Chapter 24 Gia
TWENTY-FOUR
GIA
Gia’s power thrummed, roiling in response to her shock. Where the hell had Franco come from? Had he followed her here?
A man Gia recognized ran from the burning building, pulling another along with him. “Everyone’s out!” he shouted.
They’d been in the house?
Franco didn’t acknowledge the man’s words. All his attention was on Gia, his eyes glowing orange as they had in all the memories he’d erased.
Gia’s pulse thudded, anger at what he’d done consuming her. “I was a child.” The words tore from her in a snarl.
Franco sauntered closer, Salvator falling into step beside him. “But you aren’t now.”
So, he wasn’t feigning ignorance over what she was talking about. It was all out in the open.
Gia’s vision tunneled. Not even the growing flames consuming the house penetrated her focus. She saw nothing but Franco’s glowing eyes.
Harnessing her power, she slashed a hand through the air. Blood bloomed across Franco’s face as a gash opened from his ear to his chin, splitting his lips.
He smiled a gruesome, lopsided smile as blood covered his teeth and steamed down his neck. His sickening laugh filled the air, and the bleeding slowed to a stop, his mouth knitting back together.
A chill wound through Gia.
Franco wiped his face with the cuff of his suit jacket. “I’m impressed, Gianna. Good for you. I never guessed you’d have such fight in you. Such willpower. Perhaps weakening you was a mistake.”
“You’re a bastard for making her sick along with everything else,” Aurora shouted.
She grabbed Aurora’s hand, holding her firmly in place. Franco wouldn’t get his hands on her. She’d make sure of it.
Franco made a dismissive gesture. “We had to explain the memory loss somehow. But it doesn’t have to be that way anymore. I see now that I may have”—his eyes narrowed—“miscalculated. Come home, Gia. Sit at my side. You are my fiercest enforcer, after all.”
“Gia, please.” Marc had joined them without her noticing. He took a step closer, and Franco held out a hand to stop him.
Gia’s eyes stung, but she didn’t let the pained look in Marc’s face sway her. “How can you stand by him?”
Marc’s posture straightened. “It’s who we are, G. I had to be ready to take over—”
“Are you an idiot? Take over? Marc, he’s a vampire. There will be no taking over. You’ll grow old and die, and Franco will still be scheming away.”
Marc’s face paled. “Vampire?” He whirled on Franco. “You said it was magic. Vampires aren’t real.”
He didn’t know the truth? Franco had lied to him, too?
Of course, he’d lied. Marc might not have gone along with everything if he’d known he’d never inherit the kingdom.
Wanting the empire for himself wasn’t an excuse for all he’d watched Franco do.
Even if Marc hadn’t known everything, he’d known enough.
Their mother’s murder. Franco’s control over Gia’s power.
He’d been present in more than a few of her erased memories.
“Marc, now is not the time,” Franco snapped. Marc’s face twisted in anger, but Franco didn’t seem to notice. “What do you say, Gianna? Come home and take a place by my side. I should have given it to you when you turned eighteen. Let’s make up for it.”
Gia sent her magic cutting through the air and hit Franco in the chest, slicing through his suit to gouge into his chest. “You killed my mother. I’ll never stand beside you.”
Franco clenched a fist, and more men gathered around him. There were almost a dozen, including Marc and Salvator. All of them had been privy to Franco’s manipulation, present in the nightmares he’d erased. But they were all human. Gia’s magic confirmed it.
Humans weren’t a problem. She could deal with them as she’d done many times before, and this time, she’d be striking against people who had hurt her, not Franco’s enemies. All she needed to do was get close enough to rip out Franco’s heart, and if anyone retaliated, she’d flay them open.
Franco’s glowing eyes flared. “Look at me,” he said at the same time as Aurora yelled, “Gia, look away!”
She tugged frantically on Gia’s hand, but Gia’s gaze was locked on Franco, and she couldn’t pry it away.
Ice filled her veins.
“Step away from the young woman and come here,” Franco commanded, his voice silky smooth.
Gia obeyed, dropping Aurora’s hand, and approached Franco at an unhurried pace.
No! She barely kept the scream from passing her lips. Aurora might have been freed, but Gia was as much a prisoner as she’d always been. Franco could wipe all her newfound knowledge from her brain, take her home, and she’d never know any of this had happened.
Her magic thrashed inside her, and she could hardly think. She should have seen this coming, but Franco had appeared out of nowhere. She was supposed to have time to prepare for this confrontation, time to ask how to combat hypnosis.
She reached for Aurora. Not with a hand—she couldn’t control her body—but with her magic.
Help.
Aurora’s power responded, wrapping around Gia in a feeling more secure than anything she could remember.
“Call on your power and repeat after me.” Franco sounded bored as he began the spell for an explosion.
Gia’s heart skipped. Aurora was following too closely behind her. An explosive spell would kill her.
Gia’s lips moved, and she was powerless to stop them. She longed to scream. To say anything other than the spell that would hurt the woman she was growing to love.
The last word of the spell tasted like acid, and Gia braced herself.
Nothing happened.
But she’d said the words. Why hadn’t her magic responded? She’d called on it—she’d been forced to—but, she now realized, it hadn’t come as requested.
