Page 34 of Pocketful of Us

"Well, Chris, if all of this goes to shit, I'll be joining you soon enough." I thought about what lay ahead for me and released a heavy sigh. "I have to do it, brother. After all the years of wishing I could hurt Romi's dad, I actually have to kill him."

"Not if he kills you first," a familiar voice answered me. "Something that you will make so easy for him to accomplish if you continue to laze around in the wide open and throw away our advantage of taking him by surprise."

"Do you mind?" I deadpanned. "I was having a private conversation with my brother."

"Your dead brother… or should I say your pretend brother?" Seth came to stand over me. "Either way, I'm sure it was wonderfullystimulating."

"Fuck you." Hackles raised, I rose to my feet and readjusted the beanie cap I had on. "I was saying goodbye."

"Why bother? If this ends badly, you'll be seeing him," Seth replied, falling into step beside me as we walked towards the parking lot. "Besides, the dead can't hear us, Giacobbe. That's why we bury them. Because they cannot hear us anymore. They cannot speak. They are dead."

"You don’t believe in heaven or hell, Seth?"

"A wise man once told me that we need not fear hell, because on earth, we are already living it."

"For real?" Frowning, I watched him climb into the passenger seat of my truck before climbing in after him. "That's a pretty piss-poor view of life."

"Perhaps." He rubbed his jaw. "But the man who spoke those words had endured more hell than most."

"Yeah, well, haven't we all?" I muttered, stabbing the key into the ignition and cranking the engine. Kneading my jean-clad thigh with my fist, I attempted to calm the nerves building up inside of me while I concentrated on the road ahead of me.The road back to hell."So," I said, trying to distract myself, "who was this man with the incredibly pessimistic view on life?"

His lips twitched. "Your father."

My entire body coiled tight with tension.

My hands gripped the steering wheel so tight, I was surprised the bones of my knuckles didn’t tear through my snow-white skin.

For my whole life, I'd been on the outside looking in. Watching from a distance as the world moved on around me, never truly fitting in or finding my place in a family of liars.

The reason was clear now.

They were never my family.

But to a five-year-old child who felt insecure and unloved, hindsight was little comfort.

And Chris knew.

He knew we weren't twins.

Cal killed him to keep the truth buried.

He was my cousin.

They both were.

My father and twin brother were distant relatives.

What the actual fuck?

My whole fucking life I had been misled and deceived.

I didn’t even know my real name, dammit.

It stung.

My whole life tasted bitter and toxic and I felt like I was bleeding out.

Screw it, I didn’t want to think about Raffaele Toretto and his Catalinian mob.

---