“I know all the secrets, Darlin’,” he snickers. “Nothing can stop me now.”
“… Deacon?”
“You need to get out of here,” he urges, glancing down. “Please.”
“Leave the game to the boys, Iris,” Sal hisses. “You never truly believed you were going to take it over. Did you?”
“Fuck you!” I angrily spew. “I fucking hate you!” Daisuke opens the door as I scowl with a vengeful spite at the two men who pledged to love me and betrayed me. “I will fucking destroy you!”
“… With what?” Sal arrogantly asks. “Without Lotus? What are you other than a catatonic unbreakable whore?”
I spit in his face. “I will kill you, Sal Raniero!”
“Good luck with that, lil girl.”
With Fink standing beside me, I stare at the limousine in disbelief until I can no longer see them. “I loved them,” I whisper, collapsing to my knees. “I wanted to give Sal everything. I love him so fucking much.”
“We’re clear,” Cristos yells to Fink.
“Sal left me.” Rocking, I repeat, “Sal left me.”
Fink crouches down and brushes my hair from my face. “And he loves you more than words.”
“He’s selling me out.”
“That man would die a million painful deaths before he would ever sell you out,” he whispers, gripping my fingers. “If you didn’t know that before, then you best know it now. Sal Raniero’s dedication to Lotus and Iris Nakamura is unwavering, but the Goro gang doesn’t know that.”
“I’m sorry about this, Iris,” Cristos contends, strolling up. “I’d been meeting with the Goro gang trying to find a way to appease them. I didn’t want them to lay a hand on you.”
“Is Sal…”
Fink whispers, “He’s going to fight for you.”
Losing my shit, I wail, “I should have done more!”
“Don’t go down that road.”
“… How can I not? The Goro gang will kill them!”
“Only one of them.”
“What do you mean?” I panic, looking at Cristos. “What does he mean, Delarte?”
“They agreed to a death match.”
And then, I piss myself.
Soaked, I shiver and sob, buckling over as my fingers grip the ground. There must be hope somewhere. This can’t be happening. We were happy. We were talking. We were in love.
“Help me, please! Someone help me!” I spot the sneakers and glance up to the sun and the long hair. “… Deacon?”
“Baby girl,” he commands, scooping my decimated spirit into his arms. “Calm down.”
“Oh, my God,” I shrill in horror. “You let Sal go to the pits of hell with Diablo Cruz.”
“Yeah, we did,” he mutters, nodding, “...to save you.”
With the roar of a thousand tempests, I howl indecipherable words as the explosion detonates in my core. The evolution spurred on by the continuous loop of being out of control as I rebirth into the wicked catalyst with one crusade, drowning the hungry roué in the riptides of the lost love.
The plans for absolute annihilation take hold in my cortex, nagging, replicating, and beating with the black heart of vile executioner.
From the fodder of a shredded game board, the crow’s nest reconstructs, and players wretched starvation leads to cowering in reverence and fear.
In the blood of her cunt, she washes sins away and reigns over this domicile. With groping hands and insatiable tongues, the rakes beg Mama to feed them.
And she does…with spoiled mother’s milk.
With no inkling of emotion, she observes the famine, sipping pink champagne, eating vanilla cake, and smoking a jade opium pipe.
She is The Lotus Queen.
I am her, and she is me.
Welcome to my monarchy, boys.
IX
Call. Me. Gone.
90
the quagmire of this love
His Butterfly
In the Lotus office in Tokyo, I wear his ripped jeans, Downbelow hoodie, Boston hat, and Bollé shades with ice dripping around my neck and surrounding my wrists. My Lotus gansta motif fits my tyrannical behavior as I scream thug—Raniero proud.
With Deacon at one end of the table and Fink at the other, I sit on the long side, directly across from my half-brother, Masa.
“Repeat it one more time,” I urge, clicking my black stiletto nails. “Slowly, like I’m a fucking toddler who doesn’t understand a fucking lick of English.”
I give zero fucks about my fucks and variations thereof.
With his elbows on the table, his hands press to his cheeks. Deacon closes his eyes with frustration and sighs. “Sal was concerned when we received a call from the States that the Goro gang would attempt something. He preemptively brought Diablo over and kept him at a hotel room in Tokyo.”
“He’s been here the whole time?”
“Yes,” he murmurs, pressing his hands into a steeple in front of his lips. “He didn’t want to tell you because he thought you would be safer, not knowing.”
