I look to Rian for help, and he gives me a look of pity. “The man that came in that night four years ago. The one I killed.” Then he emphasizes, “Come on, Caroline.”Get your head in the game, Caroline.
I shake my head. This isn’t who I am. I’m not this person. I’m a mother. I was a teacher. I know how to soothe a tantrum, how to bandage a scraped knee. I’ve never tortured anyone. I’ve never watched anyone be tortured. I was thinking this would be easycompared to pulling the trigger of that gun, but now that I’m faced with it, it feels like another mountain to climb.
The man in the chair coughs. Blood dots his lips. “Yeah, come on, Caroline,” he snarls, showing me his teeth. They look like a checkerboard. I cringe away from it.
Declan sees the look on my face and rage crosses his own. He reaches into the man’s mouth with a set of pliers and leans down into his face to spit, “Don’t let her name cross your disgusting fucking lips, Harold.” He pulls his head back to look at him, and his neck bends unnaturally, the middle swelling.
“Caroline, Caroline,Sweet Caroline,” the man says, singing the last part and chuckling.
Declan yanks a tooth out of his head, sending blood spraying, and yells over his cries, “You’re wasting time saying her name when you should be saying who ratted us out.”
I inhale shakily, and when I do, all the men look at me like I shot a gun into the metal box.
The man breathes hard through his nose. Laughs. “They really got you, huh? You got no idea what kind of life you just stepped in. You should have stayed a dumb fuck toy.”
Rian slams something into the man’s shin. I don’t see what’s in his hand, but whatever it is produces a crunch, and then the man screams. There’s a wet, hoarse sound, and hot tears leak from my eyes. This man seems to know more about me than I do about him, and everything he’s said to me has been cruel, but he’s a human suffering in front of me.
I turn to Kellan, burying my face into his chest. Kellan pulls me into him, muttering into my ear, “All you have to do is be herein case my father has eyes on this place. You can close your eyes and hum a song. It’s okay. You never have to hurt another soul while you’re with us.”
Behind me, the man scoffs, but it’s got no heat to it. He croaks, “Hey, girl.”
I don’t know why, but I turn to look at him, at the glint in his eyes and the blood draining from his mouth like it’s a faucet. “You think you’re safe with them? You think this means they’ll protect you? You killed the son of a Valacchi.”
Everything goes still. I feel the stillness even though I don’t understand it. Kellan’s arms are tense around me. I look up at his face and see his wide eyes, staring over my head at his brothers.
Rian stops pacing and drops the weapon in his hands. It clangs to the ground noisily, and I realize it’s a baseball bat. Pure, heavy metal.
Declan takes the pliers out of the man’s mouth and shifts slightly. “Say that again.”
The man doesn’t take his eyes off me, staring into my soul from under heavy eyebrows. “You heard me. That hit last week? The guy she shot? That was Tino Valacchi. Youngest son of Emilio Valacchi. You fuckers picked the wrong pawn.”
And I don’t know who the players are, but I feel it anyway. The room feels like it shrinks. My hands go cold.
“He didn’t have anything to do with it,” Kellan breathes.
“No.” The man chuckles darkly, his head lolling. “And you let the girl do it. The Valacchis want a war. Your daddy just handed them one. And guess who gets blamed for starting it?”
Me.
My knees nearly buckle. Kellan tries to hold me up, but I’m like jelly in his arms. I slide down his body.
Declan turns to Rian. “He lied. Dadaí lied.”
Rian nods, face pale. “He set her up.”
I back away toward the door. “I was never going to be one of you,” I whisper. “I was just bait.”
Kellan reaches for me. I flinch.
“We didn’t know,” he says. “Caroline, we didn’t know.”
But that doesn’t matter. Because the Valacchis know. And no matter what I do, I won’t get to walk away clean.
The man in the chair spits again, a broken tooth dropping like cud. He smirks through his pain and shoots, “Tell those babies Mommy will watch them from heaven, fuck toy.”
I walk over to the bat and pick it up from the ground. I raise it over my head and bring it down onto one of the man’s knees.
Nobody stops me.
