A weapon was nowhere in sight, but after removing the ring, my cursory examination revealed one fatal strike to the heart. Something thin. Sharp. Hard.
A needle-pointed stiletto blade, perhaps: a silent, easily-concealed weapon favored by assassins such as my brother.
I take a few steps closer, drop my voice. I already used the app on my phone to turn off the cameras and the microphones, cut the feed to the security room upstairs, but I trust no one at this point. If Julian has anything to say, I don’t want it overheard. “Tell me what happened,” I try again, “and I’ll make it a more peaceful death than you deserve.”
He replies so softly that I have to take another step forward to hear him. “I already told you. I came up from here, from the cells, and I found him there like that. Then Jack came in, and…” He shrugs. “But you don’t think it was me.”
“Don’t I?”
“I’d be dead already if you did.”
I have to smile at that. Julianus Aurelius Castellani, though I despise him, nevertheless knows me well. He’s made a study of me his whole life; some sense of self-preservation, I assume. After his mother died, my half-brother Julian was unloved and unwanted by all in the Family—except for our father.
He’s always known that as soon as I took the Castellani throne, I would kill him.
Except that I can’t. Not until I find out exactly what happened to my father.
Ciro Castellani, dead in his study, Julian standing over him…it wouldn’t take a genius to figure this one out. The problem is that what Julian says is true.
Idon’tbelieve he killed our father.
For one thing, our father was his sole protection. Eliminating Ciro Castellani would only hasten Julian’s demise. Look where he is now, after all.
And for another, the kill was too clean. Julian prefers theatrics.
The third reason, the one I hate to admit even to myself, is that the Family’s most competent hitman, Johnny Jacopo, also believes Julian to be innocent. Jacopo was the first to enter the room and find the tableaux: my golden-haired, red-handed half-brother standing over our dead father. And yet Jacopo is not convinced that this was one of Julian’s kills.
And no matter how much I hate Jacopo, I know he wouldn’t lie about something like this.
That doesn’t mean my brother doesn’t know something useful, of course. He’ll remain alive until I find out what he knows, until I find the killer and take my vengeance on my father’s behalf.
I may not have loved Ciro Castellani, but I know my duty. I will carry it out.
For now, I’ve had enough of my twisted half-brother. I turn my back and make for the door. Perhaps another night in these frigid, blood-soaked cells will make him talk. In the meantime, I have more pressing matters, including how, when, and where to announce my father’s death to the Family.
“You can’t keep me down here forever,” Julian calls after me.
I turn at the door with a laugh. “I can do whatever I want, little brother. I am Don Castellani now.”
But as I make my way back to the study, I wonder at the continuing emptiness I feel. I expected my ascension to make me whole. This is the moment I have been groomed for my entire life, after all: to take my place at the head of the Family. To lead them, to be loved by them, feared by them.
And yet I have never felt so alone.
* * *
When I enter the study, I’m startled to find the butler of Redwood Manor standing there, staring in gray-faced horror at the corpse. He jumps as I come back through the hidden door from the cells below, terror in his eyes.
“Have you called out for help?” I ask sharply.
He shakes his head, a jerky, unnatural motion.
“How did you get in here? I locked the door.”
He holds up a key in a shaking hand. “I came in to tidy up—I swear, sir, I found him like this.”
“Yes, yes,” I say impatiently. I’m searching for his name in my memory. For so long I’ve only called him Jeeves, a silly impertinence that amused me. But now I am Don Castellani, I must put such things behind me. “Wilson,” I say, finding his name at last. “This must be kept quiet. You understand?”
“I…” He passes a shaking hand over his face. I’ve never considered Wilson as apersonbefore, someone who might have reactions and feelings of his own. He’s been with our Family since I can even remember, a silent and loyal servant, perfectly attentive.