Pushing away from the table, I hastily stand, crashing the rolling chair into the wall. I pull the hood of the jacket onto the ballcap and pace. “He’s going to die in a stupid underground arena fight! This was so fucking idiotic! Exactly what were you two clowns thinking?”
Deacon’s fist pounds the table with hostility. “We were thinking about saving your fucking life! Thank you would be more appropriate!”
I purse my lips and shake my head as the danger of a Raniero-Nakamura war has passed, but a Cruz-Nakamura war is imminent.
“Thank you for getting me abducted. Thank you for letting my lover,” I condemn, praying it stings. “Walk away so easily with your twin brother.”
“My loyalty is with you and Sal,” Deacon proclaims. “Not Diablo. Not anyone else. You. Sal.” Getting up, he walks to the door. “I may as well be a Guido unicorn, shitting green, white, and red.”
The thought repulses me. “… Where are you going?”
“Outside to have a fucking smoke,” he offers. “And hopefully, come up with a solution, so our lover doesn’t die by the hands of my fucking brother.”
A single tear drips over my cheek as he leaves.
“You’re assuming Sal will die,” Masa emphasizes, “Sal is meaner than you want to believe, Iris.”
“… Mean enough to kill Diablo Cruz?”
“He’s going to have to be,” Fink points out, glancing up from his tablet. “There is a long history of the fights between rival gangs. You’re not going to want to hear this, but it’s a big deal. People are going to pay a lot of money to watch one of them leave in a body bag.”
“Oh, God!” I scream, fearing the worst. “I understand what is happening,” I desperately plead, yearning for someone to hear me. “The only question is, do I wear black or white?”
“You are not going.” Masa insinuates, “It is not a place for you.”
“Next thing I know you’ll be saying it’s not a place for a young lady...”
“You’re no lady.”
“Exactly!” Sliding my ass across the tabletop, I stop mere inches from him. My hands spread wide, and the harsh stare is only the beginning of pent up feminist rage I feel as I rail, “If you were Lotus, would you attend?”
“Of course,” he replies, shrugging. “But it is different for you.”
“Just say it.”
“What?” he asks. “You—Lotus Queen—don’t belong there.”
“Have the goddamned balls to say it’s different for me because I have a fucking pussy! Don’t insult me by barking orders because you are too afraid to speak the fucking truth! It is no different for me!”
“It is Iris!”
Without wavering, I command, “The Lotus is attending the Raniero-Cruz fight. I don’t give a shit how much extra security you have to put on me. And I don’t give a fuck if you don’t like it.” Hopping off the table, I spin on the toe of my black four-inch heels. “Don’t mess with me, Masa. I li
ke you. And believe me, when I say, you don’t want to be on my bad side.”
After my declaration, I step out to find Cruz, sitting on his ass against the building. He opens the pack of smokes, and I take a cigarette.
“What are we doing?” he asks as I glance back to the door. “Not what are Masa and Fink doing. What are you and I doing?”
“I don’t know,” I mutter, skidding down the wall. He flicks his lighter as our blue eyes conspire over the red flame. I am the most powerful woman in the mafia, in thousand-dollar shoes, and I’m sitting on the streets of Tokyo like a vagrant; Sal would be so happy.
Don’t let it go to your head. Keep it real.
“We need to figure it out,” he rambles, but I pay no attention. He locks his fingers with mine. “Together.”
My thoughts quickly turn to—Sal would’ve been so happy—as if the fight is done and over and…he didn’t…survive.
I see the simple wedding with Deacon Cruz; Sal would’ve been so happy.
I see our blue-eyed babies playing on a swing set; Sal would’ve been so happy.
I see all the nights with another man inside of me; Sal would’ve been so happy.
I don’t want to spend my life with SAL WOULD’VE BEEN SO HAPPY.
“Deacon,” I sob, screaming and breaking down. “He’s going to kill him!” My breath quickens as my body threatens to hyperventilate from all the time we’re going to lose. “I’m going to have to bury my fiancé just like he did.”
“No, baby girl, calm down,” he whispers, rubbing my back. “There is a massive difference between how Sal felt about Emily and how you feel about Sal.” I glance at him. “You will never recover.”
“Oh, shit... Can I get him out of it?”
“Probably not,” he replies. “It would be dishonorable.”
“Fuck the honor!” I shout. “More than anyone, I understand Lotus is built on honor!”
