The man Elio called Curse watches me with silent intensity from the driver’s seat, a gun in his lap. There’s something familiar in his gaze. I know Elio Titone has a younger brother, and I wonder if this is him. They have the same thick black hair, too, but otherwise they don’t look much alike. If Curse weren’t covered in tattoos, he’d look like a Renaissance sculpture come to life, his face chiselled like an angel’s.
A fallen angel, no doubt.
When I can no longer stand staring back at him, I turn my head to the passenger window, looking at the house’s front door, waiting for Elio to come through it. Heat from the seat warmer blooms along my quivering legs and my stiff back, echoing the body heat on Elio’s jacket when he’d forced it around me. I should have ripped it off the second he was out of my sight. Should have let it fall to the snow, ruined it even more than the bullet and blood already did.
But some strange part of me had liked the way the jacket felt, so warm against my goosebumpy skin. And if I hadn’t taken it, I’d be naked from the waist up now, with nothing but my arms to cover me. I pull the jacket a little tighter, shivering again, but this time with odd, hateful pleasure at the kiss of the jacket’s silk lining sliding against my skin. Elio’s scent surrounds me, the same scent from the pantry – exquisite and probably astronomically expensive cologne mixed with blood, leather, and a slightly deeper masculine musk.
Wrapped in his jacket and his scent, I see him coming through the front door. I should feel dread, but I can’t help the flood of relief when I see he’s found my mom’s violin. He holds it by the neck in one hand, the bow in the other. They look small in the grip of his black leather gloves, almost like toys.
I’ve already noticed how tinted these windows are from the outside. There’s no way he can see me in here, but even so, his gaze pierces right through the glass. It’s like he can see right inside me, like even my deepest inner thoughts belong to him now.
As the bright moonlight cascades down his form, I observe him, trying to memorize and understand every detail, to know exactly who I’m dealing with. He’s so tall – he’s got to be at least 6’4 – and built like a fucking tank. His black dress shirt moulds to the hard planes and curves of his muscles. I drag my gaze up to his face and I’m certain that these two are brothers now. It’s not just the hair and the eyes, but also something about the way they both carry themselves, the power that pours off of them in poisonous waves.
Elio comes around to the driver’s side and Curse slides out to make room for him, the younger brother trading places with the older. Curse is a big guy too, but when Elio settles himself into the seat, the space in the SUV feels suddenly smaller. Elio takes everything – even all the air in here.
He says a few things to Curse, and, heart thundering, I watch him. It’s the left side of his neck and jaw that are scarred, so I can’t see the marred skin from here. I watch him closely while he tells his younger brother to “make sure Morelli’s at the house.”
I let my gaze track over his hard jaw, the rugged slashes of his cheekbones, the bold nose. He doesn’t have Curse’s classic good looks. I remember what he said to me in the shadows, calling himself an ugly bastard, but I don’t see it. He’s striking. He’s not handsome in a refined way, but his features are so brutal and unapologetic that I can’t stop staring at his profile.
Curse heads off to his own vehicle – a vehicle with a trunk full of dead men. My stomach lurches as Elio hands me the violin and bow. I try to block everything out and take comfort in the familiar feel of the wood, the strings.
But there’s no blocking Elio Titone out. Especially when he turns towards me in the car’s dark interior. I tense, remembering the way he touched me in the pantry. His hands on my throat, my breasts.
But he doesn’t touch. He doesn’t say a single word. He just grasps the seatbelt from beside my head, then tugs it downward, fastening it across my chest and lap.
He just kidnapped me in a chaotic storm of gunfire and blood and now he’s worried about making sure I’m strapped in?
He’s still silent as he shifts the car out of park and starts driving. Suddenly, the seatbelt thing makes a little more sense, because Elio drives fucking fast. Absurdly, I wonder if he has good snow tires on as he explodes out of our driveway and down the road.
Although maybe it’s not that absurd, considering what happened to Mom and me. But we weren’t the ones driving fast that winter day. Not like this, not like Elio.
I decide he must have snow tires on, considering how well the vehicle is handling on the slick roads.
