CHAPTER 19 #2
“Taking control of my own life,” Gia answered flippantly as she stopped just inside the door.
“Where are Callan and Arran?”
“Alive. For now.”
“What does that mean? What are you playing at? Do you have any idea how worried Rafe has been about you?” I gasped breathlessly.
This was just getting worse. Wherever I was, whoever had pulled me from that car wreck, they had my sister too, and possibly Cal and Arran. How would I get any of us out of this? Especially when Gia seemed to be acting as if she belonged there.
“Fuck Rafe! I’m done with him. I’m done with this whole fucked up family.
I had a plan to get out…we did! Me and Mum, but you couldn’t let her go, could you?
” she spat bitterly as she looked to me with more hatred than I had ever seen from her.
“She told me…warned me. She said you’d never let her come for me.
You killed her, didn’t you? It was you! You found out about our plan. Just admit it!”
“No. Jesus, Gia. No! What plan? Our Mum was a liar and a manipulator. Whatever she told you, it was bullshit. All she wanted was money. That’s all she ever wanted – drugs, or money to buy drugs. That is all she ever cared about.”
“Shut up! You didn’t even know her! She despised you. She told me what you did to her, how you treated her! You’re the manipulative little bitch! Maybe everyone else has fallen for your act, but I know what you are.”
“You do, huh? So what’s this big plan? I assume we’re here because you decided to do it without your adoring mother at your side?” I snapped angrily.
My mother had been gone for weeks, and yet she was still there, destroying my life.
Now she had succeeded in taking my sister from me and from Rafe, with her lies and games.
I didn’t know what she had told Gia, but I could imagine, and it had obviously been very convincing because Gia seemed to be fully brainwashed by the bullshit lies.
“Do you know who your real father is, Cara?” Gia asked after seeming to take several moments to calm herself.
“What does that have to do with anything?”
“It’s actually pretty important. You see, there’s a power struggle going on over the docks Rafe believes he owns right now. The Russians and the Armenians have been fighting for each other’s turf, all in preparation for one of the families to take the docks from Rafe,” she began to lecture.
“To try and take the docks. They wont succeed,” I interrupted confidently. I knew the De Santis were still one of the most powerful families in London. Rafe had ensured that, in order to protect his family and his men as much as he could.
“That’s where you’re wrong. The Russians are going to succeed because they just got their hands on the trump card – you,” Gia sneered, almost giddy with self-satisfaction.
“Rafe won’t give up shit in return for me!”
“He will, and so will Adamian – the leader of the Armenians. They’re both going to give everything to the Russians because we’ll leave them no choice.”
“We? So you’re working with the Russians, are you?” I scoffed.
“I made a deal with them. We did – me and Mum. We sold you to Dmitri Kozlov. Mum set it up, proved to him who you were and what your significance was.”
“And who am I?” I asked, though I was pretty sure I’d already worked it out.
“You are Grigor Adamian’s daughter. He won’t risk fucking with the Russian’s once he knows that, and Rafe won’t oppose them taking the docks if we prove to him just how badly we’ll hurt you if he doesn’t.”
“The Kozlov’s are dead. They were taken out in retaliation for kidnapping you, you idiot!” I cried angrily.
“Oh, that,” she laughed. “They never kidnapped me. I was there willingly, to lure you there, but you fucked that up too.”
“I saved your fucking life!”
“My life was never in danger, you bitch! Jase would never have allowed anything to happen to me, until you shot him!” she wailed so shrill, I wanted to cover my ears.
It was clear, from her extreme reaction and the rage that came with her screamed words, that she had loved Jase, and believed that love was reciprocated.
And suddenly it all became clearer to me, why Gia’s anger towards me had escalated so rapidly since that night I thought she had been kidnapped.
She had watched me kill Jase, and whatever Isabela had led her to believe about me, had all been cemented in that instant, in her head at least, because I was the monster who killed the man she loved.
“He was a spy, planted in our family by Rafe’s enemies. He didn’t love you. I’m sorry to have to say that, but it’s true. He was playing you, Gia. He was just using you to get information on Rafe and the business,” I told her.
“He did love me and you took him from me! Just like you’ve taken everything from me!”
