68. Damon
CHAPTER SIXTY-EIGHT
DAMON
THEN
TWELVE YEARS AGO
I’m beginning to think Chloe’s laugh is haunting me, because despite living in a house that most get lost in, I can always hear it.
How can someone possibly be so happy that they laugh this much?
I shake off the question and get back on task.
It’s rare that Dad insists we do dirty work outside the cellar, but I didn’t argue when he demanded I carry this heavy son of a bitch up to the lawn.
Glancing up at her bedroom window, I find the curtains drawn and the lights on, telling me she’s either on the phone with one of her friends, or she’s reading one of those stupid books she always has her head in.
If it weren’t for the fact Ronan is standing beside me as I drop the unconscious asshole into the grass, I would think he was up there.
He’s still finding his footing on this side of the business, and I don’t blame him. Although he wasn’t forced to kill an innocent man on his sixteenth birthday the way I was, Dad’s trials for my brother have been far crueler.
He’s trying to toughen him up, to force the goodness he got from our mother right out of him, but so far he’s failed.
And I can only assume that’s because he has a bright light to run to whenever the darkness threatens to swallow him whole.
I shake off the thought before it can go any further.
I’ve played this game with myself often enough that I know it only leads to me craving that same kind of connection, something I can never have.
And not just because my future wife is one of the most irritating human beings I’ve ever had the misfortune of meeting.
I can never have what Ronan has with Chloe because I’ll stifle the goodness. I’ll extinguish the light with my darkness, and I’ll do it without even blinking an eye.
Not because I want to, but because I don’t know any other way to be anymore.
Little by little, my legacy has stolen the humanity from my soul, and there’s no going back to who I was before I was thrust into the darkness.
Ronan crouches beside the unconscious guy and checks the rope holding his wrists and feet to ensure he can’t run if he comes to.
Not that there’s anywhere to go.
The concrete fence that surrounds the property is too high to jump on a good day, but after two weeks of beatings and torture, he wouldn’t stand a chance.
And even if by some miracle he did get over to the other side, there’re miles of nothing but gators on this side of the property. We’d catch him and drag him back before he had a chance to breathe freedom.
Dad and Neil cross the lawn, their eyes locking on the man at our feet.
Pete here got a little greedy at the club he manages for the family and started skimming from the tills. It took us a while to figure it out, longer than it should have if I’m honest, but he’s about to pay the ultimate price for his betrayal.
“Wake him up,” Dad demands.
Ronan slaps his face a couple of times, dragging a groan from the man’s chest. He tries to roll over, but his bindings don’t let him get far.
His body stills when he remembers where he is and what has happened to him over the last couple of weeks, his eyes darting between Ronan and me like either of us can do anything to save him.
If that were an option, we would save ourselves from this life.
“Please, I’m sorry. I can give you back the money,” he pleads.
I sigh, dropping into a crouch beside my brother. “If that were the case, you wouldn’t have stolen from us. Only desperate men are stupid enough to steal from the Lombardis.”
“No, you don’t understand! They paid me to do it! It wasn’t about the money for me! They blackmailed me. Told me they would kill my family if I didn’t do as they said. I didn’t have a choice.”
This is the same story he’s been trying to spin since he first woke up in the cellar, but I’m not buying it now any more than I was the first time I heard it.
“If someone was blackmailing you to steal from us, you should have told us, and we would have dealt with it. But instead, you betrayed us. You knew what would happen when we found out, and you did it anyway.”
“Who threatened you?” Dad asks, stepping into view of the man.
“I don’t know.” He trembles. “They never gave me a name. We only ever interacted over the phone, and the one time someone came to reinforce the threat, they wore a mask. Please, I’m begging you. I’d do anything to protect my family, and they gave me no other choice.”
For a moment I think he’s considering it, but then he pulls out his gun, his finger hovering on the trigger for a beat before unloading the clip into the man’s face.
Blood and God knows what else splash over mine and Ronan’s faces, but neither of us react. It’s not the first time we’ve been covered in brain matter, and I’m certain it won’t be the last.
“Clean this up, and then I want you to go through his financials and phone records with a fine-tooth comb.”
“We’ve already done that, and there was nothing out of the ordinary,” I tell him.
“It wasn’t a request, it was an order. If you talk back to me again, I can think of a pretty redhead that could use a beating.”
The threat is delivered just to the two of us, too low for Chloe’s father to hear it, but it has the desired effect.
He knows that Ronan will do anything to keep her safe, and he’s not above using her to get his way when it comes to my brother.