2. Massimo
2
MASSIMO
T he house felt cold. It was more than a temperature thing. It was like the entirety of the place was waiting to exhale a cold whirlwind of bullshit onto our laps. Almost like a storm was coming.
The fucking Arctic, yet still the ninth level of Hell.
That was our home.
Hell. We’d dubbed it that long ago.
I watched my twin brothers Renzo and Roman from my chair as they threw a knives at the wall, both aiming for the tiny speck in the paint. It was a dangerous game they played, sometimes spilling blood, sometimes trying trick shots to one up the other. Their laughter had started to grate on my nerves the last few hours. They tended to get annoying when they weren’t spilling the blood of others. I think they often got bored and annoyed too because then they would cut one another like a couple of fucking creeps. They tended to get a little too… intimate sometimes when it came to blood.
Our youngest brother, Severo, sat alone and away from us on the other side of the room, sketching in his pad. I knew each drawing he brought to life on paper took him just a bit further away from this hell we all lived in beneath our father’s control. He would spend hours drawing things. And unfortunately, those things sometimes were murder scenes he’d helped with. It never failed. If a murder was committed and he was part of it, he drew the entire scene out with intricate, life-like detail. He’d collect blood and dirt from the murder scenes and add them as a sharp contrast of color to the dark lines he’d create. Sometimes he’d cut himself to add to the grotesque artwork. I hated when he did it. It was a constant reminder of the shit we dealt with. Why he wanted to immortalize any of it was beyond me. When he wasn’t drawing, he was scribbling words into another leather-bound notebook. Again, he’d use his blood, victims’ blood, and I wondered sometimes if he’d kill little creatures and use their blood. I’d never witnessed it, but Severo wasn’t normal. Quiet. Studious. Strange. That was Severo. Where the twins were wild and free, Sever was withdrawn and quiet. I was somewhere in the middle of both sides as the eldest.
“Sever,” Renzo shouted. “Catch!”
Renzo let the knife fly. I watched it topple end over end across the room, not moving a muscle as the steel flashed through space.
Sever didn’t even look up. He simply snagged it before it struck him and whipped it back, not a drop of blood spilled. Renzo dove off the chair to avoid the fast throw while Roman laughed maniacally.
I sighed and shook my head, taking another drink from my whisky before inhaling a hit from the joint I held. We mostly handled the drug side of our father’s world, but we’d been getting more things to do lately. I knew it was because Father wanted me trained to take over as his heir. I had little interest in any of it, but I put on my leather killing gloves daily and pulled the trigger as was expected of me.
Cold. Heartless. Brutal. That’s what they said about me.
Maybe they were right. I’d lived a life where cries and pleading didn’t mean shit to me. It didn’t save me or my brothers growing up and it sure never saved anyone on the other end of our barrels. Or knives in the case of my younger twin brothers.
Sometimes I wondered if my cruelty was because it was a way for me to filter out my anger at my own abuse at our father’s hands. Give it to someone else so I could feel in control for once in my life.
My biggest dream was for my father to die so I could just be free to run shit the way I wanted to. So I could be in charge and not fear for myself or the lives of my younger brothers at his hands. We all suffered because of the shit he’d put us through. We’d never be able to be the ones to kill him though. He had far too much protection. If he died, he’d take our asses with him.
Someone knocked on the door, and I looked to my brothers. As far as I knew, we weren’t expecting anyone.
“Enter,” I called out, letting our guard know to let whoever it was pass.
Benicio Rossi, my father’s right hand man, came into the room.
“You weren’t announced,” I said, lifting my joint to my lips and dragging in a deep hit.
“My apologies, Massimo. Your father sent me to deliver something to you. I thought perhaps I’d get here sooner rather than later.”
I frowned. That old bastard hadn’t mentioned sending us anything. The fact my guards just let Benicio in pissed me off. Even though I was my father’s heir, I didn’t trust the prick as far as I could throw him. I never knew when he’d get a wild hair up his ass and have me offed just to show the world the sort of monster he was.
I imagined he’d send Benicio to do it too. A way to prove to me to trust no one.
“What did he send?” I blew out a smoke cloud and watched as Benicio looked to my brothers.
“It’s for all of you. A gift.”
I raised my eyebrows at that.
“Imagine that. He’s in the giving mood. What is it? Liquor? A new gun? A hit list he needs completed?” I shook my head, already tiring of Benicio’s visit.
“It’s outside. You’ll have to do some lifting.”
“Fucking hell,” I grumbled. “Have Leo handle it. Leave it in the foyer.”
“I can’t do that. This is for you and your brothers only. Come.”
I sighed and looked to my brothers. Roman and Renzo both rolled their eyes but got to their feet.
“Sever,” I called out, standing. “Come.”
He stared at me for a moment before silently standing and dropping his pencil onto the pad of paper, following me like a fucking blackened specter. Granted, we all always wore black, but black on Sever made him even more haunting.
We made our way outside to the grounds and stopped at Benicio’s blacked out Mercedes. Jack Warner, another of our father’s men, smirked at us as we approached.
“You’re going to like this one,” he said, opening the trunk.
I very fucking much doubted it, but I remained quiet and looked into the truck as the lid opened, my brothers at my side.
After several quiet moments, I finally spoke.
