Page 5 of Savage Saint
“Why?” I say, annoyed at this whole thing taking so long. I want this conversation to be over already. I want to be out of here and back in my house. Or out finding a target, getting my hands dirty. Anything to not be thinking of hospitals. And blue eyes that can’t give me a fucking rest.
“We think she might have been trafficked,” Dante says.
My eyes snap to his in shock. “Under our noses?” I mean, we’ve had suspicions that Nico’s Blackriver Kittens were more than just stripping, but trafficking?
“She has his tattoo.”
“Okay. Maybe she used to strip for him.”
“It’s fresh and infected. Like someone has done it in a hurry just to mark her,” Luca says.
“You’ve seen it?” I growl at him, my fist clenching at the thought of someone ogling her frail body while she’s unconscious.
“No,” he lifts his hands in a placating motion. “The doctor who examined her told us. She’s got the Blackriver Kitten tattoo, the one all Nico’s strippers get. But there’s one more thing—” he hesitates, exchanging a tense look with Dante.
“What is it?” I ask as Alessa bursts into tears.
3
ANGELO
Ilook between my siblings and future sister-in-law, waiting for someone to tell me what the hell is going on. The weight in the room presses against my chest, a familiar suffocation I haven’t felt since the day my mother died. It’s the same sensation I felt standing in that shipping container earlier, like the walls were closing in, trapping me in someone else’s nightmare. The air feels heavy, tinged with antiseptic and something bitter, like dread made tangible. There is a distinct buzzing in the background—the fluorescent lights—amplifying the silence that stretches uncomfortably long. For the first time in years, fear coils around my rib cage, squeezing tighter with each passing second.
Alessa’s quiet sobs are muffled by her hands, causing Dante to pull her into his chest, his large hands gently cradling her head as though she’s the most precious thing. His grip looks protective, but his knuckles are pale with restrained anger, a stark contrast against her dark hair. It’s strange to see my brother like this, so tender, so human. Dante’s always been the controlled one, the born leader, but moments like these remind me that love has made him soft in ways I don’t understand. Soft,but not weak. He still has his edge, carrying his ruthlessness like a badge of honour, but now it’s tempered by something I’ll never have. Not that I want it. There’s no space for love in the life I lead.
Dante looks me in the eye, swallowing before looking away. My heart races, a primal instinct screaming at me that I won’t like whatever I’m about to hear.
“She’s been branded,” he says, his voice low.
“What?” My heart races. The word feels foreign, surreal, as though it doesn’t belong in this room. I must have misheard him.
“Branded,” he repeats, the weight of the word suffocating. “She’s got the letterNbranded on her hip.”
A sharp, electric jolt shoots through my chest, leaving behind a hollow ache. I try to swallow, but my throat is as dry as the desert. The thought of someone reducing another human being to a mark, stripping them of their humanity—it’s revolting. And worse, it’s a mark of Nicolosi, the man who’s been the bane of our existence. The man who just made this war personal.
I swallow, or at least I try to, but my mouth comes up dry, unable to clear the bile that’s threatening to rise in the back of my throat. I think of my mother, of her trembling hands clutching mine as she fought through her last days. I think of the promises I made to myself after her death, that I would protect, that I would never let harm come to the innocent, that I wouldn’t become my father. And yet here I am, facing the kind of darkness even I never anticipated.
“We don’t know why,” Alessa sniffles. “But there’s really not that many reasons someone gets branded against their will.”
“Nicolosi?” The question slips from my lips on a whisper, but Dante must hear me.
“Most likely.” His jaw tight as he pulls Alessa closer to him, shielding her from the conversation. His shoulders are rigid, and the vein in his temple pulses like a slow, steady drumbeat ofanger. There’s something in his expression, a mix of rage and helplessness, that cuts through me. Dante doesn’t let himself feel powerless often. When he does, it shakes the foundation of everything around him.
“And we’re sure it was against her will?” I croak out, cursing myself for even asking, but I need clarity.
Alessa’s voice is shaky, muffled by Dante’s chest. “She’s covered in bruises, and there are scabs around her wrists and ankles like she’s been tied but tried to escape. And the burn is... it doesn’t look good.”
Her words conjure images I don’t want to see: raw skin seared with metal, the smell of burning flesh, the way she must’ve screamed. My stomach churns, bile threatening to rise. Bruises and scabs, evidence of a struggle, of defiance. She fought back. Whoever did this to her tried to break her, but she fought back.
“Fuck,” I hiss, fists clenching. The anger in me boils over, threatening to explode. I’ve seen a lot of horrific things in my life, things I’ve done, things I’ve witnessed, but this feels different. It’s not just violence; it’s control, humiliation, a methodical stripping away of someone’s soul.
“What are we going to do, then?” My mind races with solutions, none of them good. Every one of them involves blood, pain, and making Nico suffer in ways he could never imagine. I don’t just want him dead—I want him to beg for death.
“Wait for her to wake up and return her home, of course,” Luca states, as if his word is law. His voice, usually a source of wit and sharp insights, grates on me. It’s not that he’s wrong, it’s the casualness of it, the dismissal of her situation as though it’s a problem to be filed away and forgotten. My chest hollows at the idea. What if she doesn’t have a home to return to? What if this is all she’s ever known? What if we send her back to hell?Fuck that.
“What if—” I start.
“We make sure she’s cared for. And treated kindly. God knows what she’s been through before you found her,” Alessa interrupts. “We need to make sure she wasn’t sold to him before contacting anyone about her. There are real monsters out there.”
