Page 2 of Ice
She turned to look at him, and he was smiling at her but not in the loving and affectionate way a normal grandfather looks at his granddaughter. No, there was a glint in his eyes, like he was amused to see her broken and in pain.
It made sense to Sofia now, why her mother ran from her home country and to the United States. This man was a fucking maniac. She couldn’t understand why her mother ever came back home to this. Why she dragged them out of the only home Sofia knew with her father and her friends. She would have fared better with her father and his enemies; at least she knew her father would die to protect her.
Her grandfather?
He’d kill her if it meant saving his own skin.
“Chain her up to the pipe again since you’re having trouble controlling a girl half your size, Pedro.” Her grandfather spoke to her captor.
She was dragged back to the hot water pipe and hung up like a piece of meat waiting its turn to get chopped up.
Sofia couldn’t stop the tears this time. “Just fucking kill me.” She wanted this to end—needed it to.
Her grandfather walked to her and harshly grabbed her face. She could feel his fingernails digging into her skin hard enough that she was surprised he didn’t make her bleed.
How were they related? How could he hurt his own flesh and blood like this?
“¿Ella llora mucho, no?”Her grandfather chuckled. “Grab my tools.”
A big black bag was dropped at her grandfather’s feet, and Sofia felt a certain peace settle over her. Her grandfather was going to kill her, after he tortured her some more, she was sure of it. But at least she’d get to see her mother when it was over, if there was such a thing as an afterlife. She just wished she could see her father one more time. She missed him and Domenico—the only boy she ever got to love.
Sofia licked her dry lips. “Why?” Her voice cracked. “Why are you doing this?” She didn’t think her grandfather would answer her. The man did what he wanted without reason, but she had a burning desire to know why he wanted to do this to her instead of just sending her back home to her father.
“Mi nieta.”He had a pair of scissors in his hand. He cut the flimsy shirt she was wearing down the middle, exposing her to the rest of the warehouse that had seemed to fill with more men—twenty more—she hoped her mind and weak eyes were playing tricks on her.
“You are of my blood.” He shrugged like it made all the sense in the world to hurt someone who was family. “I didn’t have any sons, and since none of my children had children except for your mother, all of this—” he pointed to the men who stood behind him “my empire is yours when I go.”
He dropped the scissors and went into his bag, pulling out a knife. “It is a shame your mother didn’t give me a grandson. It’s even worse that she ran away and reproduced with that Sicilian bastard. Now I have to erase their influences on you. I need to kill the hope that even now flows from your eyes like a stream with an endless journey.”
He cut Sofia slowly across her stomach, laughing as she cried out in pain. “There is no happy ending for us,nieta.There is only power or death. You’ll learn what it means to be a Gomes and the power that comes with it.” He drove the knife into her side, not deep enough to do serious damage but enough to get his point across.
“Pedro!” her grandfather shouted. “Get the whip. We’re going to erase that Barbati name from you,nietaor I’ll put you down like the Sicilian whore you are.”
DOMENICO LEANED UP AGAINST HIScar, keeping a watchful eye on the exit doors of the airport and scanning the pick-up area. It seemed entirely too busy for an early Tuesday morning. Every time a car buzzed past him, he felt himself reaching for his gun.
He rubbed the back of his neck, already feeling the tension knot forming. This war they were in had him running on barely any sleep, constantly having to watch his and his father’s backs and it was about to get worse with the arrival of Sofia Barbati.
A car door slammed a little too loudly, and Dom turned around to watch a couple argue over how heavy their luggage was. Another car door slammed, and he snapped his gaze to it, watching a husband help a wife put their kid in a car seat. Every little noise seemed to set off the same reaction in him, making the hairs on the back of his neck stand up.
Nothing seemed out of place, though. Everyone was lined up as they should be, waiting for whomever to land safely. The airport attendants and the construction workers were moving about as they normally would. No one stood out to him, and yet he couldn’t shake the feeling that he was a sitting duck about to get ambushed.
Dom checked his watch for what seemed like tenth time in five minutes, cursing when he noticed the time.
Sofia was late.
Her flight should have landed already. It made the uneasy feeling he’d been wrestling with since she reached out to him a month ago morph into a choking sensation. It had him tugging at the collar of his shirt, trying to get some air he seemed to have trouble breathing in.
A deep chuckle had Dom turning toward his father, who stood beside him, looking as relaxed as he wished he felt. “What’s so amusing, chuckles?” Dom quipped and his father’s laughter continued.
“My son, Domenico ‘The fucking Silencer’ Marchessi—the one everyone fears is fucking nervous,” his father mused. “And don’t tell me you’re not. Just because my eyes ain’t good, don’t mean I can’t see.” His father turned his head in Dom’s direction. “I see you sweating, boy.”
Dom scoffed. His father lost his eyesight when Dom was twenty-two—the result of a job gone wrong. His old man couldn’t see two feet in front of him, but he always had an uncanny knack for seeing shit that someone with eyes was blind to. If his father didn’t sense any impending doom lurking around a dark corner somewhere, he needed to relax.
“I’m not sweating or nervous. I’m just cautious.” Dom crossed his arms over his chest. “I told you I felt off since this morning. The fact that Sofia is late seems to be amping up the feeling.”
His father scratched at his beard before responding. “And why is that, Dom?”
“Seriously? She’s walking into a war. If anyone got wind she was coming back and when, they’d gun her down. You know what’s at stake for her.” It was why Dom pushed for her to get on a private plane. He’d have control over the pilot and what guards he could have protecting her.
