35. Francesca
The room I was in smelled of mildew, and I could hear the night wind howling outside. A man who had been in the shadows approached me and I tensed. He had been there all along, but now that Grigori, his son, and Donato had left, he walked my way.
When he came into the white light, my heartbeat oddly, like it wanted to accelerate but lacked the strength. Umberto, my old guard was here. The man I had considered a father was here. Was he a part of this?
Two of the other armed men in the room started to stop him. “I’m checking her wound,” he explained. “Your boss won’t like it if it becomes infected.”
Whether they believed him or not, Umberto kept coming my way. Once he reached me, I glared daggers at him. He crouched beside me and tried to touch my forehead where I was hit.
“Don’t touch me.” I couldn’t help but cry out.
“Francesca,” he whispered, with a gentle hand he checked my wound. It made me cry harder.
“Why?” I wanted to know why he would betray me.
Umberto crouched lower and we were face to face. “Look away, pretend you’re angry.”
“I am,” I snapped.
“Good, keep that attitude.”
Was he deranged. “Cassio is coming for you,” he announced.
“No.”
“Quiet,” he pleaded as he checked my bindings, and I noticed he had a small switchblade concealed in his jacket which he began cutting the tape with.
“He’s coming with his men, don’t worry. It will be alright.” He cut one than the other, still using his body to hide us from the other guards.
“Why is he doing this?”
He looked at me his black eyes filled with sorrow. “Power. Your father always wanted to be Capo?—”
“Enough,” one of the guards snapped. “Boss will deal with her later.”
Umberto kneeled closer and whispered quickly. “Don’t do anything stupid. Wait for Cassio.” He snapped the last of the tape.
Looking from above, it was still attached to my skin, but it was no longer holding me. If I desired, I could move. Not that I would, I wasn’t stupid, I was seriously at a disadvantage. Even if Umberto was on my side, it was two against many. Or rather one since I had no idea how to shoot.
A commotion took me by surprise and Grigori, his son, and Donato came rushing into the room. They didn’t look concerned or scared, in fact, they looked happy. Eager almost. Like they had accomplished what they wanted. Fear began to take hold once more.
The guards in the room, all five of them, turned their guns toward the door—which I had my back turned to. Slowly, the temperature in the air shifted and a figure surged in my line of sight. I knew it was Cassio even before I saw him. There was this pull, this energy between us that made me aware of his presence when he was near.
Cassio walked into the room like he owned the place, his face stoic and cold. He didn’t look at me, he didn’t even acknowledge my presence. One guard followed him, a gun aimed at his head, but Cassio didn’t even seem to care.
My heart hammered against my chest. He was alone. He walked toward the center of the room and stopped, facing all three men who had plotted against him.
“I am here, let her go.”
Grigori laughed. “Always so entitled.” He shook his head. “I always despised you, boy. So sure of yourself. So arrogant.”
“Are you done complimenting me, Grigori?” He ran his thumb under his lip.
Grigori’s smile fell. “Get on your knees.” He pointed a gun at Cassio.
“I kneel for no one,” he said coldly.
Slowly the gun shifted, and the barrel was facing me. “What about her?”
Cassio looked at me for the first time and for a flicker of a second, I watched his eyes change from murderous to terrified. Slowly, I watched as the most powerful man I knew got down on his knees.
“Tell me, Donato,” he turned toward my father. “When was it that you woke up and decided this is the day I’m going to betray all I have ever stood for?”
“You are a boy!” he snapped. “You have no idea what you are doing,” Donato shouted. “This war, it was consuming us.”
Cassio scoffed. “So, you decided to ally yourself with them.”
“It had to stop.”
“So, you decided to sell your daughter to the enemy in exchange for what? Peace? Come on, Donato, we both know you’re not a man who enjoys peace. It’s bad for business.”
Donato smiled. “I’ve waited four years for this, boy. Four years to take everything from you like you did from me. I was supposed to have been Capo when your father died. Me. Not a drunk child who barely knew what to do.”
Cassio went silent for a while, and I watched as the wheels in his head began to work. “So, you killed Paolo Biancini because you needed his money to fund the attacks on our cargo, and Francesca free to be married again.” He pointed, speaking to himself.
He paused, looked at me, and smiled. “Except she refused to come home and with my protection, you couldn’t touch her.”
“You had to put your nose where it didn’t belong.”
“So, you had Grigori’s men try to take her by force, but it didn’t work,” Cassio said pensively.
“Can we get this over with already?” Grigori’s son complained. “Now that all plans were unmasked, can I fucking marry the girl now?”
“Touch her and you die, Mikail,” Cassio warned, his tone frosty and murderous. A promise of death.
Mikail laughed. “Or what? You’re surrounded. No one is going to stop me.”
