Page 76 of His Savage Ruin
I don't want to do this—don't want to pull these memories out and examine them in the light, don't want her to see the terrified boy I was before I learned to be ruthless. But she's asked, and something about the way she's holding me makes me believe she can handle the truth.
"I knew something was wrong the second we walked in. The positioning was off." I can still feel the concrete under my boots, hear the echo of our footsteps in that empty space, smell the industrial cleaner they'd used to scrub the floor that couldn't quite mask the scent of old violence. "Then the first shot came before anyone could move."
"Your guards?"
"Dead before they hit the ground." I swallow hard, and I can feel my pulse hammering in my wrists the same way it did that night, terror and adrenaline making everything too sharp, too clear. "Then there were guns on my father. Four of them pointing at his head, his chest. And Arian was standing there with this knife in his hand—the knife my father had given him as a wedding present."
Her arms tighten around me. "The knife that did this?" She touches the scar again and I nod.
"He grabbed me when I tried to fight, twisted my arm behind my back." The memory makes my breath catch because I can still feel his fingers digging into my bicep, still feel the panic of being held immobile while my father stood there surrounded by enemies. "He put the blade right here, and the metal was cold against my skin, sharp enough I felt it break through before he even pressed down." My throat wants to close, wants to stop me from saying the rest, but I force the words out. "He said—" Christ, I can hear his voice in my head, can hear exactly how calm he sounded, how reasonable, like he was giving me advice about homework instead of holding a knife to my face while men aimed guns at my father.
"What?" Her voice is soft, careful. "What did he say?"
"That if I moved even an inch, Emilio would put a bullet in my brain and make my father watch me die before they killed him too. That I should stay very still and watch and learn." The words taste like battery acid coming up, burning my throat, making me want to spit them out and scrub my mouth clean. "Learn what happens to Romanos who don't bow to Moretti power."
She's quiet for a long moment, and I'm grateful for the silence because I need to breathe, need to remember that I'm here in the pool with Alessia and not back in that God forsaken warehouse with my uncle's knife cutting into my face. She just holds me, her heartbeat steady against my chest. "Did Emilio say anything?"
"Gave a whole fucking speech about territory, about respect, about my father being too proud and too stubborn to see that the world was changing." I can still see Emilio's face—that smile, cold and certain, like he was explaining basic arithmetic. "About how this was business, nothing personal, just the natural order of things. Then he put the gun to my father's head, and I tried to move—tried so hard to break free, to do something, anything—but Arian just pressed the knife deeper, cutting me, and whispered that it would be over soon. "
The gunshot echoes in my skull, loud enough that I flinch even now, seventeen years later and hundreds of bodies between that moment and this one. Alessia feels it, presses closer.
"I'm sorry." Her whisper breaks something in my chest.
"The sound. It was so loud in that enclosed space, so impossibly loud that I couldn't hear anything else for minutes after, just this ringing in my ears that wouldn't stop. And then he just... dropped." Her hand finds mine beneath the water, laces our fingers together, and I grip her so hard I'm probably hurting her but I can't make myself let go.
"And your uncle?"
"He spit on my father's body while his blood was still spreading across the floor, while I was still being held with a knife to my face." Rage surges hot and immediate, makes my pulse spike and my vision narrow. I want to kill him again, want to make it slower and more painful, want to make him feel a fraction of what I felt. "My own blood. Standing over my father's corpse,spitting on him like he was garbage. While Emilio laughed and his men joined in, all of them laughing at the Romano don bleeding out on a warehouse floor. And then he left."
"How did you get away?"
"Emilio let me go because he thought I was broken, thought watching my father die would destroy whatever fight I had left." The humiliation of it still burns—being dismissed as harmless, as too young and too traumatized to be a threat, being patted on the head like a child who'd just learned a hard lesson. "Said I was just a boy, too broken to be dangerous. That I should go home and remember this night every time I thought about challenging Moretti authority."
"But it didn't break you."
"It didn't break me." My hand tightens on hers. "I took my father's gun from his body, and it was still warm from his hand, still had his fingerprints in the blood on the grip. And I hunted Arian down like the animal he was."
Her breath catches. "You killed him."
"Found him six miles away in a safe house, celebrating with Moretti money." I can still smell the cordite from the shots, still feel the recoil traveling up my arms, still see the surprise on his face when he realized the broken boy had followed him. "Walked in, put two bullets in his chest so he'd know it was coming. Then I waited while he choked on his own blood, waited until he looked me in the eyes and understood exactly what his betrayalhad cost him. Then one more bullet in his head to make sure he was finished, and then I took his knife and I carved our crest into his fucking corpse so everyone who found him would know a Romano had done it."
Silence settles between us, just water lapping and cicadas and her breathing against my neck, and I wait for her to pull away, to realize she's holding a monster who killed his own uncle at seventeen and felt nothing but satisfaction.
"I was seventeen," I say again, quieter now. "And I'd just inherited an empire I had no fucking idea how to hold on to it."
"But you did." Her hand cups my face, forcing me to look at her. "You survived."
"Barely survived those first few months." The admission scrapes out, and I hate how vulnerable it makes me sound, but she's already seen the worst of me and hasn't run yet. "That first month after I took over, I had to prove I wasn't easy prey. Had to show everyone that the boy died in that warehouse and what remained would break anyone who tested me."
"That's when you becameIl Diavolo."
"That's when I became what I needed to be to stay alive." I touch the scar again, feeling the raised tissue that's been with me longer than I've been without it. "This reminds me every time I look in a mirror. That trust is a knife waiting to cut you. That mercy is weakness that gets you killed. That the only way tosurvive in this world is to be harder, colder, more ruthless than everyone else who wants what you have."
Dawn lightens the sky—deep purple fading to pink.
She's quiet for a long moment, studying my face in the growing light, then: "Do you really believe that?"
"I have to believe it because it's kept me alive this long."
