill the sink with warm water and a squirt of dish soap. “When are you seeing her again?”
“Friday. I’m gonna take her out for food.”
“Does Carlotta know this?”
“No. But I’m sure I’ll be able to persuade her some way or another.” Cass places a smooth kiss to my temple. “Which will leave you with just enough time to figure out how you’re going to apologize to her and how you’re going to tell her the truth about who you really are. Deal?”
“Deal,” I grumble, the cogs in my head beginning to whir.