Mikail walked my way and Cassio moved, but Mikail pointed his gun at me so fast, even I gasped in shock. “Move and I’ll kill her.” Cassio sat back on his haunches.
“Good boy,” Mikail taunted.
He stepped behind me, placed his gun against my head and leaned in to kiss my cheek. I hated the tears that fell from my eyes. I wanted to be strong for Cassio, but I was so afraid. “I’m going to love making you mine. Maybe I’ll do it right here in front of him.”
“Are you going to let him do this to your daughter? Shame your name like that?” Cassio pleaded with Donato.
“She has already shamed my family,” he said, but then added. “We had a deal, Grigori, your son would wed her first, and I would kill Cassio.”
Neither Cassio nor I breathed. “Fine, fine,” Mikail complained. “You can have him if you wish.”
I watched as Donato raised his gun and pointed it at Cassio. He was about to shoot when something in me snapped. I jumped from the chair, the tape pulling at my skin. I fell before Cassio and used my body as a shield to protect him.
FRANCESCA
“Don’t shoot!”
Panic like I had never felt in my entire life took hold of me and pulled me under. One moment she was tied up, and in the next, she was kneeling before me. Her beautiful face was shrouded in fear.
I watched as Francesca fought the vise-like grip Mikail had on her. Francesca twisted and turned but he was pulling her by her hair until he managed to snake an arm over her chest. I moved instinctively, but when I did, Donato had his gun trained on me. Son of a bitch. Mikail was hurting his daughter, and he didn’t even care.
“Let her go!” I shouted.
“I don’t think I will.” His grip tightened around her enough to make her cry out.
“I will fucking kill you,” I warned him. God, I didn’t even know what I would do to him if he harmed a single hair on her body.
Mikail’s laughter echoed in the room. The fucker thought I was joking.
With the gun trained on me, I didn’t want to do anything stupid. My priority right now was to get Francesca out of here in one piece. Francesca surprised me and Mikail as well when she bit him hard on his forearm, and when he let her go, she head-butted him.
“You fucking bitch.” He held his bleeding nose.
Francesca wasn’t fast enough to escape him; he gripped her by her arm and spun her, hitting her with the back of his hand. She fell to the floor with a loud thud.
“I wouldn’t.” The barrel of the gun connected with my head when I tried to move.
“She’s your fucking daughter,” I roared, almost begging him to see it.
“That’s enough,” Donato ordered.
Mikail stopped moving toward Francesca who was slowly sitting up. “She’s my wife,” he said simply.
“Not yet.” Donato pointed out.
Francesca finally sat up and wiped her bleeding nose. I never thought I would be this angry in my life. There had been moments when I lost it, but now looking at her large, scared eyes, and the blood running down her nose and forehead, I knew right then I was going to skin him alive, slowly, so that he felt each agonizing press of my blade to his skin.
Her eyes found mine and then followed them to where the gun was pressed to my head. She turned so white that I thought she was going to faint. I shook my head urging her to look away. She did, but what came later, scared me even more.
She slowly crawled toward me and kneeled before her father, tears already trailing down her face. “Don’t kill him,” she begged. “Please, please let him go, and I will do anything you ask.”
“Francesca.” I tried to stop her, but she wasn’t having it, she didn’t listen to me, she kept on going.
“Please. I promise I’ll behave, that I will… that I’ll marry you.” She turned to Mikail. “I’ll marry you and I’ll be an exemplary wife. I’ll do what you ask of me, and I will never speak up, I will never try to run or disobey you.”
What is she doing?
“I’ll marry you right now. There… are witnesses and—just please,” she cried. Still on her knees, begging.
I had been hurt before, I had broken bones, been cut by knives, and then stitched up, I had been shot and watched as they used tweezers to remove the bullet from my flesh, but nothing, and I mean nothing, prepared me for what I saw before me.
“Now?” Mikail seemed interested.
“Yes. Yes!” she cried. “Just let him go. Exile him, send him far, far away.” She turned toward me and, in her eyes, I saw all that despair. “Do whatever you want with me but just let him go.”
“No,” I roared. I tried to move but the end of Donato’s gun hit my head and I felt dizzy.
“Don’t!” I heard her scream. “Please. Just take me, and I’ll come willingly. Hurt me however you want but just let him go.”
“Why?” I heard Mikail’s voice but couldn’t see him, my vision was still blurry.
There was a pregnant pause, then I heard her voice loud and clear. “Because I love him. Because I would rather suffer and know he’s alive than live in a world where he’s not in it.”
My heart broke.
“This has grown boring. I think I’ll have you and kill him.” I opened my eyes.
Everything happened in slow motion, I watched as Mikail lifted his gun and trained it on me. I saw his finger pressed against the trigger and then the shot echoed in the room.