Page 45 of The Beast's Broken Beauty

A heavy sigh escapes me, the weight of realization crushing. "All those doubts, maybe even that revenge—it's him playing with my mind, making me see how much I fucked everything up. How much I've always been his puppet, dancing on bloody strings."

The weight of it all presses down like a mountain of stone, suffocating, crushing. I don't want to keep thinking about my mistakes, my failures, the blood on my hands.

And yet there's one last truth—the one I've never shared with anyone. The one that might change how she sees me forever. But I have to tell her. The words burn in my throat, acid and fire, demanding release.

This truth I've kept buried under mountains of pain and rage. Something her father knew and used to manipulate me from the very beginning. One of the reasons I sought his protection, desperate to become someone he'd be proud of. Someone who could stand tall and make damn sure no one—no one—would ever hurt what was mine again.

"I had a brother."

The words hang in the air between us, three simple syllables that cost me everything to speak aloud.

The words hang in the air like smoke after gunfire. Isabella stares at me, those eyes that have haunted my fucking dreams for months now wide with shock, her lips parted like they were last night when I made her come apart beneath my tongue.

The firelight cuts across her face, turning shadows into demons that match the ones clawing at my insides. I can feel them scraping beneath my skin, taunting me with truths I've buried deeper than bodies in the Mediterranean.

Because I wasn't strong enough. Not then. Not now.

My brother.

"What did you just say?" Her voice barely reaches me, soft as a blade sliding between ribs. The way she's looking at me—like I'm something worth understanding—makes me want to put my fist through the nearest wall.

I swallow hard, jaw clenched tight enough to crack teeth. This isn't the confession I planned. This is weakness. This is giving her ammunition she could use to destroy whatever's left of me. But the words are already climbing up my throat like they've been locked away too fucking long.

"Angelo," I rasp, the name scraping like gravel. "My father was higher up in the Falcone family—but he wanted to leave. He thought he could. Fucking idiot didn't realize that once you leave, there's no protection anymore." I pause, muscles coiling tight beneath my skin. "That's why I'm changing this. Why nobody leaves my organization without backup."

I shake my head, hating how my brain is trying to drag me back to the boardroom instead of facing the blood-soaked memories threatening to drown me. My scarred fingers close around the tumbler of whiskey, knuckles white with strain.

"One day, the Falcone's sworn enemies raided our house and killed my little brother."

The words rip out of me like bullets, and suddenly I'm there again—the scent of blood thick enough to choke on, gunpowder burning my nostrils, screams that still echo in my nightmares.

I can see Angelo's eyes staring up at me, empty and accusing at the same time. My little brother with his gap-toothed grin and bruised knees, the kid who used to follow me around like I hung the fucking moon. The same kid whose blood soaked through my shirt as I held him, begging him to stay.

The kid I failed.

The whiskey burns as I down it in one swallow, embracing the fire that spreads through my chest. Better than the ice that's been there since that day. Better than the hollow echo where my heart used to beat.

"My father begged them not to," I continue, voice dropping to something darker than hatred. "He fucking begged them... he didn't fight them. Didn't put his body in front of him." The glass shatters in my grip, shards digging into flesh already mapped with scars. I don't flinch. "I respected him until I saw how he was no match against the violence. He froze."

Blood drips from my palm to the floor, crimson on stone. Isabella's gaze follows it, and there's something in her expression that makes my chest constrict. Something too close to understanding.

I don't deserve her understanding. I don't want it.

"But as I look at you, Isabella," I force myself to meet her eyes, to face the damage I've done, "I see the truth I've been avoiding, the truth I can't escape anymore."

The words come out like they're being dragged over razors, each one leaving me bleeding. "You were right. About me. About everything. I know I can't change the past, no matter how badly I want to. I can't undo the damage I've done, the fucking pain I've put you through. I've turned into the very thing I hated, the monster I never wanted to become."

My brother would hate the man I became. He wanted out—away from the death, away from the fear. Instead, he got both in spades.

I take a breath, feeling like I'm inhaling broken glass. Isabella's scent—honeysuckle and something uniquely her—wraps around me, making this confession more intimate than it has any right to be. "And I don't know if there's any going back from that. The darkness, the rage, the fucking agony... they're part of me now, just like the scars I carry. They define me, remind me of the bastard I've let myself become."

My voice drops to something raw and wounded, a sound I barely recognize as my own. "I'm sorry, Bell'cenda. I know it's not enough, that it can't erase the hell I've put you through. The ways I've hurt you, broken your trust, shattered the love you once had for me."

She flinches at the old nickname, and the pain in her eyes hits harder than any bullet I've ever taken.

"In the end, your father got what he wanted. He turned me into the weapon he always intended me to be. And I lost. I lost myself, my soul, everything that ever fucking mattered."

I step closer, the space between us charged with something more dangerous than hatred. "But I won't let him hurt you anymore. Not you, not Elena, not Naomi, not anyone in this goddamn fortress. I'll burn everything to ash before I let him touch any of you."

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