Chapter 43 Zahra
ZAHRA
All I can taste is metal. No doubt from the blood that came after Cyrus slapped me in the face and told me to be quiet while he dumped my body in some dingy basement. Every muscle in my body is screaming at me in agony, and I’m shaking from how frigid the room is.
I have no idea where I am, or if anyone even knows I’m gone. What I do know is that I’ll either be killed soon or used as a bargaining chip and then killed. Neither option sounds appealing, but for once in my life, I can't think myself out of this.
The longer I’m trapped in this dark room, the more my eyes adjust until I can finally see my surroundings. The room is nothing more than a cinder block cellar with a metal door on the left wall, the faintest hint of light peering from under it. A potential escape?
I groan as I shift and the chain wrapped around my ankles weighs me down.
That is definitely going to make things more complicated.
Although they seem to have a great bit of slack to them, perhaps enough that I'd be able to lift the excess chain and use it as a weapon.
My hands are bound by a rope, chaffing my wrists.
Sharp. I needed something sharp to cut the rope.
From there, I would figure out the chains.
Figure out how I can defend myself. A loud creak freezes me in place as a silhouette fills the door frame, light pouring in behind the figure like a halo.
Except the figure is anything but an angel coming to save me–it’s the man who’s been plotting my demise behind my back for months. And I hadn't even realized it.
He presses a button on his phone that triggers the lights to turn on. I blink rapidly at the sudden change, eyes blurring as he carries two chairs over.
"Sit," he orders.
Defiance fills my bones, but it's not enough to overpower my need for the explanation I have a feeling he’s about to give. How did I end up here? And why? Sitting down, hands tied behind my back, I subtly assess the chair’s frame and, finding a loose screw, I start to toy with.
"Sweet, courageous, little Zahra. I knew you were going to be nothing but trouble from the moment you were born.
Of course, back then, I was still convinced I could change your father's mind.
Get him to see that his plan for the future was nothing but a fool's wish.
" Cyrus sighs, reaching down to grab the water bottle he brought in.
My throat clenches at the sight, reminding me how dehydrated I am. I press my lips together. I refuse to beg for anything. He would not get that from me.
"Oh, where are my manners? You probably want some water, don't you?" he chuckles. I gasp as water splashes all over my face and the top of my shirt. Being soaked only makes the chill in my bones worse.
"Bastard," I growl, spitting at his feet.
"Now, now, little Zahra. I won't answer any of your questions if you disrespect me."
My lips curl back in a sneer as he calls me little Zahra. What was once a term of endearment, my father called me as a child, has now been sullied by Cyrus.
"I suppose it's best to start at the beginning.
As you know, your father and I immigrated to this country together, with hopes and dreams of starting a new life.
We experienced many highs and lows the first few years.
The start of our new tea and coffee business, a market crash that rendered that shop futile, and the rise of a new endeavor - surveillance and hacking.
" Cyrus' tone is oddly fond, especially for a man who killed his best friend.
"Once your father aligned with Cillian, we were golden.
With the protection of the Irish mafia and the eventual rise of our own, we were untouchable.
And everything was worth it. The ridicule of our parents saying we would never make it in America.
The sneers from our so-called neighbors who would cross the street whenever they saw us, or yell at us to go back to our home country.
None of that mattered anymore because we ruled the city.
But, as you know, once you're at the top of the mountain, everyone else wants to push you off it. "
Cyrus pauses, running his hands through his salt and pepper hair, and rolling up his sleeves. "The Italians were the first to take a hit at us—"
"For thwarting their drug routes," I guess.
Cyrus smirks. "For talking to their biggest supplier about adding our own routes. Though I can see Naser never told you the full truth on where our decades-long feud with the Italians started."
"You're lying, my father asked Cillian to pull out of the drug trade. He would never get involved in it on his own accord!"
"Your father," Cyrus laughs, "was a very, very different man before you came along. Everything changed after that. Even though he’d deny it at first, I saw the look in his eyes the first time he held you.
