Total pages in book: 126
Estimated words: 115400 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 577(@200wpm)___ 462(@250wpm)___ 385(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 115400 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 577(@200wpm)___ 462(@250wpm)___ 385(@300wpm)
Not bothering to knock on Killian’s door, I stride right through the door of his office as though I have every right to be there. “Hey Killi—” I pause, cutting myself off as I find the luxurious office empty. My gaze sweeps left to right as my brows begin to furrow.
“Huh,” I mutter to myself. Where the hell could he have disappeared to so quickly?
My gaze sails to the small store room, and I quickly cut across the room, twisting the door handle as I shove my hip against the solid door. “You in here?” I ask, stepping deeper into the store room.
It’s bigger than I expected, and unlike the rest of the overly organized house, this room is different. There are papers, files, weapons, and briefcases scattered everywhere. It’s a stark contrast to everything else I’ve come to know. The back wall is covered with surveillance screens, and I can only assume this is some kind of private security office, different than the normal cameras scattered across the property.
A strange nagging pulls deep in my gut, and it forces me farther into the room. My gaze shifts over the shelving full of boxes. Some look worn down and tired as though they’re centuries old, while other boxes look as though they were only sealed yesterday.
There’s a big table in the center of the room with paper scattered across it and a half-empty coffee mug that looks as though it was only placed here this morning. My gaze shifts to the papers, and while I’ve never taken the time to look over a police report, I can tell when I’m looking at one.
“What the hell?” I murmur, skimming over the pages as my heart races.
It says something about a massacre at the home of Deago Donatelli, the leader of the Donatelli crime family, and while that name means nothing to me, I’d bet everything I have that it means something to Killian. My curiosity gets the best of me, and I start flicking through the pages, but when I find crime scene photos, that curiosity turns into dread.
Horror rocks through me, taking in the blood pooled on the ground and the dead bodies littered with bullets. There are hundreds of images, one after the other, taken from a million different angles, but when the attention focuses on a different man, everything stops.
This one is different.
He’s not littered with bullets like everyone else, he’s been tortured to death. Deep, precise stab wounds cover his body. This man bled out in agony. His death wasn’t quick or forgiving. It was brutal and callous, just like Killian.
I feel the blood drain from my face, leaving me faint and unsure.
Had I only seen the other photographs, I could have convinced myself that Killian had nothing to do with this, that he only had these police reports out of morbid curiosity for an opposing mafia family, but seeing the stab wounds over the body of the man I assume to be Deago Donatelli, I know it was him.
Killian orchestrated this massacre.
He did this.
Every bullet. Every death. Every last stab wound to that man’s body. Killian was responsible for all of it.
My stomach clenches as fear pounds through my veins.
This is the man I’ve been allowing myself to fall for. Despite his warnings and demands that I fear him, I foolishly chose to believe there was something good buried beneath the darkness. But how could that be true? A man who’s capable of wiping out a whole family couldn’t possibly be capable of love. How could there be anything good inside his heart?
Fat tears stream down my face, and as I take in all the boxes of files around me, I realize they’re all filled with the same thing—horrors of the crimes he’s committed in the name of family. Horrors of the leaders who’ve come before him.
And this man wants me to give him a child—a child who will eventually stand in his place and be responsible for the same demented acts. How could I allow that to happen?
Moving to the wall of screens, the dread begins to drown me, but I can’t walk out of here without truly knowing. After all, isn’t this what he wants? What he’s been trying to warn me about. He wants me to know who he is and what he’s capable of. He wants me to have an informed fear and to know the man I said I was beginning to fall for. This might not be how he intended for me to find out, but isn’t it best I know now before I fall too deeply?
I have to respect his decision to warn me. It’s about as noble as it gets in the mafia world, but now that I’m peeking through the window of his soul, I don‘t know how I’m ever supposed to belong to him.