Chapter 9
Valentina
Six Months Later
Glass and steel reek of obscene money. Security cameras blink red in the corners, monitoring everyone and everything. Guards make their presence known. The scent of lilies and polished stone fills the space, clean and perfect.
It makes sense that Sean bought his penthouse here. The new Chicago building sold out almost instantly. It screams O'Malley arrogance and Marino power.
"Happy birthday to you!" a group sings, then clapping fills the air. I turn toward the coffee shop, and a millennial woman with blue hair and green eyes grins. She blows out candles on a cake.
Nausea rolls through me as soon as the flames go out and smoke swirls upward. Six months later, I still smell burning flesh when I close my eyes.
Mine.
His.
The V stained into my flesh still has faint pink remnants, unfaded against the parts that have turned white. Every time I look in the mirror, fresh shame floods me.
Time doesn't soften anything. I keep moving, hoping the memories will turn into muted ghosts I can peacefully live with, but it's only a wish that never comes true.
The doors open, and a gust of wind blows through the lobby. The faintest smell of blown-out candles tortures me. Another round of nausea hits, and I press my hand to my stomach.
The scar on my stomach pulls and throbs. I wince and move to the corner of the lobby, then lean against the window. I close my eyes, forcing myself not to leave.
The elevator bank glows at the far end, four sets of doors framed in brushed gold. My heart bangs against the V burned into my skin.
I came to see Zara. I brought a baby gift for her since I couldn't go to her shower.
Another ache tugs at my heart. I'd have given anything to get an invitation, even though I know it isn't possible.
It's not Zara's fault. Some things will never change, no matter how hard you try. So I remind myself it is what it is, and at least Zara doesn't hold the past against me. And that's the one good thing I have in the hell I'm surviving in.
Barely.
I shake off the pain in my torso, a flashback of the branding ceremony when the hot metal got pressed into my chest.
It wasn't the first time I got branded. I have the skull on the back of my neck, just like Zara does, only mine is red, as hers is pink.
I wanted that skull, I remind myself.
I blink hard and take deep breaths.
The gust of wind hits. I glance toward the doors and freeze.
Zara's father, Luca Marino, steps through the lobby doors like he owns the building, the city, hell, the whole damn world. His black coat flares around his legs as he takes one power step after another.
My pulse skyrockets. Shit!
The years have carved deeper lines into his face, silver threads through his dark hair at his temples, but I would know him anywhere.
Luca's my mother's brother and my uncle. He's the man I adored before I could talk. And I loved him. But that was before I knew what bloodshed and betrayal meant.
I shouldn't be here. Not right now. I duck behind a column, then study him, trying to push more emotions away.
He stops to greet the guards, then comes closer.
I pull deeper into the shadow. My lungs refuse to cooperate. He stands next to the elevator and exhales slowly like he's already tired of whatever fight waits upstairs.
The tiny scar on his cheek catches the chandelier's light.
He didn't have that when I was little. Back then, his skin was smooth, his eyes mischievous, his smile warm and wide.
My Luca brought pastries and candies and whispered stories in Italian that made me giggle under my blankets when I was supposed to be asleep.
Now, his mouth is a flat line. His eyes scan the lobby with the detached, lethal focus of a man who's ordered more hits than hugs.
I angle my face and press my nails into my palms.
Why can't you still love me?
The thought hits me with a punch. I blink harder, then wipe under my eye.
He adjusts the cuff of his shirt, revealing the edge of a watch that costs more than most people make in a year. Then he unbuttons his coat and makes small talk with another guard.
The elevator doors slide open, and he steps inside. The doors begin to close. Luca's shoulders straighten, his expression hardening as if he's bracing himself for impact.
The gold metal doors shut tight, and another flashback haunts me. It's the last time I saw him in person. I was four, maybe five, clutching a stuffed rabbit in an Italian villa while my parents screamed in the other room.
"You can't trust him, Valentina. He's using you. He's using all of us," my father declared.
Mom insisted, "He's family. He would never do that to us."
My phone vibrates. I pull it out of my pocket and read the text message.
Cassian: Luca, alert! Do not go inside Zara's!
Anger spools, and I bang my fingers across the screen.
Me: I should have known that ten minutes ago.