Nothing else mattered to him but you. He would give up anything—his power, his expansive wealth, the organization he had built with me from the ground up—all of it. He would give it up for you."
Tears prick my eyes, and my heart physically aches as I think of my father and how he was ripped from me. I can’t process what Cyrus is saying. "My father loved everyone who worked for him, he would never abandon his mafia."
"Naser was an idealist who thought he could have it all.
The second you were born, he became infatuated with the idea of turning the Persian Empire into an organization that only engages in more.
..legal operations. I entertained his dreams early on.
What did I care if he restarted his tea business and marginally increased our income by trading various spices and goods?
But then he started to talk about slowly phasing out the gun trade and living a simple life.
Once your mother was killed, he was dead set on his plan to abandon any mafia ties. No matter the cost."
Killed? What the hell is Cyrus on about? "My mother wasn't killed...she died of a heart attack."
Cyrus clicks his tongue. "A half-truth Naser told to protect his little Zahra.
She did indeed die of a heart attack, one that was caused by an unspecified poison they found in her drink at a restaurant your father burned to the ground after her death.
Whether he was the true intended target or not remains unknown.
But as far as he was concerned, he was the one who killed her. Him and his position as Don."
My entire body starts to shake. It was hard enough to wrap my brain around Cyrus betraying me; now, everything I knew about my mother was a lie, too? My head spins and my stomach turns, nausea rolling through me. Focus, Zahra. Focus.
With all of Cyrus’ monologuing, I’d been able to remove the loose screw from my chair and start to chip away at the rope binding my hands.
I just hoped by the time I was free, Cyrus would still be in the room so I could choke him with my own bare hands.
I wanted to be the one who saw the life drain from his eyes. Slowly. Painfully.
Cyrus continues, "Once his obsession with abandoning the crime life formed, he couldn't be swayed.
I had hoped everyone would look at him like a madman, riddled with delusion, but instead.
..he was met with support. Cillian was a little skeptical at first, but he could see how much this lifestyle was weighing down on Aidan, even from a young age.
Lorkan took minimal convincing as well. This lifestyle had taken a lot from him. "
A week ago, I would have laughed if anyone had told me Lorkan was anything but bloodthirsty for power, but given I’d just been kidnapped and chained by a man whom I had once considered to be a second father, I was willing to accept that everything else I thought I knew was a lie.
"Your father had it all figured out. The day he died—"
"You mean the day you killed him!" I screech, thrashing in my chains with rage.
He waves his hand. "Semantics. The day he died, he was meeting with Cillian to discuss an official shift in organization priorities.
You and Declan would be brought in soon to hear about their three-year plan for phasing out the gun trade and any other mafia-related endeavors.
At the end of the three years, you and Declan would be phased in as the new bosses or, I guess, CEOs.
Whatever is more palatable for civilians.
Your rise was supposed to be a beacon for prosperity and happiness.
Like that of the Homa, a native vulture to Iran. "
"A vulture?" My eyes widen. "Like the one all the men who have tried to kill me had tattooed on their chest?"
The sinister smile on Cyrus' face doubles in size. He’s enjoying this.
"The vulture tattoos you know are near replicas of the images they were inspired by." Cyrus reaches into his pocket and pulls out a series of images.
The first one I'd seen already from Aleksander—Lorkan with his chest emblazoned with a black vulture.
Cyrus tosses the image to the floor to reveal one of Cillian sitting inside a tattoo parlor, a fresh vulture tattoo on the skull of his head.
One that would be easily hidden, once his hair grew out.
The final picture has tears streaming down my face.
My father, sitting on the floor playing with me when I was likely no bigger than a year old.
At first, I don't even notice what Cyrus wanted me to look at, too caught up in seeing my dad so happy, until I scan the entire image.
Tattooed on my father's right foot is a vulture identical to Lorkan and Cillian's.
