By Fate I Conquer (Sins of the Fathers #4)(4)

“What the fuck is it now?” Dad muttered, stepping in and freezing when he spotted me. The harshness slipped off his face, and his expression became one I couldn’t understand. Too many emotions flashed across his features.

More tears streamed down my face, shaking my body with their force.

Dad glanced at Nino, then at the knife in my fists, aiming at the soft spot beneath my ribs.

“What are you doing, mia cara?” His voice was gentle, like a caress. It was comfort and love. It was everything I loved.

He moved closer but I pressed the knife harder against my chest and he stopped. “What have you seen?”

I searched his eyes, and swallowed. Everything. Too much. I couldn’t say anything but he must have seen it in my eyes. Dad was good at reading others.

He looked at Nino once more, then at the man on the ground. “He deserved it, you know?”

I sobbed, shaking my head. I didn’t want to hear another word. I just wanted out, away. I wanted darkness and quiet. But I couldn’t leave now, not before I’d done what needed to be done.

Even though every word felt like shrapnel in my throat, I croaked, “Don’t hurt him anymore.”

“Why don’t you come upstairs?” Dad said, holding out his hand. He exchanged another glance with Nino, who shifted his weight. Maybe they thought I didn’t notice, but I did. I noticed everything, every little detail no matter how inconsequential. That was the problem, and now my salvation.

I backed farther away and pressed the knife into my flesh. The tip pierced my skin and I whimpered, not used to pain but willing to brave it.

Nino lifted his hands once more.

“Mia cara, drop the knife.”

“Show mercy.”

Dad regarded the man briefly and his eyes made it clear he wouldn’t. Dad never lied to me, and he didn’t now. “I won’t. Not even for you. This is something you can’t understand yet.”

The man opened his eyes and looked at me. He wanted death. “Kill him then. Just don’t hurt him anymore.”

Dad stared at me, then at the man, and his expression hardened once more. Nino shook his head, as if annoyed by the whole situation, and stalked over to the man, grabbed his head and twisted hard. I heard his neck breaking and the light leave his eyes, but with it the terror and anguish left too.

I dropped the knife with a clatter. Both Dad and Nino looked at me as if I was about to break.

I stormed out, evading Dad and ran faster than ever before. I knew these corridors by heart, even in the dark that cloaked them now. I’d roamed them too often at night in the last few years.

Light chased me as Dad and Nino tried to catch me and turned on the lamps hanging from the low ceiling. But I turned one corner after the other, never slowing.

Their calls echoed in the basement, hunting me.

Tears burned my eyes, blinding me. But I didn’t need them to see. I followed my memory until I reached the basement below Fabiano’s mansion and hid in the storage room in a big carton that was filled only halfway with discarded clothes.

I curled into a small ball and closed the box over my head.

I stared into the darkness, fighting nausea and trying to quiet the whooshing in my ears. Soon the dark and quiet took effect and my pulse slowed, and then later the whooshing in my ears settled down as well. Sweet oblivion.





Voices carried through the room.

“This is a fucking mess,” Fabiano muttered.

“Can you imagine how scared she must be?” Leona said, sounding heartbroken.

Hearing her voice, my own heart ached. Then I realized who she was talking about—me.

She was heartbroken for me, worried I was scared. Was I scared? Should I be?

Of Dad? Of every man in my family? Of my own brother? I didn’t know what I was feeling. Mostly, I didn’t want to feel. I just wanted to be, in the dark and quiet, all alone.

“I doubt that’s all she is. Seeing something like that changes you,” Fabiano said. They didn’t think I was here because they didn’t know I had the code to their part of the basement.

Their voices disappeared, probably to help my family search for me.




Eight hours later—at some point I’d started counting the gentle thud-thud of the second hand of my wrist watch—I had to leave my hiding place. I needed to relieve myself and my legs and back hurt from being curled up for so long. When I was certain I was alone, I opened the lid and climbed out. The blood on my clothes had made the fabric stiff, but I didn’t smell the coppery scent anymore. My nose was desensitized to it by now.

I shivered. It was cold in the basement even at this time in the year. I hadn’t noticed before, but my fingers and toes were stiff from the cold. I looked around for a place to pee, but every corner felt as bad as the other. I felt bad about sullying Fabiano’s basement like that.

The memory of the blood puddle in the cell entered my head and I shuddered once more. Maybe I could hold on for a few more hours…but what then? I couldn’t return to my home, not yet.

I hugged myself and shivered harder.

What was I going to do now?

I glanced to my right and went into the corner. I retched as I touched the bloody fabric of my leotard to push it aside so I could pee. Squatting in the corner, I hurriedly emptied my bladder, then got dressed as quickly as I’d undressed and rushed back to my hiding place. I needed quiet, needed dark, darker than the storage room, dark enough to black out my too accurate memory replaying every detail of the man’s anguished face. I didn’t even know his name. Would anyone remember him? I wanted to forget but was it wrong of me to wish for something like that? I curled up as small as I could on top of the clothes in the box then closed the lid.