Page 28 of Brando

“So you didn’t even try to hide it.”

“Didn’t think I had to.”

She lifts her head, turns to face me with her dazzling blues. “You turned out so fucking perfect, Brando.”

My hand stops moving through her hair as I look at her. She turns away quickly, embarrassed that she’s given away more of her feelings than she meant to.

“Perfection is perception, Mia.”

She says nothing but goes back to gently tracing her fingers along my inked skin.

“There’s almost no-where left if you wanted to get anymore,” she whispers. Her fingers only stop when I reply, my voice thick with sleep.

“There’s room,” I tell her, before I lift under her arms until she’s laying on top of me and we’re face to face. I catch her mouth with mine, my tongue darting out to taste her. I bruise her with my punishing kiss, holding her to me, trapping her in the cage of my arms. My dick twitches again, and it feels like he’s finally coming home after a long break away.

I turn her over onto her back, my hand on her chin, sliding down her neck as I continue to breathe new life into her. She thinks I turned out perfect, but there was no such word until Mia found her way back to me. This here is perfection. Having her by my side is as perfect as it could possibly get. All the women that came before her, the casual hookups and the short-term stints who I couldn’t manage to stay with past a month, there was never even so much as entertaining the idea of them staying. They were never keepers. They weren’t permanent. I never understood why, but now I do. If was because I had to go through them in order to understand what Mia would mean to me once she found her way back to me. I may not have known it then, but I sure do now.

15

MIA

The phone's shrill ring cuts through the stillness of my room, a foreboding harbinger in the quiet night. I hesitate, then reach with a steady hand, heart hammering against my ribs. “Hello?”

“Ah, Mia,” Frank's voice slithers through the line, cold and precise as a scalpel. “So good to hear your voice.”

“What do you want, Frank?” My voice is a controlled calm, belying the fear that twists in my gut.

“Why, we have much to discuss, Princess.”

“I told you to leave me alone,” I hiss down the line. His next words stop me dead in my tracks before I have a chance to hang up on him.

“Your sisters, Mia. I have them.” His words are like ice, and I feel their chill wrap around my bones as a cold fury engulfs me.

“Why? Why do you have them, Frank?”

“That’s what we need to discuss.”

“Are they safe? I swear, if you’ve…”

“For now.” The two words hang between us, fraught with unspoken threats. I shoot a hand to my temple, my shaking fingers drumming their anxious song against my skin.

“Let them go, Frank. What business do you have with my sisters?”

“You’re right,” he responds. “But I do have business with you.” There’s a theatrical pleasure in his tone, the kind that comes from holding all the cards.

“What do you want?” My voice is barely a whisper caressing my trembling lip. My fingers grip the phone with white-knuckled force, my heart beating so erratically I think it’s going to explode out of my chest.

“It’s simple, Mia. You, I want you. Come to me.” It's not a request; it's an ultimatum.

I close my eyes, breathe out a silent plea for strength. Frank's demand echoes in my head, a nightmare come to life. My sisters’ faces flash before me—innocent, scared. They have so much to live for, so many things to look forward to. The weight of their world rests on my shoulders, a familiar burden. This is no different. I’ll sacrifice anything I have to in order to save them.

I open my eyes, steel myself. “Where?”

“Our spot – come alone.” The line clicks dead.

Our spot. The spot that once meant so much to me, now an echo in time, tainted by the cold dark hands of a madman pulling my shaky strings.

My decision looms, inevitable as a storm cloud. Fear gnaws at my resolve, whispering dangers and dark outcomes. But deeper than fear and stronger than dread is the fierce need to protect my only remaining kin. Like I’ve always done. The way I’ll do to my dying breath.

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