She stormed across the room in her heals like she had been walking in them all her life, and before I saw it coming she slapped me hard.
My body moved to retaliate, but I fought it.
I wasn’t going to hit my sister. She had been brainwashed into believing the bullshit she was spouting.
None of it was her fault. I refused to hurt her unless she gave me no other choice.
I knew personally how easily our mother could get into your head.
The woman had convinced me my loving brother would kill me, and I had believed her, even though, deep down, I had known how much Rafe had loved me as a kid.
Isabella had gotten into my head though, and I had fallen for it.
The woman had been a master manipulator and she had manipulated Gia now, too.
“Gia, they’re all using you, sweetheart. Please just listen to me. I love you. Rafe loves you. We can fix this if you stop it now,” I told her, desperate for her to listen and hear the truth in every word.
“I don’t believe a word that comes out of your lying mouth,” she hissed, then she hit me again, this time with a closed fist. She had a huge ring on her finger and it cut into my cheek.
I cried out as the hit knocked me sideways, then slammed my bound hand over my cheek as blood started to trickle from it.
“Enough!” The guy, who had stood back and just watched on until this point, called loudly.
Gia instantly stepped backwards away from me, as the guy came at me, grabbing my arm roughly and wrenching me hard from the room. All I could do was stumble after him as he dragged me along.
The small room opened out into what seemed to be some kind of empty warehouse.
The space ahead of us was vast, and even colder than the room from which I had come.
It was dark for the most part, but I could see two chairs, sat in the centre of a small area, which was illuminated by some overhead lights.
“Oh God!” I gasped as I realised Cal and Arran were tied to those metal chairs, and surrounding them were five, very clearly armed, men.
I set off running as much as I could with the pain I was in and my hands bound.
The closer I got, the more afraid I was of the amount of blood I could see on both guys.
Arran clearly had a head injury because I could see the open wound on the side of his head, and his hair was soaked in blood.
His face was bruised and he was slumped forwards as if he were unconscious.
Cal’s right ankle was sat at an odd angle and he had two huge, deep gashes on the arm I could see. There was blood dripping from a cut on his forehead, but he was awake at least and looking right at me as I raced to him. Both of them were tied by their wrists to the chairs they sat in.
“CAL!” I screamed, as I dropped to the floor before him and hesitated with my bound hands held up between us, not sure if I should touch him for fear I’d hurt him more.
He was gagged with something tied around his mouth, but he tried to speak anyway as his intense eyes met mine and tried to tell me something I was too messed up to read.
I barely been there a moment before rough hands grabbed me and dragged me away from Cal. I hadn’t even seen Arran properly. I didn’t even know if he were alive.
I screamed and fought to get free of the hands, desperate to get back to the guys, but my body was too painful and broken, and I didn’t have the strength.
I was tossed down brutally to the side, landing hard on the rough concrete ground with a grunt of pain, but as soon as those hands released me I was fighting to get up again, to get back to Arran and see if he were breathing.
This time when hands landed on me, they shoved me down so hard, my head smashed off of the ground and I was left seeing dancing black spots and fighting nausea as I pushed up to sitting again.
I could hear Cal trying to shout through the gag, but nothing of sense was coming out. I just wanted him to stop. He had a head injury too, and he’d only cause himself pain.
“Fuck me! Settle down, lover boy! They’re not going to kill her…yet,” Gia said with a smirk as she strode in. I saw the moment Cal froze and just stared at her with shock.
“Gia!” I called, my voice trembling as I fought not to throw up.
My head felt like someone was stabbing a blade through it over and over, and opening my eyes was making it worse, but I sat tall and looked to my sister with desperation.
“Please, let them go. I know…you h-hate me. I know that, but the guys…they’re your family. You love them. Let them go,” I pleaded.
“Correction. I did love them, until you got your claws into them. Now I’m just going to enjoy them being forced to watch you being ripped apart.” Gia said it so brazenly it was terrifying.
I started to think for the first time, that maybe Gia really was mentally ill. When we got her away from here, I would need to talk to Rafe about getting her some real help and maybe a diagnosis. If we could get her the help she needed, maybe we could get her back.
“Enough talking, Gianna. I think you have already said enough,” A deep, accented voice spoke, then a figure emerged from the shadows to my right.