"The men who tried to kill me…they had the same tattoo. One screamed that a queen would die at the end of this." My voice is so scratchy I barely recognize it as my own.
"Your father and his two idiot best friends acted like school girls getting those matching tattoos. 'A physical symbol for the progress they would make in the future.’” Cyrus rolls his eyes, mocking my father’s voice.
“When I formed our rebel group, it was my idea to reclaim the vulture tattoo as a symbol of strength, honor, and tradition.
Plus, I knew the truth would be revealed to you one day.
And you would view the one symbol your father intended to use to guide you, as the one you feared most."
Cyrus hadn't laid a finger on me since he entered the room, but every word he spoke felt like it was slicing through my skin. A never-ending torture.
"The men who tried to kill me. At the restaurant, the banquet, the rat at our main warehouse. They were all your soldiers. Your soldiers who wanted me dead...so you could come into power."
"Precisely."
"You killed my father, your best friend, all because he wanted to protect his family? Because he wanted better for me?" I scoff, shaking my head in disbelief.
"I killed your father because he turned his back on me.
Everything we had built together, the loss, the pain, the bloodshed.
We had finally gotten to reap the benefits of what we sowed and he was going to throw it all away!
Make us nothing more but lowly paupers again.
All because after decades of being a lion running his pack, he decided it was time to cut off his own claws.
What kind of honorable man does that?" he shouts, voice echoing off the walls.
"Once he was dead, you knew I would seek vengeance.
Though you probably never accounted for the fact that I would notice it was a setup.
Despite all the bad blood, I knew that the Italians never killed my father or Cillian.
" It’s hard to be smug when you're chained in front of the man who’s going to kill you but I refuse to let him see any more chinks in my armor.
As if I willed it, the rope binding my hands finally breaks.
I keep my hands behind my back, leaving Cyrus none the wiser.
"You impressed me with how quickly you discovered the truth, or at least a piece of it.
I debated whether I could still manipulate you into thinking it was another rival, but the risk was too high.
Plus, I figured once you and your father were dead, it would be way too easy to convince your underlings that we needed to exact revenge and sharpen our forces. " Cyrus shrugs.
"You were going to start a war? Are you out of your mind? Do you remember how many soldiers we lost in the last one?"
Cyrus drags his chair closer to me, his hot breath wafting over my face. "Don't lecture me, little girl. I was alive and fought in the last war. And while it was bloody, it was also incredibly profitable. Wars build revenue. And loyalty."
I channel every ounce of rage that has been building for the last thirty minutes and thrust my arms out and around, using the remainder of the cut through rope that was wrapped around my wrists to strangle his neck.
Tugging as hard as I can. I may die today, but I will do everything in my power to ensure he dies with me.
We crash to the floor and I use my legs as leverage, tying them around his waist in an attempt to further restrict his air flow.
I’d clearly caught him off guard, which I need to use to my advantage.
Cyrus chokes and claws at me, and in my weakened state, I don’t know how much fight I have left in me.
Still, I yell at myself to hold on, feeling every muscle in my body ache with pain.
Behind me, the entry door to the room flies open and soldiers rush in, ripping me off Cyrus. He's rising to all fours, panting for oxygen, and raises a shaking hand to point at me.
"You'll pay for that. I was going to kill you first, but now I think I'll wait for your husband and friends to arrive and kill them one by one as you watch."
No. No. Declan can't find me. I refuse to let him or Azula or Arman die because of me. They deserved to live, deserved to carry out the dream my father had planned for us. "He won't come. He knows it's too risky."
"He will. I saw the look in his eyes when you boarded the plane. Love. The most lethal thing on this planet."
Love. That was the emotion I’d seen in Declan’s eyes. The thing I’d felt in my gut the past few days. He loved me, I loved him. And I would never get to tell him that.
Cyrus finally stands and kicks me as hard as he can in the gut. Pain sends me crumbling to the floor. My head smacks off the concrete, and black swallows my vision, the world slowly fading away until all I see is Declan's face.