Page 1 of Stalk
Prologue
MATTIA
Thirst for blood is embedded in my genetic makeup.
It was hard to quench my thirst early on. As soon as Zìa began taking me on jobs with her, I craved more.
The screams trapped within my memories lulled me to sleep. The color of freshly exposed flesh and rivers of blood was what I envisioned at the end of each day. After school, I silently prayed that Zìa would ask me to tag along after our family dinner that evening.
My eighteenth birthday was the greatest day of my life. An adult. A man.
Initiation.
It’s my birthright. One I was hesitant to embrace during the majority of my youth. One I was given no choice in receiving. A destiny I now live for. One I know I would die without. It’s not for everyone, but it comes with being a Giordano. The hunt is ingrained within our DNA. I am a true predator by nature.
It’s not for the tenderhearted. Many people will live out their lives without the sensation of a person’s last breath falling against their cheek. They won’t witness the light that graces aperson’s soul fade as they are sent to an oblivion we cannot begin to comprehend in this realm.
The majority of the population will never know how it feels to playl'angelo della morte.
REN
They came for me the night of my twenty-first birthday. Quiet and stealthy; no louder than a spider creeping through a house in the early hours of the morning.
She never told me they might come. Mother didn’t even leave me a letter. A warning. A hint. Hell, I would have taken one sentence on a wrinkled Post-it note. Instead, I was left with old photo albums. An inheritance. A house I didn’t ask or care for. And no details of her past.
What do you make of your life when all of your dreams are ripped away from you, with no hope of escape? No promise of life on the other side?
I’ll tell you.
When I wake every morning, only several minutes before noon, I stare at the ceiling of my bedroom with crusty eyes and a sense of overwhelming, inescapable doom. The only reason I get up and out of bed is because I need to piss. When I’m empty, I stare at myself in the mirror, and ask my reflection when was the last time I truly smiled? Without conscious thought—without effort.
I can’t remember.
When was the last time I laughed from the deepest parts of my chest? When was the last time I fell asleep and looked forward to tomorrow?
I can’t remember.
The person who stares back at me is a shell. Less than, really. A cracked and disintegrating living ghost of a human; one that will surely crumble with the first gust of a harsh wind.
I tell myself I’m being dramatic. Feeding into my own misery. Part of me believes those lies.
After that? I have no choice. I shower. Bathe away any leftover sins from the night before. Get out. Dry off. Force down a protein shake. Get dressed. Tell myself I’ll make it through another day—whether I want to or not. Then, I leave my dead mother’s house and report for my shift in hell.
CHAPTER 1
Mattia
Ilove the way it feels. Love the way it seeps into every fine line permanently etched into my palms and fingertips. I revel in the feeling of how…naturalit is. It may not be my own blood covering my forearms all the way down to the pads of my fingers, but the deceased body I left in the alleyway downtown is now part of me. My blood or not, that’s all it is.Blood.Once it’s on my hands, my victim becomes closer to me than kin.
I’ve never understood how many can’t stand the sight of it. It makes me laugh to think that some people actuallypass outjust from looking at it. If they all pretended it was fruit punch, would it still bother them—make them ill?Fuck, no.It’s the meaning behind it that terrifies them, not the actual substance.
Papà always used to say,“Le creature più deboli sono gli umani.”He repeated the words often. Especially after completing a hit, but sometimes under other circumstances as well.
The weakest creatures are humans.
I couldn’t agree more. Right when I think one of my victims will fight back—bear their teeth or claw at me to get away—they falter. Instead, they beg. They whine and scream.Weak.Every last one of them, up until the very end.
It’s not like any of my targets could escape me, anyway. It would take someone skillfully trained or outrageously strong to break away from my grasp. Because once my hands are on you, there’s only one possible ending:morte. It’s not typically an easy one, either.
