Page 42 of Kadra: The Unfeeling

My heart stops dead when I see his bed is made but he’s nowhere near it. Just before I lose my shit, I see him lying on the floor in a fetal position holding on to his knife.

“Fuck.” I whisper harshly, dying a little bit inside. Walking towards him, I gently pick him up in my arms. The second his head touches my chest, time seems to slow down. Looking down at his little face, I see myself in him and a little bit of my brothers too. The first time I laid eyes on him I tried to find something that reminded me of his mother but nothing. How can I? When I don’t even remember the woman. She’s faceless just like the rest. It might make me a cruel bastard but that’s the truth. Sex has always been meaningless. Nights that I forget soon after. Now Azariel is the reminder of one of those nights.

He’s a big boy. Not a baby. I missed that. I didn’t get to have that and I will forever regret it. But I’m here now and I’m not leaving. Ever. I carefully place him on the bed, pull the covers up to his chin, and leave the knife in his hand even though he won’t need it. Not as long as I’m here. I’ll be his sword and his shield too but if it makes him feel strong and in control then so be it.

Azariel snorts softly, making me smile.

He looks like me and at times acts like it too. There’s no denying it.

Reaching forward I brush his raven lock back from his face. “I’ve made them bleed for you, malen’ kiy korol.” I whispered fiercely. “I won’t stop until they all bleed and you both don’t have to share a world with that filth. They don’t get to breathe the same air as you both.” I vow, knowing I won’t stop until I make it happen.

Taking one last long look at my son, I leave the room, closing the door gently behind me.

I noticed soon after I woke up in this mansion that all of Kadra’s men guard the home from the outside and not the inside. Only Vernon, the African American man whose name I learned is Lenox and the other fuck, Crow, are allowed inside her home.

Walking down the same hall, I go in search of her. While I walk I take notice of everything. Every corner of this mansion is her.

This place is not as big as the Parisi mansion but it’s still grand in every sense of the word from its size to its expensive taste in decor. It’s her. Somehow every corner of this place feels like her.

When I reached the last door, I noticed a light slipping through the gap. Pushing the door slowly, I step inside what looks like a home library. Not one you would imagine most people have in their homes, no. This room has bookcases for walls. Rows and rows of books. It reminds me of those libraries back in ancient times. Bookcases made of hardwood, oak I’m guessing. It makes the entire library seem more elegant and rustic at the same time.

Walking farther inside the home library, I take in the rows of colorful books on one side and then the classics that tend to be almost lifeless in color. Neutral. That’s more my Kadra. Reaching forward I grab one of the colorful books and notice a naked man using a Santa Claus hat to cover his cock. Huh.

“Put it back.” A sweet, sweet voice that belongs to my temptress orders in a bored tone. Turning around toward the sound of her voice, I find her sitting comfortably next to the window with a newspaper in hand. Doing as she says, I put the book back before walking her way. It doesn’t escape me that I can breathe easily when she’s nearby. When she’s gone it feels as if the air is missing from my lungs. Shit. What has this woman turned me into?

“You don’t seem like the type…” Raising my gaze, I look at her face and I have to remind myself to breathe. She ditched the tight leather clothes and let her hair fall around her face in loose mahogany waves. She always looks otherworldly to me but there’s something about her without makeup on and her hair loose that makes the heart inside my chest stop. How lovely…

“The type?” She arches a thick eyebrow in a silent challenge.

There’s the attitude I love.

“The type who reads romance stories with naked men on the cover,” I smile when her eyes narrow and her nostrils flare, a clear sign that she’s not too pleased with me at the moment or my comment.

“Very judgmental of you,” she says and I shrug like I couldn’t care less. Then she looks away from me and towards the books on the wooden shelves. “I’m not, but my sister is. Those are hers.”

She has a library filled with books she doesn’t read but her sister does.

“Did your sister leave them here or did you buy every one of those books?” I see my question catches her off guard by the way her posture becomes rigid. Silence falls between us before she speaks again, dismissing my question.

“Do you make a habit of entering places without knocking, Solonik?” She closes the newspaper and places it on her lap. Then out of nowhere, the ugliest fucking cat hisses at me before jumping on Kadra’s lap. Of course, she wouldn’t have a normal pet. She wouldn’t be her if she did. So rare. One of a kind.

Leaning back against one of the bookshelves, my eyes fall to the newspaper in her lap. Washington Weekly.

Ahhhh. You can try and fool the world into thinking you’re heartless but I know better. A heartless woman wouldn’t be reading her sister’s newspaper. She certainly wouldn’t keep old newspapers from said sister all over her home. Especially when it’s all news from another state with nothing to do with Detroit.

A cold woman who doesn’t care about others wouldn’t fill a room with countless books of genres she does not read. Books her little sister does.

She can fool herself all she wants but never me.

I see what lies beneath all that anger and all that pain.

Unconditional love and a light that never fades.

Crossing my arms over my chest, I say. “The door was open.” She left the door open just like she left it open before leaving to torch the Parisi hotels.

“And?” She gently scratches behind the cat’s ear. The irony that she looks like a comic book villain right now doesn’t escape me. “Just because a door is open, it does not mean you can enter without announcing yourself first. Did you forget your manners? That is if you had any to begin with, of course.”

I smile at that.

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