Twisted Cravings (The Camorra Chronicles, #6)(43)

Kiara didn’t say anything at first, her eyes distant as if my words had taken her back many years. Instead of answering, she opened the oven and took out the casserole, obviously weighing her words from the tense look on her face. “Not everyone’s way of coping with trauma is revenge on their abusers. It seems like the logical, maybe even only choice from your brothers’

and maybe even your standpoint, but some people seek reconciliation and a clarifying conversation over violence. What Dinara needs and desires is impossible to say without knowing her.”

I knew Dinara, or at least, I knew as much as she’d allowed me to see so far, but I wasn’t sure of her motives. She was a tough girl, so revenge didn’t seem completely out of the question. “What about you, Kiara? Nino killed your uncle in the cruelest way possible. He exerted revenge on your behalf.

Did you want to be avenged? Or would you have preferred to make peace with your abuser?”

Kiara’s face flickered with pain, and her smile became a bit shakier.

These small signs showed me that even after all these years, the events still haunted her. Maybe it was impossible to overcome something as horrible for good. It depressed me to think that Dinara would carry the weight of her past on her shoulders forever. “I could have never forgiven him. I needed him gone, but I could have never done it. I don’t think I could have even asked for it, if Nino hadn’t decided to do it. He took the decision, the weight of it, off my hands. Maybe I could have saved my uncle from his fate but I didn’t want to. If he’d lived, I’d have always feared he’d come for me again, even if Nino protected me. To find peace, I needed his death.”

“So you’re grateful to Nino for killing your uncle the way he did.”

“I am, to both Nino and Remo. When I found out he was gone, I felt relief.

I never felt guilty over it. It was a necessary step for me to heal.”

“Do you think Dinara wanted me to find out the truth so I’d exert revenge for her?”

“I don’t know. She isn’t helpless like I was back then. She’s got her father and his men as support. From what Nino said, her father knows what happened, so Dinara isn’t burdened to keep it a secret. She could ask her father to kill her abusers, and he’d do it, right?”

“He’d do it, no doubt, but he’d risk Remo’s wrath and retaliation if he shed blood on Camorra territory.”

“Remo wants revenge to happen.”

“He wants it to happen the way he wants it, and I think for him there’s only one person who should shed blood, and that’s Dinara. If I’d kill everyone for Dinara, Remo wouldn’t do anything to me. I’m his brother. He’d be pissed but that would be all. Maybe Dinara suspects it. Or maybe she’d rather risk my life than that of her father or Dima.”

“You think she’d use you like that? To do what she and her father can’t do?”

“It would explain why he allows her to race in our territory.”

Kiara regarded me with worry in her brown eyes. She let out a small sigh.

“I guess there’s only one way to find out. Talk to her. Deceit isn’t a good start for a relationship.”

That’s something I’d learned the hard way with my first girlfriend Harper.

I’d overcome the deep sense of betrayal and I wasn’t the unstable teenager from back then, but if exacting revenge through my hands had been Dinara’s plan from the very start, it would definitely leave its traces. Still, for some reason I couldn’t imagine Dinara to be deceitful like that. She had been honestly shocked that her mother was alive and she didn’t know about the existence of the recordings or that my brothers had gathered the names and addresses of her abusers. Even if revenge had been on her mind, it could only have been an abstract concept.

Kiara smiled. “Talk to her. Tell her what you know and see how she reacts, then you can still decide if you want to cease contact with her.”

I nodded. “Dinara was worried that I’d treat her differently after I knew.

Now I think, how can I not knowing what I know now? She went through some horrible shit that must have left deep scars.”

“Definitely, but when you met her those scars were already part of her.

She didn’t change. She’s still the same girl you met.”

I motioned at the steaming casserole of mac and cheese. “If we don’t take the food to the table soon, I fear the hungry bunch is going to devour us.”

Kiara squeezed my forearm briefly before she grabbed a bowl with salad.

I carried the casserole and tried to enjoy a chaotic evening with my family, even as my mind kept whirring with a myriad of thoughts. I wanted nothing more than to hold Dinara in my arms again, even if part of me dreaded the encounter.





The drive from Las Vegas back to camp seemed to last forever. It was difficult to focus on the street, on anything really, except for the horrible images I’d seen. They’d haunted my night. I couldn’t help but wonder how much worse it must be for Dinara. We’d on occasion shared a tent and her sleep had often been interrupted by unintelligible mumblings. Whenever I’d asked what she’d been dreaming about, she’d evaded a reply.

It was impossibly difficult to link that helpless, cowering girl with the fierce and confident woman I’d been spending so much time with. I’d expected a sad story, but not this. Even a night’s sleep hadn’t managed to calm the raging flood of emotions in my body.