Chapter 37
DANTE
I’m being scolded like a child. Well, the way I imagine other children were scolded. I wasn’t punished with words; it was always with a hand or object, depending on the severity of my offense.
Lorenzo and I stare at one another from across the broken coffee table. He looks far too big for the chair he's seated in, and I can’t help but smile at his discomfort. At least it’s not just me in trouble.
“Wipe that smirk off your face,” Romi bites at me, and I try my hardest to rein it in, getting all sorts of flutters in my stomach from the way she speaks down to me. Seeing her like this, bringing men to their knees, turns me on.
Lily and Romi sit on the couch, mediating between my brother and me.
Lily is holding Lorenzo’s hand, with a stern look on her expression, but she's being supportive nonetheless.
Not my woman, though. When I glance at Romi's hand, she pins me with a glare, as if to say, Don’t you even try to grab my hand right now.
“How much do you know?” Lorenzo asks Romi while still glaring at me. Fuck, it’s so hard not to rile him up. I wipe blood from under my nose, appreciating the swelling and redness blooming around his eye.
“About the Armanis and Morettis?" Romi asks, "Enough to tell you, you’re not saving me from anything. Much like Lily has decided to stay by your side, I’ve decided to stay by Dante's.”
“Really?” I face her, and she raises another finger to me as she stares down my brother. My powerful cattivella in all her full glory.
The moment I realized I’d fucked up hit me so painfully hard.
Thinking that I might lose her had me in a near panic.
I always knew Lorenzo would figure out what I was doing.
In fact, me posting on her Instagram wasn’t exactly hiding the fact.
But I didn’t anticipate that he would come here himself.
He might be risking a lot if Luca doesn’t know he’s here.
It also shows the extent he would go for Lily and someone she cares for.
In that moment, all of it felt irrelevant.
When Romi asked me if what was between us was real, my only objective was that she believed I genuinely love her.
That despite all of my games and antics, that what we have is real and true, even if it hadn't started off that way. If I hadn’t convinced her by now, I’d use the rest of my life to prove it to her, relentlessly.
Because I know she’s the only woman for me.
Just because she took me at my word, doesn’t mean she accepts me, though. In fact, I think as she asked the question, she already knew my answer. But if she’s telling my brother she’s made up her own mind, doesn’t that mean she wants to be with me?
Lily releases Lorenzo's hand so she can switch Borris to that side and grab Romi’s hand in support with the other. I shift, uncomfortable and slightly jealous that she gets to hold her hand and I don't.
“I wanted to tell you,” Lily says earnestly.
“A lot happened in a short period of time. Then there was Lorraine’s death, and we were moving to Italy.
And I just couldn’t find the right time.
I never wanted to keep any of this from you, Romi.
I swear. But part of me also thought it might’ve been the best way to protect you. ”
Romi offers her a smile. “I know, and I don’t blame you for anything. I most likely would’ve done the same thing. We can talk about us after. But right now, we need to deal with these two knuckleheads.”
I try not to laugh, because only my woman would be ballsy enough to scold two of the most dangerous men in this city and be intimidating enough to keep both of our asses in our seats.
“You might think you know my brother, but I can assure you, you don’t,” Lorenzo insists, narrowing his gaze on me accusingly. I’m still so insignificant to him, nothing but an irritating fly buzzing about. It makes me want to instigate another fight.
“I do,” Romi asserts. “He’s a killer who dropped out a year before becoming a surgeon, much to your disapproval. He’s not quite a psychopath, but close enough. He’s also highly irritating and a master shit-stirrer.”
“And here I didn’t think you saw all of my good traits,” I say with a smile. Her deadly glare slices back over to me, and I bite my bottom lip, silencing myself before she does it for me.
“He’s a loose cannon, Romi. It’s not that I don’t trust your judgment, but I feel protective of you because you’re Lily’s best friend. Dante can go off the rails at any moment.”
“As can you, as you just showcased by breaking half the shit in my apartment,” Romi chides.
Silence.
I don’t like being spoken about like I'm a child; however, I'm surprised and oddly comforted that someone has finally dared to speak up on my behalf or defend me. I’ve never felt like I was worth defending because I’m self-aware enough to know that my approach to most things isn’t usually the sanest.
