Page 34 of In the Dark

Thank God.

His grip loosened just enough for me to break free for about half a second.

Or maybe half a heartbeat. It was long enough to see what they’d come for, to see a man in a ski mask kneel at the corner of the rug.

They’d come for my uncle’s safe. I lunged, but pain exploded in my abdomen as another fist slammed into the fresh wound, forcing me to collapse to my knees.

“Hold that bitch and stop fighting,” someone snapped.

Two sets of hands pinned me down while I writhed and fought.

“Stop.” One hand grabbed my hair and slammed it back into the floor. “Fighting.”

He did it again, and my vision went black for a moment.

Again.

And I was out.

It had to be for more than a moment this time, because when I came to and groaned in pain, no one was holding me down. I blinked a few times and felt liquid seeping across my arm from my head. I glanced down and saw the blood. It was such a pretty red that mixed with the black and blue of my hair. I wondered if the bruises I would have tomorrow on my face would match too.

If I lived till tomorrow.

I could only watch as they peeled back the rug. Then, the men were efficient and cranking on the floorboards one by one until they found the safe. One man sat close and seemed to listen as he worked the lock. He was practiced at opening them because it swung open in one try. Then, they rifled through the contents. Cash. Documents. A black ledger.

A flash drive.

It had fake passports of ours, maybe a couple thousand dollars. Our reports on flash drives. I knew all the information there. When it came to the accounts, my memory was near photographic, I swear. I’d studied them front to back.

The only thing I didn’t recognize, they didn’t see.

Up under the large oak desk my father had in this room that Paolo had adopted and never changed was a small crack. It was the exact spot I used to tap on for my father to stop working. It wasn’t supposed to be there—it was too clean of a crack.

So clean like it had been carved out.

My uncles had never shown me. My aunt had never pointed it out.

It meant they didn’t know it was there either. It meant my father had done it.

And for some reason, I felt focused on that only. Not on what the men were doing, not on what they were stealing, just on that marring of the wood.

No one was paying enough attention to me to catch the movement.

As they stood to leave, one crouched down in front of me, tilting my chin up with a gloved finger. I didn’t so much as breathe when we locked eyes. I tried to focus on his features, but I saw three of him rather than one. He didn’t look away as he brought a phone to his ear after pressing a button.

“You said there would be more money,” he murmured, and then, “Yeah, I’ll be sure.”

Fuck. They were going to slit my throat to “be sure.”

He hung up the phone and said, “Pity we have to gut you now, sweetheart.”

He shoved my face aside, and I made my move quickly. I scrambled for a weapon as men descended on me. I was more than injured, though. So weak, I actually grumbled to myself that I was a little bitch and to knock it off. Mothers could lift cars off their babies. There had to be some hidden adrenaline I could tap into.

For a moment, all I could hear was my heartbeat pounding in my ears.

Then the pain hit all at once. Catastrophic into my stomach again as I rolled and kicked and screamed. They’d attacked the same place, stabbing deep into my center. I took the sharp pin from my hair. It was a last-ditch effort, but I swung it at my aggressor.

The gurgle and stumbling I heard after meant I’d got him where it mattered.