Page 48 of The Chameleon

Turning, he stalked toward the man dangling from the ceiling—hands tied above his head, tape securely fastened against his lips.

“Why?” he asked, staring up into the terrified brown eyes he had loved since the day he met them.

The man muttered something under the tape.

“Oh, sorry. Let me help you with that.” Ares reached up and yanked the tape off the young man’s mouth.

The man let out a cry as the tape tore against his sensitive skin.

“Now. Tell me,brother. Why?”

The man who had been born exactly eight years and a day after Ares stared down at him, weeping and sniffling.

“Ares,please. I’m your brother.”

Ares stared into his brother’s eyes with hurt and disgust. He couldn’t understand why Abel, his own flesh and blood, would try and have him killed. The Sabarinos he understood. They weren’t family.

Studying the documents in the file he had obtained, Ares had learned that the Zitti family had taken advantage of Abel’s lackof money and hefty drug addiction and offered him a solution to both. Cash for intel on where the Sabarinos were so they could kill them, and free drugs for life. Ares wasn’t so sure this last part of the deal would have ever been held up once the hit had been carried out, but why had Abel tried to have his own brother killed as well?

It had been Abel who had informed Ares that the Zittis were on their way to kill the Sabarinos that day, and it had been Abel who suggested that he fly them out of the country. It wasn’t until after the flight took off that Arescalled his brother to inform him that he had stayed in Italy to gather some intel.

“So, why? Abel? Why did you want me dead?” Ares growled, slashing the knife across his brother’s chest.

Abel cried out as crimson leaked from his open wound.

Watching the liquid slide down his brother’s bare chest made the monster Ares kept locked away smile. There was something about the pain and the vulnerability that fed his beast’s hunger.

Ares knew that he needed to keep the beast locked away, only feeding it tastes every so often. Just enough to keep it satisfied and contained. He knew that if he ever gave in and let the beast out, it would consume him. Taking in all that rage and anger stemming back to his father’s murder and the years he spent hiding with his brother, trying to ensure their survival. All of it being released at once would decimate the world around him.

Yes, Ares knew that deep down inside him, he was majorly fucked in the head.

“Why?” Ares yelled, startling his brother.

After everything Ares had done for him. Saving Abel from the men who murdered his father, making sure that he had food to eat and clothing to wear, raising him, protecting him, andmaking sure that his brother had a chance at life. Why? Why? After all the sacrifices and struggles Ares had made for him.

This was the worst kind of betrayal he could have everimagined.

“Because. I was going to take over your business.”

Abel’s whispered words pulled Ares from his spiral of self-torment.

His what?

“My business?” Ares asked, confused by the words his brother had uttered.

His brother worked part-time for Ares as a driver and made easy deliveries when needed, but the man was a flake. No commitment, no follow-through. You were lucky if Abel showed up for work two days in a row. So, why, given his brother’s major drug addiction and lack of… everything, would his brother have wanted to take over Ares’s business?

“Yes, the gun trade. Mr. Zitti said I could take it over once you were dead.” Abel let out a sob. “He was even going to hook me up with his contact in Sicily to get me started.”

His contact? How stupid was his brother?

“You honestly thought that one of my biggest competitors was just going to hand you over my business once I was dead? Are you a fucking idiot?”

Ares couldn’t believe what he was hearing. He had been betrayed by his own brother for a chance to take over his business.

The thought made him sick.

“After everything that I’ve done for you, this is how you repay me? By trying to have me killed?” Ares was furious now. The thought that his brother wanted him dead was unfathomable. “I don’t get it. Why? Why Abel?” he shouted.

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