Assassin's Heart (Assassin's Heart, #1)(38)

I hated them. I hated that they had so much power over me, that because I needed them, I had to do what they said. I was powerless, like the night of the fire.

Just give them what they want. The faster I cooperated, the faster I could get back to the plan. And I didn’t have time to waste. I pushed down my hood and slid my mask to the crown of my head.

I stared at them, daring Alessio to brave a cocky comment, daring my uncle to gloat. A single wrong word and I’d show them what someone behind a mask could truly do.

“You are Bianca’s daughter, Oleander,” Marcello said. “I can see much of her in your face. Not so much my brother Dante.”

“Oleander.” Alessio smiled slowly, and no matter how hard I searched I couldn’t find malice or jest in his grin. “One of the prettiest of the poisons.”

“Lea,” I snapped. “Only my mother called me Oleander.”

Alessio inclined his head. “Kalla Lea.”

Marcello glowered, and I agreed. I didn’t approve of Alessio calling me something in a language I didn’t speak.

“And why have you come here?” Marcello strode to the kitchen. He lifted a carafe of amber liquor and poured a glass. “Has Dante come to his senses and sent you to fetch me home? Surely if you’ve come to end my life you would’ve done so by now. Unless the Saldana standards have fallen so low?”

I glared at him. Anger seeped through my limbs like hot honey. My cheeks burned and tears pricked my eyes. I blinked them away. “My father is dead.”

Marcello exhaled through his nose. “I see.” He took a drink. “Was it illness? An accident?”

“It was the Da Vias,” I spat. “They killed us. Everyone. My father and mother. Rafeo, Matteo, Emile, and Jesep. Even the servants. I am the only Saldana left.”

Marcello stared at me blankly. Tension coated the air as Alessio glanced between the two of us.

Marcello looked at the glass in his hand, watching the amber liquid slide across its surface as he rotated it in the light. His breath sounded rapid and harsh.

He screamed, a loud, guttural noise from deep in his body. He threw the glass across the room to shatter in the fireplace, the liquid hissing and sputtering in the flames.

Alessio covered his head when the glass soared past his face. He spun toward Marcello. “Gods, Master!” he shouted, but the anger leaked out of him as he saw my uncle’s state.

Marcello stood unmoving, but his body shook as tears poured down his cheeks, tracing the lines of his face like a river through sand.

He wept for them. He wept for our Family. Would he weep so easily if he knew it was my fault? If he knew I’d trusted Val, which brought about their deaths? I pressed my hand to my chest, feeling the key tucked beneath my leathers.

“Gods damn the Da Vias.” His voice hitched in a sob. He sank his face into his hands. “Gods damn them all.”

Alessio approached my uncle and, when he met no resistance, escorted him to a chair in front of the fire. I followed quietly behind and sat in the other chair while Alessio visited the kitchen and returned to my uncle with another glass of liquor.

“Drink this, Master,” he said quietly, pressing the glass into my uncle’s hand. There was real tenderness in how Alessio cared for him. They must have been together a long time, only the two of them, a sad little clipper Family in a country where the people feared the night. It must’ve been lonely.

“So this is why you came, niece?” Marcello’s voice was gruff with tears and grief. “To torture me with memories?” He drank, the liquor splashing against the whiskers on his chin.

I shook my head. “No. Truthfully, I did not come for you at all. I came for me. I seek help.”

He glanced at me out of the corner of his eye, then returned to staring at the fire. He took another drink. “And what could I possibly have that you would value? Tell us, kalla Lea,” he mocked. “Tell us what it is you need.”

As if he had the right to be angry. He wasn’t there when our home burned. When Rafeo’s blood spilled across my hands.

“The Da Vias,” I said. “You’re going to help me kill them.”

He turned to me, surprise flashing in his eyes. And then he laughed in my face.





seventeen


A RAGE FLARED ACROSS ME, SO BRIGHT IT BLINDED ME. I lunged to my feet, the heavy oak chair screeching like a cat in an alley as it slid across the stone floor.

Alessio jumped to my side, hands at the ready to stop me from grabbing my weapons. But I didn’t need a weapon for this.

I slapped my uncle across the face.

The crack echoed dully against the stone walls until the only sounds remaining were the popping of the fire and Alessio’s sharp intake of breath.

Marcello’s face was streaked red where I’d struck him. He gingerly brushed it with the tips of his fingers before he faced me.

“Get out of my home,” he said quietly.

“How dare you.” My voice scratched against my throat. “You weep for my Family, my Family, and rage at the Da Vias, but when I call on you for help, you laugh in my face? You are not a Saldana. You were not there when we needed you the most. You gave away your name when you murdered your own uncle.”

“I said get out!” Marcello screamed.

I raised my hand to strike him again, but Alessio grabbed my wrists, dragging me away. He was stronger and taller than me. And I was full of grief and rage, and Father always said strength comes only with a cool mind and heart.