Page 6 of A Sinner's Truth

“Why? Shelli? Why the fuck are you doing this to me?” I drop my head into my hands. “We were meant to have forever. Now I’m left with a forever of you haunting me. A forever of not fucking knowing!” I scream. “I just want to know why!”

“What’s up?” My baby brother’s voice has me turning my attention to him.When did Vin get here? What is he doing here?

“She’s really dead,” I tell him.

“Yeah, bro, she is.” Vin glances at the casket briefly before he looks back at me.

“I see her though, Vin. She’s standing right there.” I point to the end of the grave. “How is she standing there if she’s in…there?”

“I think that maybe you want her to be here so badly that your mind is playing tricks on you, Santo. She’s not here. I wish more than anything that she were. I wish I could bring her back for you, but I can’t. We can’t,” Vin says, his voice quiet.

“What if I don’t want her back? What if I just want answers?” I’ve never voiced this thought to anyone before. What if what I want back isn’t really Shelli? I love her, but I also fucking hate her for doing this to me.

“Answers to what?” Vin asks. I notice how his shoulders stiffen slightly.

“Too fucking many questions. What if that’s not her?” It could be someone else. It’s decomposing. It could be anyone really.

“Santo, you found her, remember? You held her body in your arms. You know it’s her,” Vin says.

“We were going to be parents. I was going to be a father.” I stare at Shelli as I say this, and she glances away. Odd. She never had trouble looking me in the eye before.

“Yeah,” Vin says.

I jump back into the hole. “You should leave, Vin. This isn’t your problem,” I tell him.

“Get the fuck out of the hole. And you are my brother. Your problems are my problems,” he barks, his tone suddenly more commanding.Thatalmost makes me smirk.

“I can’t, Vin. I can’t keep doing this. I’m losing my fucking mind. I died with her. He won. The old man fucking won!” I yell out while tugging at the ends of my hair again.

“No, he didn’t. That fucking bastard will not win. I won’t let him.” Vin jumps down into the hole with me. Pressing a hand on my shoulder as he leans his forehead against mine. “I didn’t let him win when he put me in a room, month after month. Nor when he let a bunch of sick fucking assholes use and abuse me time and time again. I’m not going to let him win now either. He will not beat you, Santo. You’re stronger than this,” he says. His voice quiet but loud enough for me to hear him.

My entire body goes rigid before I pull back to look him dead in the eyes. “What?” I question him, because I don’t want to believe what I just heard.

“I won’t let him beat you,” Vin repeats.

“Not that. What do you mean you were abused?” My blood is boiling. The coldness I usually feel turning to scorching heat.

“It doesn’t matter. What matters right now is you and the fact that you are going to get through this,” Vin says.

“It matters to me. What the fuck happened, Vin?” I’m vibrating with rage. I’m going to fucking obliterate whatever motherfucker thought it was a good idea to touch my family.

“It started when I was eleven. Stopped when I was fourteen.”

My stomach recoils. I feel sick. My baby brother was abused for three fucking years and I let it happen. “Three years? Three fucking years, Vin?”

“He had a house. I wasn’t the only kid to get locked up in those rooms. But I was the only one related tohim. Once a month, the old man took me there. Sometimes I’d be there for an hour. Other times… with other men… Well, they wouldn’t leave until I broke,” Vin explains.

“Why didn’t you tell me? Or Gio? Or any of us? We would have never let that fucking happen, Vin.” I would have fucking killed the old bastard myself.

“I couldn’t… He said if I told any of you, then he’d take you there too. Better me than any of my brothers.” Vin lifts a shoulder.

He was an eleven-year-old kid. It was my job to be looking out for him, and this happened right under my goddamned nose. Anger like nothing I’ve ever felt rises to the surface. I was livid when Shelli was taken from me, but after this? Hearing about my little brother’s abuse? It’s a whole new level of rage. That confuses the fuck out of me, because I lived and breathed for that woman.

“That wouldn’t have happened. You should have come to us. Fuck!” I’m yelling at him as I kick at the wall of dirt again.

“It’s in the past, Santo. I’ve dealt with it.” Vin glances over a shoulder. “Fuck,” he curses under his breath. Then pulls himself out of the hole and closes the lid on the casket. “RIP, Shelli,” he whispers.

“You know her?” I ask while staring in the direction of the young girl who seems to be watching us.

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