Page 45 of Pretty Poison

I spin around to face her again. “I don’t know how he passed the background check when he has so much deceit under his belt.”

“So you do know his name, then?”

I shake my head. “I knew him as Axel Abrahms, but that’s not his name. I had Ciro dig further into his background and his aliascrumbled, but it was a dead end. We were never able to find him, therealhim, and he’s been here pretty much ever since.”

“B-but that was years ago, right? You’ve kept him here for years?”

“No,” I say with a roll of my eyes. “He managed to flee the compound before I could get to them here. He was on the run for two years before I found him again. He’s been here for three years.”

“Three years?!” she whisper-yells. “That’s fucking insane, Dario.” Her eyes widen again, her body reacting to my presence as if she’s terrified of me.

“I’m not a bad person, Liana. I do what’s necessary to protect my family and everyone who trusts me to keep them out of harm’s way. This man violated my trust and faith in him, proving himself to be the bastard that he was hired to eliminate.”

“This is a lot to process,” she breathes quietly.

“It’ll take time for you to understand what I do, and when that happens, you’ll realise that it’s necessary for me. To be a don is a tiring task, but it’s a responsibility I take seriously. If breaking this fucker is what it takes to find out who sent him and why, I’ll do it, even if he dies in the process. As long as I get the answers I’m looking for, I’ll be happy.”

“So why did you bring me here?” she asks again.

“To show you that even though it looks like I sit in that comfy chair back in my office and flip through files for hours on end, I’m not afraid to get my hands dirty. To show you that you’re safe here with me, even if sometimes, you doubt that.”

“Why this particular room?”

“What’s with all the questions tonight?”

“I’m only trying to understand.”

“Well, I wanted to introduce you to one of the many men that may take me away from you from time to time. I haven’t spent a lot of time here recently, but eventually I’ll go back to my old ways and spend hours just trying to understand the lengths this man was willing to go to in order to get what he wanted.”

“Can I see him?” she asks, peering around me to get a quick glance at him.

“Are you sure?” She nods. “Okay, but don’t let his appearance scare you. His face is worse than his body.”

“And I’m sure Silas is the one to blame?”

I just laugh, walking over toAxel. With a tight grip, I yank his head up, revealing his slightly disfigured face. God, it looks fucking horrendous. Silas has spent maybe a little too much time in here recently.

His mouth resembles a Chelsea smile, both corners have been sewn up multiple times, until the stitches are yanked out each time creating bigger scars. It’s like his entire right cheek has been Silas’s personal pin cushion.

Liana’s gasp fills the air as she slowly retreats towards the door, her chest heaving.

Releasing him, I walk to her in three long strides. “Hey, you’re okay.”

She thrashes her head side to side, shaking it with tremendous fear. “Can you—” She pauses, attempting to compose herself. “Can you show me his right bicep?”

“What for?” I query, stepping back once.

“Just show me… Please.”

Giving her a confused glance, I obey, walking back over to him and twisting his right arm to reveal a split skull tattoo with ghost-like skulls escaping it. “I never understood it,” I admit. “I’ve seen it hundreds of times and it never makes sense. I always thought tattoos had to have some sort of meaning behind them and maybe it does, but I can’t quite see the meaning here.”

She swallows. “I-it was his way of expressing himself,” she starts, her voice a mere whisper. “He was practically disowned as a teenager and we grew close because he and my brother were friends. We got matching tattoos, sort of. His was personal in the sense that he felt dead inside and the apparitions escaping the skull are his family, people who have been dead to him ever since.”

She takes her oversized hoodie off her own arm and reveals a similar one. “My tattoo tells a different story. In life, there will always be death, but from the soil that’s tossed into their space in the earth, flowers grow.”

“Come with me,” I say, almost excited. “I have something else to show you.”

She shakes her head again. “Release him, Dario. H-he doesn’t belong there like a puppet for your pleasure. He’s a fucking good man.”

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