Cassian: Apologies.
I stare at the screen, fuming. There should never be a time when I don't know if I'm in danger. Luca, seeing me, represents the highest threat.
I need to talk to Kirill about replacing Cassian. He's making too many dangerous mistakes.
I should have predicted Luca would come based on Zara's texts this morning.
Zara: I think my father knows something is up. And Sean's uncles, too. We're both getting the nonstop questions on all sides.
I asked Cassian if I was in the clear.
Did he lie?
He's just incompetent.
Is he? For two years, he made no mistakes.
I press the back of my skull against the marble and stare at the elevator numbers as they tick upward.
Ten.
Eleven.
Twelve.
My throat burns.
When I was a child, Luca was my world. He smelled like espresso, expensive cologne, and the slightest hint of cigar smoke blended into Scotch. He taught me how to swim without fear, to hide so I wouldn't get caught, and how to keep my mouth shut when it was important.
He used to call me Stellina, meaning his little star.
Then the war between the Marinos and the Abruzzos went from simmering to volcanic, and everything caught fire.
My father was Abruzzo. My mother was Marino. They thought love would be enough, and my father even kept Luca's infiltration into the Abruzzo clan a secret, knowing how much my mother loved her brother.
It was my father's greatest hope that the wars would stop and children could grow up in both families without further bloodshed.
But it wasn't that easy. Luca had slipped into the Abruzzo world as a spy. My mother met my father by mistake, and Luca had to explain his role which didn't make my mother stop seeing my father. It was out of necessity that my mother lied to my father about who they really were.
But my father found out. Instead of turning them in to his family, he kept their secret. It was my love for my mother that made my father view the world and his family politics differently.
So Luca smiled at my father's table, drank his Scotch, and held me on his knee. All the while, he reported everything back to his own family.
My father knew it, yet he hoped things would change. When he realized how bad things were getting, how close the Marino fire was to swallowing us whole, he moved us to Italy.
We got a new house and a new set of rules. Instead of calling me Finzia, my parents insisted I use my middle name, Valentina. My father changed our last name, and no one was to know we were Marinos or Abruzzos.
I didn't understand then, but I do now.
Luca hated my father for "stealing" his sister. My father hated the Marinos for using Luca as a weapon. The only thing they agreed on was that the streets were eating all of us alive.
So my father joined the Underworld. He bought into the promise they sold him. He craved a neutral ground, shared power, and a table where Abruzzos and Marinos and every other rival name would sit side by side, sworn to work together. It was the only way I would survive since I had both blood in me.
So my parents earned their seats. They bled for them, vowed loyalty, and within a month, their plane "malfunctioned" and fell out of the sky.
They never determined whether it was engine failure, pilot error, or bad weather. You can pick whichever lie you want. It doesn't change that the only thing left of my parents came back in charred boxes and folded flags.
The only true question is whether it was the Abruzzos or the Marinos who orchestrated it.
My eyes sting. I blink hard and drag air into my lungs until my vision clears.
That's why my seat at the table matters.
It's why I've swallowed everything the Omni has fed me.
I took their punishments without arguing and survived their tests.
Once I claim what my parents died for, maybe I can finally drag these families into something that isn't constant bloodshed and retribution.
Seeing Luca makes everything raw. I'm a reminder of the Abruzzo man who "ruined" his sister's life. I'm the product of a marriage he never approved of, and I stepped into the Underworld, refusing to take the Marino side.
And Luca knows about the Underworld. My father gave him the chance to join them, but he wouldn't. Somehow, Luca escaped the wrath from the Omni no one else does. You don't learn of the Underworld and refuse to pledge without dying.
He preferred to keep the war. If he didn't, he would have chosen the Underworld. So he'll say I'm dangerous, unstable, manipulative. He'll tell Zara I'll hurt her.
I won't. Zara has become the sister I never had.
She curses too loudly, laughs too hard, and loves too fiercely. She'd throw herself in front of a bullet for Sean without thinking. But I know she'd also do the same thing for me.
So, I would die before letting anything happen to her.
But Luca won't ever choose to believe it. In his story, there are only Marinos and everyone else. So he'll continue to paint me as a threat Zara needs to cut out of her life if she wants to survive.