“What the Devil?” Franco yelled, rushing forward and grabbing her arm. His eyes flared brighter. “Call on your magic and hand over control. Allow me to wield it. Speak as I speak. Act as if we are one.”
Gia’s head swam with the commands. She called on her power, but Aurora held it hostage. The tight squeeze was unmistakable now. It constricted, keeping her magic grounded. Keeping it from Franco.
She’d given Aurora permission to channel her, and it seemed her hold was more powerful than anything Franco could command.
“You can’t have her.” Aurora’s voice was calm and threatening.
“Witch,” Franco snarled, spit flying. “Salvator, kill her.”
Before anyone could move, the men were blasted backward.
Gia wanted nothing more than to tear her gaze away from Franco’s glowing eyes and see what Aurora was doing behind her, but she couldn’t.
Franco growled and shook Gia violently. “Damn you! Why isn’t this working?” He fixated on something behind her. “Look at me, witch.”
“Make me, vamp,” Aurora spat.
“Gia, stun her,” he commanded.
The words passed Gia’s lips, her arm reaching for Aurora as if it were someone else’s, but her magic was locked down, and the spell came to nothing.
Franco roared, his fangs descending as his grip on her tightened past bruising to near bone-shattering.
“Let her go!” Aurora shouted. “Walk away, and maybe I won’t kill you.”
“Kill me?” Franco scoffed. “You can’t kill me.”
Aurora clutched the back of Gia’s neck, her palm growing hot at the contact. “I can, and I will,” she snarled. “Now, let Gia go.”
Gia’s magic surged, escaping Aurora’s tight hold to flow through her once more. Had Aurora’s concentration broken? Gia’s heart thundered, sweat breaking out on her brow. She didn’t want control of her magic. Aurora had to keep it safe.
Franco’s hypnotic link to her flared, and her magic latched onto it. Franco’s face twisted in pain, and he screamed.
Gia stared in shock.
“Let her go,” Aurora commanded as she directed Gia’s power, pushing it further into the link between Gia and Franco.
Franco inhaled through his nose, gritting his teeth against the pain. “Fuck you.”
The smell of burning flesh met Gia’s nose, and she recoiled. Was her magic doing that? Was Aurora using the connection created by his command to burn him like she’d burned the binding?
Yes. That’s exactly what she was doing. Gia shook, nearly overwhelmed by her magic’s ferocity. “Let me go, Franco, or my magic will burn you alive.”
He snarled, his eyes flaring red. “Stop what you’re doing,” he commanded.
But Gia couldn’t stop because she wasn’t doing anything. Aurora was in charge, and Franco was giving her an easy path to destroying him by keeping her under his thrall.
“I said stop!” With an animalistic screech, Franco threw Gia to the side and lunged for Aurora, but her eyes were clamped shut to keep Franco’s hypnosis at bay.
A gunshot went off. Someone screamed. Gia whirled around in time to see Viv tackling the man nearest them, his handgun flying across the grass.
Franco grabbed Aurora, and they fell to the ground as he tried to pry her eyelids open. She thrashed beneath him, screaming, but didn’t release her hold on Gia’s magic.
“Stop, Franco!” Gia yelled.
Marc appeared at her side. “Father, listen to her! Please.”
Franco’s skin began to smoke. He pushed Aurora away, staggered to his feet, and lunged for Gia instead.
“Kill her!” he roared, his breaths growing short. “Stop her.” This time, the words were nothing more than a gasp, and everyone around them looked aghast at Franco’s fallibility.
The light in his eyes faded as Gia’s magic burned him from the inside out and he slumped to the ground, unmoving.
This was the only death Gia wouldn’t feel guilty about.
She’d killed so many people for him, and even though she’d had no choice, she carried the pain of their deaths.
She’d give anything to undo it. But this?
This was earned. It was a fitting end for Franco Balzano and she was relieved it was over.
Salvator turned and ran, the others following without a backward glance.
“He’s dead, right?” Gia asked.
“We might need to toss him in the actual fire,” Aurora said in her ear, almost apologetic.
When had she come so close? Her arm wrapped around Gia, and she gestured to the burning house.
“I don’t know if magic can burn thoroughly enough to prevent him from regenerating. His body is still intact, after all.”
Viv appeared at their side. “Yeah, you’re gonna need that extra step if you don’t want him waking up.”
“Where the fuck have you been?” Aurora asked her.
“Someone snapped my neck, and it took a hot minute to heal. Sorry.” The last word dripped with sarcasm.
Aurora seemed mollified. “At least you’re okay.”
Viv shrugged and pointed at Franco. “What’s the verdict with this one?”
“Toss him on the fire,” Gia said, her voice oddly distant, even to herself.
Viv hummed agreeably. “Gotcha. Look away if you don’t want to watch.”
Gia didn’t bother. Out of all the horrible things she’d seen, she needed this. She had to know it was over, so she watched as Viv threw Franco’s body into the fire consuming the house.
The Thornfields seemed to have fled along with Franco’s men, except for the ones who’d been killed. Bodies littered the lawn, and fire burned in the distant trees. It was a hellscape. Only Marc remained, staring blankly at the burning building. At his father, Gia supposed.
Franco might not have been her birth father, but he had raised her, and now, he was gone. The price for what he’d done to Letti and Jeffrey was paid at last.
Exhaustion overwhelmed Gia. She was ready for the day to be done. To move on to something better.