Page 72 of The Devil's Den

She’s gone.

When the fight leaves him, I slice the knife across his neck, running after the other man, who only makes it to the corner.

There’s nowhere to run. No place to hide. There are six of Bianchi’s men in this shithole. They’ve come here for a show. They expect a worthy fucking performance, so I give it to them.

The handle of the knife digs into my palm as I ready to puncture the throat of the man begging for my mercy.

“Kill him! Now!” Drew stresses.

My feet trudge closer until I’m right in front of the guy’s face. The kick across his calf comes quick, and he drops to the floor with a loud thump. I settle over him and he grows rigid, his body readying to die, his eyes round and full of fear.

There’s something about killing someone when they stare at you. It’s worse. It’s haunting. I see them sometimes, all the people I’ve killed. I can picture their faces. The way they stared at me. Their voices as they begged.

And when I remember them, fuck, the emotions in the pit of my stomach gnaw, reminding me what a bastard I am. But was there ever a choice? I was bound to become a monster. That’s what they’ve always wanted.

With Aida by my side, I was a little more human, a little more accepted, but now that she’s stopped seeing me the way she once did, I don’t know what I have to live for anymore.

“Please, man,” the guy no older than me pleads. “I don’t wanna die. I did nothin’.”

I lift the knife in the air, right above him. “Neither did I.” I let the blade slide all the way into his neck, blood spurting out, coating my hand, drops landing on my face.

It doesn’t take him long to die, and once he does, I get to my feet, wiping the result of my sin from my cheek. The knife drops beside him, and two men take the body away.

This place holds so many ghosts, I wonder if they haunt it.

Will I die here too?

CHAPTERTWENTY-FOUR

AIDA AGE 23

These have beenthe hardest weeks of my life. Every day I see him, I want to forgive him, but then something stops me. The memories of being raped, Ms. Greco, it all comes back, and that’s when I find it hard to look at him.

So I leave, and I cry alone against my pillow, remembering our fantasy of Corvo Island and wishing we could return to the days where we’d dream about the life we could build together. But it’s too late now.

He’s finally returned from wherever they take him, and I climb down the stairs to bring him dinner, my heart beating so fast, I almost drop the bowl from my quivering hands.

He peers up at me from the mattress, his face tucked into a palm. His jaw pulses when he drags his hand away, his gaze falling from my face, down to the rest of me. And I suddenly shiver. The way he just looked at me, I felt it everywhere and suddenly I’m self-conscious. I know he’s touched me, and it never happened again, but still, he’s never actually seen me naked…except when he saw me at the club. My stomach churns at the memory, my throat closing in.

I try to fight myself from looking back at him, but it’s a losing battle. I get lost in his eyes, like I always do. They’ve always been what’s kept me safe and grounded.

“Aida, I miss you. Please, talk to me. I’ll do anything to just hold you.”

My chest rises and falls, faster and faster, my hands tingling, my eyes shuttering, the familiar pain behind them growing.

I miss you too. So much. Talk to him. What the hell is wrong with you? Haven’t you punished him and yourself enough? You need him and he needs you too.

“I—” That’s all that comes out.

“That’s a start.” His mouth quirks up at the corner.

“Matteo, I don’t know how to do this anymore.”

“Do you still love me?” His tone hovers just above a whisper, and the thought of him thinking I don’t is like a dagger to my heart.

“Of course I do.”

“Then that’s where we start. Because I’ll never stop loving you.”

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