Page 96 of Thorns of Lust
Slowly, like each movement was at the slowest speed available, I pressed play.
My sister’s face was the mirror version of the woman on her knees. The same curly red hair. The only difference was the green eyes. Isla’s were vibrant green. The eyes of the woman in the video were dead, even before I pulled the trigger.
She stared somewhere in the distance, not seeing me. She was lost to the living even before I killed her. Papa saw to that.
Bang.
One clean shot. Her body fell over. Blood seeped from her temple. It was too fucking similar to what had happened to my mother.
It wasn’t a good picture. Isla wouldn’t forgive me.
I stared at the video, no longer seeing it. Instead, memories from twenty-two years ago rushed to the forefront of my mind.
A sense of foreboding slithered down my spine as I watched my father with the girl who had to be younger than me.
I looked much older than most of my peers at eighteen. Even Maxim, and his build was similar to mine. I guess being a killer and my father’s right hand aged me.
The girl, who couldn't be older than eighteen, climbed the cake-like marble steps, my father clutching her hand. Her curly red hair shone like fire under the Russian sun, throwing off the colors of a burning sunset.
Then my papa and his new woman stopped in front of me and the lead settled in my gut when I noticed her bump. She was younger than I thought. Yes, she had tits, but her curves were all due to her baby bump. She still had baby fat in her face. She never had the chance to become a woman and lose that baby fat.
I gritted my teeth and shot a glare at my papa. How far he had fallen!
Ever since that night he executed Mama, he’d been going through women and whores. He’d done some shit that had me going ballistic.
“There is my boy,” Papa greeted me. He didn’t smile. I hadn’t seen him smile since Mama’s death. Maxim and I didn’t have much to smile about either. Maxim had been on and off pills, going through periods of depression. And I had turned into the spawn of Satan. I learned how to kill a man, turn off any and all emotions, and I learned attachments were trouble.
Papa was more than happy to teach us that lesson. Hence the surprise he managed to knock up a woman. He was adamant about never marrying another woman. They were just something he fucked, then discarded when he was done with them.
“This is Pixie. She’ll stay around for a while,” he grumbled when all of us remained silent, Pixie’s green eyes locked on me and Maxim. I saw fear in them, and I fucking hated it. I could kill a man without a second thought, but seeing fear in women’s eyes never sat well with me.
My eyes lowered to her belly, then back up to her face.
Papa must have followed my gaze because he added, “She’ll have a baby so you two might have a sibling. It remains to be seen whether it’s mine or not. We’ll keep her alive until she has the baby.”
Papa didn’t even try to be subtle about it.
Terror replaced the fear in her eyes, but she quickly tried to school her features, which blew because it meant she’d been through some shit.
“She’ll be in the guest room closest to mine,” Papa ordered me. He had yet to spare Maxim with a single glance. Just a glance from Papa would have Maxim crying. Sometimes, he’d lose his shit and snap by beating the shit out of him. Then I'd step in and take the bulk of the punishment because Maxim couldn’t handle it. It was a joyous affair here. “She can still be useful to me.” Then his eyes locked on mine. “I don’t mind sharing her. After all, the whore can’t be knocked up again.”
I clenched my jaw so hard my bones ached. A terse nod and I extended my hand to her for a handshake.
“This way,” Papa gritted, jerking her forward.
Poor girl. She knew she’d found herself in a pile of shit. I wondered how she ever even connected with someone like my father. She was too fucking young. She should be in school, not fucking an old man like my papa.
Papa and she headed into the house and up the stairs that Mama used to decorate for every occasion, including summer. She’d have flowers on every step, perfuming the air. Now, this place was just a large mausoleum where the Konstantin men ruled their empire.
I watched after the two of them until they turned the corner at the top of the steps.
“Is she a whore?” Maxim whispered. My twin brother was slowly dying on the inside. Each fucked up thing he witnessed caused him to die a bit more. Papa insisted he needed to become stronger. Good thing he wasn’t around too much, busy with chasing the next skirt, leaving me to run the empire and shelter my brother from it all.
That night, I heard her screams. That night I lost my shit and snapped, not my brother.
I got to Pixie’s room just in time to see Papa shred her shirt down the front, her full tits spilling free. He held the belt in his other hand and whipped it across her pregnant belly.
“Shut the fuck up,” he hissed, reaching with his other hand and squeezing her tits. “You thought because you’re pregnant, you’re off the hook. You’ll pay your dues until that bastard child is out. Then I’ll decide whether it’s mine or not; whether I’ll keep it alive or not.”