Lorenzo seems to straighten up, acknowledging her point. “You may judge me for pushing my brother into his studies and wanting him to make something of himself, but I’m sure he didn’t tell you why.”
Her gaze slices back to me, expectantly. Ah. I suppose there’s that. Well, there's no point in keeping secrets now. Besides, it’d been quite some time since I’ve had to hide my true self in the shadows for Romi’s sake.
“I went on a massacre,” I say simply, expecting her to judge me the same as Lorenzo did. To be disgusted or have a sudden urgency to reform me in some way.
Her gaze narrows on me, but she says nothing.
“As you can see, he doesn’t care about these things.
He only ever plays games. He’s hated me for trying to put him onto a better path, to make something of himself so he can have a better life,” Lorenzo says, shifting his attention back to me.
“You had started a new life, were getting an education. But you threw it all away for another massacre before coming here to New York. Why would you do that?”
I nod in agreement. Yep, that basically covers it all. I wait for the shift in her gaze, when she’ll turn on me and think of me as nothing but vile or beyond her help. But instead, she carefully asks me directly, “Why did you kill them?”
“Because it was fun,” I answer.
Lorenzo shakes his head disapprovingly, his face twisting in disgust, just as it had that day he came to clean up my mess. Hypocrite.
“What did they do to deserve it?” Romi asks next, and my attention snaps back to her.
She’s looking at me, really looking at me, and I swallow the lump forming in my throat.
No one has asked me that.
No one cared.
Instead of asking me why, Lorenzo had accused me, as if I were nothing but an irritating delinquent.
It was the first time he’d visited me in so many years, and his first words were vile accusations.
At that moment, I made the decision to become both sides of the coin: the irritating delinquent and the surgeon until I couldn’t lie to myself any longer.
“Dante, what did they do to deserve it?” Romi asks again.
I want to lie. But after so many years of sticking to the same story, of becoming the villain my brother so very much wanted me to be, it's time for the truth to come out.
I swallow. I know the answer I give her next will change everything between us going forward. And the thought of her looking at me with the same disgust as my brother did that day is something I can’t swallow twice. So, for the first time, I answer honestly about that night.
I clear my throat and pick at the edge of the couch. It’s strange how small I feel right now, but I look her in the eye as I think back to that time.
It was only by chance that I was at the market that day and noticed something suspicious.
“There was a man who was walking around with a young girl in one of our local markets. She looked so much like Milia. Or maybe it was just her size or the way she did her hair. But she caught my attention. And something about him felt off. I hadn’t seen either of them before, and the girl seemed frightened but mute. ”
I swallow again as graphic memories return. I’d seen many things. Dealt with many things. But there’s one thing I draw the line at.
“It felt off, so I followed them back to a big house on the outskirts of town. There were more adults there; six men and five women, to be precise. There were more children as well. Fifteen in total.”
“There weren’t any children,” Lorenzo interjects, and I look at him then.
“Not when you arrived. You think just because you left with Luca Armani that I wasn’t still in the know with locals?
That I wasn’t still connected? You left me behind, thinking you took the Moretti name with you, but I stayed in the town we were raised in.
I looked after our people. Do you really think they were more loyal to you than me? ”
His jaw grinds.
I continue. “They were… fiddling with the children.” I shift uncomfortably in my seat.
“Those children had been kidnapped and abused. So, I gave those sick fucks a deserving end, and I made sure the children were looked after by people I trusted, people who could help them. We all know I’m not the best choice for that. ”
"It’s only because of how many I killed that one of the men in town alerted Luca, which is how you caught wind of it, Lorenzo."
I inhale deeply, then exhale slowly before going on.
"No matter the aftermath, I wanted to make sure the children were left out of it. You came to clean up the mess but only saw the bodies, and you accused me of being messy,” I say to Lorenzo, point-blank.
I bark out a humorless laugh, thinking after all these years I might as well just say it all. It’s not like it’ll change anything anyway. I’d long given up on my relationship with my brother.
“There was a part of me that always thought you’d come back to claim me. It’s like you kept me on a leash, and I waited obediently. “