It’s crazy just how mundane that thought is. I wonder if that’s a protection mechanism. If by focusing on things like seatbelts and snow tires, I can make it all a little less real.
But it is real.
This is happening.
I’m really being abducted by one of the most brutal men in this city, this country. The life I thought I had is gone, maybe forever.
No. Not forever. Dad will find me.
He wasn’t among the bodies in Curse’s trunk. Hopefully I’ve bought him enough time to figure out a way to fix this. I still can’t believe what Elio has said – that my own father sold me out. I also can’t believe that he would steal from Darragh.
But if he hadn’t stolen from Darragh, why didn’t any of Darragh’s men come to help us?
It’s all too much to think about. Instead, I focus on watching the landscape so I know where Elio’s taking me. A chill runs through me when I picture where I may end up. A warehouse? A prison cell? Somewhere no one can hear me scream.
But he said live-in musician…
His house.
I don’t fool myself. I could still end up in a warehouse, or worse, in a heartbeat if Elio decides he’s done with me.
We’re heading south, into Toronto proper, leaving my Thornhill neighbourhood behind. I wonder if we’re going downtown. I allow myself small glances at Elio, and I see how wet his shirt is with blood at the back.
“Your shoulder,” I whisper.
He keeps his eyes on the road, though he’s only driving with one leather-gloved hand on the wheel. His left hand rests limply on his thigh.
“Worried about me?”
“I’m worried you’ll kill us both when you lose consciousness from blood loss,” I snap before I can stop myself. I clamp my mouth shut, internally berating myself. Talking back to a Titone is not smart, and I prepare myself for the blowback.
But it doesn’t come. Instead, Elio laughs, a dark, gruff chuckle.
“Too many men want me dead as it is. Don’t plan on making things easier for them by doing it myself.”
I stare at him in disbelief. He’s been shot. He’s bleeding badly from the shoulder and obviously isn’t using his left hand at all right now. And yet, he seems completely unperturbed. His grip on the steering wheel is relaxed and he commands the road with ease even while driving twice the speed limit.
I lurch in my seat as he takes a sharp corner.
“You’re driving too fast!” I cry, unable to hold it in.
“This is slow for me, Songbird. Consider it a courtesy since I know you’re not used to this yet. Soon, you will be.”
Those last words are ominous, and I try not to think too deeply about what they mean.
“Aren’t you at least worried about being pulled over?” I ask.
He laughs again, a disbelieving bark of sound. It’s like I just asked him if he ever worries about Santa putting him on the naughty list. Like it’s something nonsensical.
I lapse into silence, unsure why I’ve even engaged him in conversation in the first place. I return my attention to the outside world. We pass Edward Gardens and turn onto Brindle Path, one of the most expensive streets in one of the country’s most expensive cities.
I’ve never been in this neighbourhood, but I know exactly where we are. Millionaire’s Row. A lush, secluded neighbourhood of sprawling mansions on gigantic lots. It doesn’t even feel like we’re in Toronto as we pass castle-like houses on entire acreages of their own. My house is large, but it’s nothing like these ones.
We continue along the street before turning onto a long and winding driveway. Gigantic trees arch on both sides, casting shadows on the glistening drive that’s like an entire road unto itself. Despite the drifts of snow on either side, the driveway is immaculately snow-free and salted, its smooth black surface reflecting moonlight like still water.
We travel so far into the trees that the main road disappears. I worry at my lower lip, feeling like I’m falling further and further into a trap. Like I’m headed for the underworld and I’ll never claw my way back out.
A huge gate looms ahead, manned by a tattooed guy in a booth. Elio doesn’t stop, doesn’t even slow down, and I gasp, thinking we’ll crash right into the wrought iron, but we don’t. The gate slides sideways, the man in the booth giving a deferential nod as we drive through.
I wrench around in my seat, staring backwards as the gate closes behind us. Black bars slicing through the night and cutting me off from where I came from.
From everything I’ve ever known.
I turn around to face my new future as Elio stops the car and darkly mutters, “Welcome home.”