Page 37 of Deadly Vows

My small squeaks fill the room, accompanied by tears as he leaves me in only my bra and panties, but when his eyes meet mine, I see no lust behind his gaze.

“If you were anyone else, you would have been dead a long time ago. But you’re you. And you’ve… crawled into my mind like a parasite, crumbling all my resolve regarding you,” he says.

“L-luca,” I whisper as my shivers grow violent. Luca’s eyes shift to my body, noting how cold I am, but does nothing to resolve it. It must be at least thirty degrees at this point. But he shifts, gripping my chin with his gloved hand as he speaks.

“Rooms like this are designed to derange the mind. It helps when I’m in a time crunch to get information.” Luca’s hand drifts from my chin to my arms, where chills have appeared. “The mind is a fragile thing. It wasn’t made for extreme conditions. So instead of listening to the logic part, the part that warns younot to give information that can get you and everyone you love killed, it compels you to reveal anything you can for the sake of ending the pain.”

Luca inhales a deep breath, standing. I whimper as the warmth of his touch disappears, leaving me a trembling mess.

“Unfortunately, you have no information that I want. In fact, I have all the information you need so that you’ll finally understand the position you are in,” he says.

I can barely focus on his words as my breathing becomes erratic from the chill settling in my bones. The unpleasantness of my body makes me want to scream and beg, but I don’t even know what I would be begging for at this point.

Mercy?

As if Luca would ever be so dumb to grant me something like that after what I’ve done. The sound of a lighter pulls me from my suffering, and I look up to see that Luca has lit another cigarette. I envy the small white stick as the flame kisses it, enveloping it in warmth while I shiver only feet away.

Luca takes a deep drag, his eyes never leaving me as he exhales.

“Sometimes, I wonder if my father making me marry you was God’s way of punishing me for what I’ve done. For as long as I’ve lived, I’ve hated the Trovolis. But my father insisted that it was for the good of our family that I marry you.” Luca releases a bitter chuckle, staring at the ceiling.

“I warned him against trusting you people. Someone who would do what Eli Trovoli did to your mother fears no one. Not even God. And your mother learned that the hard way,” he finishes taking another pull of his cigarette.

“He kept it a secret, you know. The truth behind her death? He used it as a ploy to get the Trovolis to go to war, but the truth is, he sent her to her death. He’d had his son by then. And needed to tie off loose ends,” he says, eyeing me.

“You’re lying!” I scream.

The tears streaming down my face leave a burning trail from the chill in the air. They don’t have enough heat to fall, so they stick to my face, leaving a frosted trail on my cheeks.

“Your father wanted power. His family is the same. I’m sure your cousin fed you some bullshit line about the family needing you now that Eli is gone even though they didn’t care to protect you before that,” he says.

“She wanted touseyou, just like Eli, for the same exact reasons,” he says.

“Shut up! You’re a liar!” I screech. I lift my hands to place them over my ears, but the cuffs prevent me from doing so, holding me firm to the cot. Luca soaks in my distress in satisfaction as he stands over me.

“I’m very serious. Wanna know how I know?” he asks, kneeling before me. I shake my head vigorously. I don’t want to know, which gives Luca all the ammunition he needs to reveal it.

“Because I found the bastard child your father kept hidden. And his mother was all too eager to give me information on everything she knew for the right price. That not only included the location of the one threat to your life, but the incident of your mother finding out about the indecent affair, and for trying to get rid of his mistress and bastard, your father had her killed,” he says.

“And guess who just turned seventeen when your cousin miraculously showed up to whisk you away?” he laughs, gauging my reaction.

If not for the cold, I would throw up from the information he gave. In a matter of seconds, Luca has shattered the fragile reality I already lived in. My entire life... meaningless. Every stitch of pain Luca has suffered in the past few months is because my family is so desperate for this dream to be realized. And now Luca has located the half-brother who is a threat tomy life, who is the reason my mother is dead. Even Ari, who I thought would never betray me, only showed up to take me away, probably to trade me for my half-brother’s life. And while Ari’s true intentions are an even bigger betrayal, I find myself clinging to Luca’s revelation about my father.

“Y-you knew? This… entire… time?” I manage through clenched teeth.

“Of course, Elise,” he says.

I shake my head. “…How?” I ask.

Luca’s smile widens as he crosses the room, kneeling in front of me on the cot. His eyes take in every piece of my shivering form as he places his cigarette between his lips.

“Like I would ever tell a Trovoli.” His eyes are cold as he speaks. He rises, making his way to the door, and I flinch as the lights go out, plunging me into darkness. Luca offers me no words of comfort as the heavy creak of the door closing sounds, leaving me alone in the freezing room.

Chapter Seventeen

Luca

Love is a strange thing. In my family, it was given freely. My father was proud to have me as his son before I ever took my first steps—my first words—a life. He was excited about the things he believed I would accomplish. He knew, from the moment of my birth, that no matter what direction I took my life in, he would love and support me unconditionally.

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