26. Siena
Siena
I stand with my back pressed against the cold steel door, the chill seeping through my shirt as I fix Franco with a searing glare. My voice cuts through the tension like a blade. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost, Franco. Any chance that’s because you left me for dead last time I saw you?”
Franco blinks away the wide-eyed shock on his face, replacing it with an expression of big-brother irritation, patronizing and dismissive.
“You’re confused, Siena. I had nothing to do with what happened to you. But the guy you left with? He can’t say the same.”
Before I can think it through, my fist clenches of its own accord, and I snake a punch into the side of his jaw, driving his head into the concrete wall with a dull thud.
He leaps off the bed, fury igniting his features, but the chain tethering him to the frame holds him back.
The rattling metal punctuates the silence.
“That’s for leaving me to be raped, beaten, and God knows what else. ”
“Fuck you, Siena. Where’s your fucking loyalty?” Franco snarls, his voice like gravel.
“ My loyalty?” My voice rises, barely kept in check to avoid drawing unwanted attention. “You stood by while I was being assaulted and did nothing . And now you expect what? A fucking hug?”
Franco yanks violently against the chain, his face reddening with rage. I’ve never seen him like this before, and I don’t know what he’ll do if he gets free. I warily eye the bed, but the chain holds firm.
“You don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about, Siena,” he growls. “You have no idea what’s going on or how much you’re fucking things up. I’ve been locked up here for a month because of you .”
The accusation blindsides me. “Because of me?” My voice trembles, disbelief washing over me. “You’ve always been delusional, but this? Wow. You think I’m responsible for you being here? I’m a prisoner too, asshole!”
“Really?” Franco spits the word like venom. “I don’t see any chains on you.” He yanks on his restraint for emphasis. “Must’ve spread your legs so wide they fell off. How does it feel to be a side-piece cum slut for the monster who slaughtered our sister?”
My fists clench so tightly my nails bite into my palms. It takes every ounce of control not to hit him again. Instead, I hold up the keys, letting them jangle lightly.
“Keep running your mouth, Franco. You’re making a lot of noise, and if we get caught, I won’t be able to save you. Just like you didn’t save me.”
Franco glares at me, his jaw tightening, but he stops struggling against the chain. “You expect me to believe you’re here to break me out when you think I left you for dead? How stupid do you think I am?”
I tilt my head, feigning thoughtfulness. “Good question. I’m not sure how stupid I think you are. Let’s come back to that.”
“What, you think you’re in charge?”
Raising an eyebrow at him, I lean casually against the door, resting my hand on the back of a chair and crossing one ankle over the other. “I’m not shackled to a bed, and I’m the one holding the keys. I’d say that puts me in charge.”
He rolls his eyes and sits heavily on the bed. “You’ve always been an entitled cunt.”
“Sure,” I snap back. “If expecting my brother—my family—to help me when I’m hog-tied on the floor counts as entitlement, then fine. You know what else? Fuck you.”
“You survived,” Franco says flatly. “But let’s be honest. The guy who tied you up is no different from the guy who cut you loose and carried you out of there. The only difference is that you want to fuck one of them.”
“I don’t want to fuck anybody.”
“Bullshit,” he snorts. “Just because you haven’t gotten laid since Bryan kicked you out doesn’t mean you wouldn’t fuck a random asshole. Matti is the king of assholes, which makes him just your type, right?”
The mention of Bryan twists like a knife in my gut.
Franco knows exactly what he’s doing. Bryan threw me out like trash after years of cheating, and Franco watched it happen without so much as a word of support.
Five years together and Bryan leaves me the day his other girlfriend gave birth to their child. Class act.
“You don’t know anything about me or my type, Franco,” I snap.
“Don’t I?” His voice drips with venom. “You and Emily both: whores for criminals.”
A cloud of red tinges the edges of my vision. My hand tightens around the keys as I thread the blades between my fingers. “Don’t fucking talk about her like that.” My voice is soft, but every part of my body is shaking.
