Page 87 of Violent Pawn

“Cara mia.” My hand shifts from the wheel to her face, thumb ghosting over the teardrop before she jerks away, snarling.

“Don’t touch me. Don’t ever touch me again. Do not look at me. Do not speak to me. I don’t want to hear one more lie out of your mouth.”

“Can I explain?”

Motion in my peripheral vision reveals Zeno leaning against the warehouse’s entrance, his arms crossing as he watches the scene there’s not enough alcohol in the world to drag me through.

“Explain how you got close to me, fucked me, and then stole my father’s information from my phone?” Rage pours off her, an uncontainable energy that even she recognizes, since her next step is from the vehicle itself, the car door swinging near my legs.

“I asked for it months ago.”

Her entire body twitches. “And that makes it okay?”

“No. That wasn’t why I slept with you. I like you, Ana.”

She barks out a single laugh, harsh from emotion and tears. “I don’t think you know the meaning of that word. So if it wasn’t why you slept with me, stealing from me was a bonus?”

“Yes.”

“You killed him, Nero! You murdered my father!”

Zeno straightens from the doorway as she slams her fists into my chest, right over the heart that’s breaking apart with her every tear. Every tear I’ve made her shed. Nothing will ever heal this part of me because I shouldn’t have done it.

Not to her. Not to the woman who was starting to call my heart hers.

“Sì, because⁠—”

“My papa!” Another hit.

“I’m sorry.”

“Sorry?” She slams two fists into my chest. “Sorry doesn’t change what you stole from me. From Lev!”

“Your father deserved⁠—”

Rage like nothing before, not even upstairs, consumes her. She’s all limbs, hitting and kicking and scratching, and all I do is take it, feeling the impacts of bruises both internal and physical. I let her, realizing the second my knife slid along her father’s throat, this thing between us, which had an actual shot of being something, was ruined.

My first act after boarding the commercial flight was to order a drink. As I downed the shot-sized bottle, it dawned on me that I stopped drinking so much when in Anastasia’s presence. With her around, she has become my addiction. I may not have had her for long, but the snarky attitude and games were enough. They were healing parts I never knew were broken until they stopped hurting.

If I stayed in her bed, if I woke up with her in my arms and got to see what she looks like with the sun hitting her face and maybe even make her breakfast in bed, or at the very least, showered with her, things could be different now. We could be different.

“You think I’m unaware of what my father fucking deserved? You think I don’t know the pain he caused the world? You have no idea what he’s done to me—to Lev and me. You assume I’m angry because the asshole is dead?” She releases one shrill humourless laugh that belongs in the deepest depths of prison. “I’ll be the first to spit on that man’s grave and burn garbage on top, and that is my point. You took what was mine. Mine and my brother’s. You stole his death from us, all for what? Petty, old feuding reasons. You have zero fucking idea what he’s done to Lev and me, but I’ll bet every coin in my bank that your problems won’t even cover the top layer of ours.”

Shit… I breathe for the first time since her initial hit, but it doesn’t help. Rather, my lungs shrivel up and become useless organs. I didn’t know—didn’t think… Fuck.

“Anastasia, I—” My hand lifts, attempting to appeal.

“No.” She smacks it away, replacing it with a nail in my chest. “No, you don’t get to speak right now. The feud that existed between our organizations—which I hope you enjoyed because I will single-handedly raze the entire Cosa Nostra for what you’ve done, so enjoy war, asshole. Hope it was worth his death.”

Zeno doesn’t even look fazed by that comment, which from anyone else, would be a death sentence.

“I need one more thing from you. One single word. A yes or a no. Were your issues with him worse than mine and my brother’s? Were you thrown into prison repeatedly when you were a teenager, all because you didn’t obey a command? Were you beaten up and forced to survive a room full of grown-ass men, all of whom despised and blamed the Bratva? All because you’d rather fiddle with computers than shoot a gun?”

This time when she hits, I stagger backwards a step. This time, it’s Lev in my mind.

“Were you trained—yes, trained—to seduce grown-ass men when you were fourteen years old? Were you taught how to poison drinks and use knives and rope and every other deadly paraphernalia, to murder? Were you taught how to combine those two—to seduce men and accept their offers back to their hotel rooms, all to have to fuck them, kill them, and watch him take the credit?”

This time, her hit physically drops me to my knees. Zeno approaches, but his attention and concern remains on the woman about to slit my throat.