Page 1 of De Luca: The Saint

Part One

Chapter One

Damian

The rain pours from the angry sky as if mimicking my every emotion. Darkness is closing in, threatening to consume me. Kat stands before me with her drenched dark hair clinging to her skin. My fucking everything pulling away from me, the way I always knew she would. Our worlds don’t align. They never did, never could.

“I can’t do this anymore,” she shouts loud enough to hear over the thundering sky. Lightning strikes, thunder rolls, and the ground vibrates under my feet.

Normally, a person would jump from the ear-piercing boom, but I don’t.

I’m frozen. Immobile. Fucking broken.

She shakes her head as if trying to clear her thoughts. Unshed tears fill her eyes, mixing with the rain, gripping my heart. I fucking hate it when she cries. I want to take the pain away, I need to make everything okay. It’s not okay. It never will be.

I reach for her, but she jumps back, “Don’t. I can’t.”

Kat turns and walks away from me.

Pain.

Excruciating pain.

This is why mobsters don’t fall in love with wholesome women. Katherina Kennedy is an angel. She’s too good for Earth and far too good for me. More than once, I wondered if she was sent here to save my soul. Impossible. She couldn’t save me. I’m too far gone. Forever broken. Fixing me is like trying to glue a shattered glass back together.

I’m fighting the beast within that wants to throw her over my shoulder and keep her under lock and key. I want her to need me like I do her. She doesn't. I'm letting her go because the unbearable truth is she deserves a better man. A man I could never be.

I’m everything bad. Good and evil can’t have a happy ever after. The sacrifice is too great.

I watch as she gets further into the distance, barely recognizable to my eyes.

Pain.

I clutch my chest as the anguish threatens to destroy me. I already know it will. I am a shell of a man without her. Before she came into my life, it was dark. Miserable. Empty. Fucking random women to ease the ache. Never feeling a goddamn thing. This is my existence.

Broken. Shattered. Complete devastation.

Kat’s taking her light with her, once again I’m in the dark. Mere hours ago, I was inside her, and now, I’ll never fucking touch her again.

All because of my pathetic need to be honest.

She asked, and I swore I’d never lie to her. Kat wanted to know the truth, but now she left me. I should’ve fucking lied. I would’ve done anything to hold onto the one good thing I had. Too good. I thought she had accepted me for who I am. How could she? We never made sense. It’s insanity at its finest, I knew it then and I know it now but it doesn’t ease the ache. I can never come back from this. Kat will go on, meet an accountant or some boring ass shit like that, and I’ll live forever alone. Exactly as it’s meant to be.

They say misery loves company, but misery doesn’t deserve company.

I didn’t choose this life. It chose me. I never walked away from it either, not even knowing it could cost me Katherina. I knew this day would come when I held her for the first time, and it has. Knowing didn’t prepare me for it. Nothing could’ve prepared me for the worst day of my life.

I stand staring as she disappears from view. I never should’ve told her. That’s the bullshit about hindsight. I should’ve held her longer, tighter. I should’ve cherished her taste even more than normal. Should’ve, could’ve, and would’ve all pave the way to my personal hell.

The sorrow turns to anger as dark as the black sky. Katherina Kennedy is my ultimate destroyer. She ruined me, and I’ll never breathe another breath without thinking of her. She gave me oxygen, gave me life, but now she has taken it away. I live a life of no regrets, or at least I did before her. Now, I regret losing her, but more than anything, I regret ever fucking loving her.

Chapter Two

Kat

Most girls my age are either in college or getting ready to go to college. It was never in the cards for me. I wish it were. Instead, I spend my nights at Devil, a popular nightclub owned by a family of mobsters. My mother would be very disappointed in me if she knew. I told her I was working in a coffee shop. The last thing I need is my anxiety-riddled mom worrying about me working with a bunch of criminals. I tried to find another job before landing this one, this wasn’t my first choice. After thirty interviews and no bites, I jumped at my first opportunity. How could I possibly say no?

I don’t know many twenty-one-year-olds raking in over one hundred thousand dollars a year. I work for a family of four brothers. The two I’ve met have been polite which was surprising given what they do for a living. Domenic and Drake were both friendly and seemed, dare I say it, nice. I know they kill people. Right? Isn’t that what mobsters do? Kill those they deem worthy of death.

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