Franco glares at me. “Fuck you. Fuck Emily. You’re both whores for these assholes who have me tied up like a dog. Your loyalty is as shitty as hers. You deserve to die just like she did.”
Deserve to die? Because of a lack of loyalty?
My head spins as the pieces of the puzzle start to fall together.
Franco was working with Matti’s people when I saw him at the law office. He had to know that Mikey was on the run and targeted by the Demonios, Emily along with him.
That’s how he knows that Matti was the one to kill them. Because he knew before it happened. He knew how, he knew when, and he knew by whom.
And he didn’t try to save her life, just like he didn’t help me.
Something primal ignites in me, and I’m on him before I can think, fists flying. The keys slice into his face, his neck, his chest. Blood sprays, and his screams barely pierce the roaring in my ears.
Franco falls back, flailing to shield himself. I grab the chain and pin him down by the throat, my chest heaving as I lean into him. “You could have saved her, couldn’t you? You knew she was going to die, and you did NOTHING!”
He thrashes beneath me, eyes wide with panic. “It wasn’t me!” he rasps. “It was the Demonios! Matti was there, not me! I didn’t know they’d kill her, too!”
His words sting like a slap. My grip loosens, and I back away, trembling. My hands are slick with blood, his and mine from where the keys have cut into my skin. I stare at him as he gasps for air, slumped on the bed.
“What do you mean, ‘kill her too’?” I whisper.
Franco rubs his throat, coughing. “I knew there was a hit on Mikey, but I didn’t know Emily would be there until you told me. I don’t have any power in this thing, Siena. I never have. All I was ever trying to do was make some money on the side by working with Aurelio. That’s all.”
“Holy shit,” I breathe, staring at him like he’s a stranger. “You’re a fucking gangster.”
He sneers, blood dripping from his mouth. “Learn your history, baby sis. We’re all fucking gangsters. Ask your boyfriend about the Bellamorte name.”
The red cloud threatens to overtake my vision again. “You’re fucking delusional. Mikey was your brother-in-law! Emily was your sister! You really thought that she wouldn’t be with them, that she wouldn’t be in danger too?”
Franco spits again. “You think you’re better than me?
You’ve been here as long as I have, and I don’t see any shackles on you.
You’re telling me that you haven’t been kept as a cum dumpster for the real gangster, the one who took out your sister?
He has a fucking girlfriend, Siena. You’re nothing more than a fuck hole to him. ”
His words slam into me like a truck, churning up shame and guilt. I didn’t fuck Matti. But I wanted to and what I did do was bad enough.
And Franco’s right: I am nothing to him. I haven’t heard from him once since that day in the shower. The only sign that he thought of me at all was the full line of Bergamot & Basil bath and skin care products that appeared in the bathroom a few days later.
Which is fine. Because I don’t know this man at all. He was a distraction, nothing more. Something to think about when I was locked up here when I didn’t want to think about losing Emily.
But I’m not locked up here anymore.
Without thinking, I drop the keys I’ve been gripping so hard they’ve cut into my palm, grab the chair, and hurl it at him. It’s wooden and heavy, and the leg hits him in the face, bouncing off of him and onto the floor in front of me.
Franco falls back on the bed, dazed. “Fuuuuuck! You fucking bitch! I should have let AJ rape you in that office, let them all have their turn, you fucking whore!”
I grab the chair from where it fell and heave it over my head, bringing it down onto Franco, using every ounce of force I can draw from my body.
A sickening crack echoes through the small room as the heavy wood makes contact with his skull. He grunts as it hits him, then slides off the bed into a pile on the floor and stops moving.
My breathing comes in fast and hard, loud heaves that punctuate the silence. I kick the chair off of him. He’s knocked out cold, blood running out of his nose, his cheek and jaw red and already starting to swell.
I swipe the keys off the ground and lean down to whisper in his ear, “Fuck you, Franco. You’re fucking dead to me.”