“What the fuck is this?” I demanded, gazing down at the tied up female in the trunk. She was a goddamn mess. Ugly bruises marred her face. Her dark hair was long and twisted around her small body, half her hair in a messy braid. Her hands and feet were bound and there was a gag in her mouth secured with duct tape.
“He even made sure she was wrapped.” Jack chuckled.
“He sends us some tortured girl?” I looked to Benicio, my jaw aching from clenching it so hard. Usually, they weren’t tortured when they got to us. Half the time, they were ready to suck cock, thinking they’d service us well enough to continue to live. The other half, they were a pain in the ass and we simply tortured them for the sake of doing it.
“She’s pretty,” Roman said, cocking his head to look at her.
“Is she alive?” Renzo asked, frowning at her still form.
Sever said nothing and simply stared at her, his brows crinkled.
“Take her back. She’s already halfway dead.” I made to move away, but Benicio was quick to stop me.
“She is a debt owed. Her father paid his debt off tonight with her as currency. She’s been through a lot. Sending her back to your father is not wise for you or for her.”
I ground my teeth and looked back at her. “What’s her name?”
“Arianna,” Sever murmured.
I looked to him, surprised he knew her.
“How do you know her?” I demanded.
“Arianna Day. We went to Cardale Academy with her. She graduated at the top of my class.” Sever continued to stare down at her. “She knocked me out of the position.”
I looked back at her. She did look familiar now that he’d put a name to her face. She’d probably look better without the bruising and cuts on her face though. Perhaps I’d have recognized her faster that way. What I did remember from when she was a freshman and I was a senior was that she was picked on a lot. Rich kids tended to be dickheads to the poor who attended Cardale. That was usually the less fortunate who came in on scholarship because unless you were elite, you didn’t attend Cardale. I vaguely recalled Sever being around her here and there.
“I remember her. Looks like her tits finally came in,” Renzo said with a laugh, nudging Roman. “Remember that time Clarissa Avery stole her clothes after gym and she had to wrap toilet paper around herself and walk home?”
Roman nodded his head, grinning. “I remember. Mason Laurie tried to set the paper on fire and she screamed.”
“He did set it on fire,” Sever murmured. “I put it out. It burned her leg.”
I watched as Sever reached out and pushed her skirt up gently to display a small scar on her leg from the burn.
The way he touched her made my stomach twist. Sever wasn’t one to lay his feelings out, but if he was out there saving some girl from being burned, it meant something huge considering he was often the one setting people on fire.
I wanted more than anything for Sever to have some sense of relief in his life. Out of my brothers, he worried me most. Him snapping and taking out everything around him was a major concern. I’d never put it past him either.
“Your father wants to know what name you’ll give her,” Benicio said.
I sighed. He always made us give them stupid fucking names. I knew it had something to do with creating a disconnect in the event we tried to developed feelings.
I glanced at her again. The girl looked fucking miserable.
“We’ll call her Misery. Bring her in,” I said, backing away.
“Hell yeah. Remember Wisp?” Renzo said, lifting Misery’s unconscious body out of the trunk. Her face was too bruised and swollen to get a good look at her, so I didn’t bother trying as my brothers spoke about one of the last women our father gifted us.
“Useless,” Roman muttered. “All she did was bitch and moan. I was glad to gut her.”
I sighed and walked toward the house, the sound of my twin brothers’ laughter fading away. Sever stayed close to them though, his attention focused on the girl in Renzo’s arms.
“Your father wants you to call him after you’ve settled in with her tonight,” Benicio said as we stopped at the front door. Renzo walked past me with Misery in his arms, Roman at his side and Sever right behind them.
“Thank you for bringing us this gift,” I said evenly. “We’ll see that it’s put to good use.”
Benicio nodded. “Use her or your father will. And you know how that will go. Have a good night, Massimo.”
I watched him walk back to Jack and get into the car. I stood and watched them leave, their tail lights eventually fading away from view down the long, winding driveway to our mansion.
Sighing, I went inside to the office and picked up the phone and dialed my old man.
“Father,” I greeted him when he answered.
“Do you like your gift?” he asked, sounding pleased with himself.
“A half dead, unconscious woman in the trunk of a car? Loved it,” I said, my words clipped. “What do you expect us to do with her?”
“Fuck her. Practice torturing her to see how long it takes to break her. The same thing as you did with the last one.”
“The last one was a bitch,” I said.
He chuckled softly. “Arnold Day owed me a lot of money. This is his payment.”
I knew Arnold Day. The guy was as useful as a bent dick. I’d roughed him up for owing money more times than I could count. He’d beg and plead, asking for more time. I’d give it to him only because I knew the end game of killing his ass would be sweet.
“Is he in the clear?” I asked.
“You tell me. I’ll give you time to decide if she’s worth it. If you break her before, say, April, you can go kill her father. He’s the one who put those marks on her pretty face.”
I ground my teeth at that.
“What is her new name?” he asked.
“Misery.”
He let out a soft laugh at the name. “She’s your late Christmas present. Enjoy her, my son. I want to be able to hear the whore’s screams all the way to my estate. If I can’t, I’ll be sure to pay a visit. Capisci ?”
" Capisco, padre .” I looked to the door, knowing I was going to have to go deal with this shit. If we didn’t make her scream, then he would.
“We will speak soon, Massimo.” And with that, the line went dead, leaving me to stare at the door I knew I’d have to walk through. Once I did, everything would change.
God bless the poor girl upstairs.
She’d need it living in Hell.