Shaking his head, he snickers, “Sal is working on the eight virtues, and even if you could see him, you aren’t going to talk him out of this one, babe. He’s determined to be an honorable man fit for a Lotus.”
Raising my hands, I snicker, “… What does it matter if he is dead?”
“It matters because he is a man of his word and agreed to do something,” Deacon explains. “It’s important in Sal’s world. He said it. Shook on it. It’s done.”
“It’s the admirable thing to do,” I concede, not giving up my reasonings. “But did he ever once stop to think about what the right thing to do for me was?”
“He was trying to get you out of that situation,” he implores, holding my hand. “He loves you, Iris. And if that means he has to get in a ring with a monster or kill someone with his bare hands—he will do it…for you.”
“What am I wearing?” I tragically chuckle once. “And before you say I cannot go, don’t…”
“I would never say that to you.”
Taking a long drag, I stare at the young Japanese girl walking with her mother. She’s about four or five. She could’ve been me. She should’ve been me. With revenge on my mind for everyone who has harmed, dissed, or let me down, I exhale, “… Black or white?”
“Red because my twin brother’s blood is going to spill.”
Curling my lip, I snicker, “Are you okay with that?”
“I have to be,” he heartlessly says. “There is no other option.”
“Can I wear a white hat and green shoes?”
He peers over at me like I’ve lost my mind. “No, I get the Italiano idea, but no. We have fashion sense here on the Tokyo streets.”
“Get a size six.”
“I will,” he mutters, kissing my fingers as I stare at his rings. “When are you leaving?”
“Directly after the fight,” I reply, turning to him. “Please, don’t say anything.”
His sad blue eyes stare into mine. “I won’t.”
“And if we’re wrong…about the fight?”
“We take his body home to Sugargrove,” he acquiesces as I cry against his shoulder. “And then I take you anywhere else in the world, make you Iris Cruz, and we wickedly destroy everything in our path.”
“I’m doing that regardless.”
He wraps his arm around me. “Let me help you.”
“There are only three people in the world I trust, Deacon.”
“And I am number two,” he contends, gazing at me. “I love you, baby girl.”
“I love you too.” In the midst of my sobs, I confess, “Sometimes, you’re number one, Saint.”
“I know, baby girl.”
The Master
“We cannot agree to your terms,” Daisuke stresses as I glance at Masa the day before the fight. “The Goro family believes we have a right to the Lotus legacy.”
“And we cannot come together?” I preach the same tune I have for the last four hours—Peace. Love. Harmony. The new Sal mantra. Toss up a bead curtain. Turn on the lava lamp. Smoke a bong. Make love, not war. And call it a motherfucking day.
“The Lotus refuses any notions of the Goro,” Masa informs.
Say the whole sentence.
What aren’t you saying, Masa?
Leaning back in the chair, I slouch and rub my face with my hands. “Can I see Iris?”
“No,” Daisuke replies. “We do not acknowledge any woman as being the leader of Lotus. We will not abide by her rules because she is a non-existent entity.”
She was very existent on my dick five days ago.
Mark my word, I am going to kill Daisuke with my bare hands for that one comment.
“So, I’m fucked,” I boast, shoving the wooden chair in the small interrogation room. It flips on its side. “You won’t let me see Iris because you think she’s invisible, and I cannot make this any better without her because she refuses any notions of Goro. We are at an impasse.”
“There is no impasse,” Daisuke quips, heading for the door. “You will fight our representative.”
“What the actual fuck is he talking about, Masa?”
Tapping his fingers on the table, he informs, “You don’t have to fight Diablo. You just have to fight someone.”
“… What?”
“Before you think about killing me—now, let me explain,” he pleads as I give a side-eyed glance. I like Masa, but there is a limit—a place where he is no longer likable. “Goro threatened to raid the palace if we didn’t agree to a fight. Our heritage would’ve been forever lost and forgotten. It was never about selling Iris to Stanis Kozlov.”
“The Bratva put in a bid?”
“Yeah!” he loudly booms. “A huge one. But Goro wants the fight more than the funds.”
“… Why?”
“To dishonor you so you won’t have The Chairman’s blessing…again.”
“I lost it…”
“And she lost grace,” he quickly rebukes. “Why would it be any different?”
“Does The Chairman know about the Bratva?”
“No,” he says as I glare over the top of him. “But Lotus does. Goro promised as long as a fight happens, they will keep away from the palace because they’re convinced you will not earn his blessing.”
“And they think she wouldn’t marry me without it?”
“Without the blessing, she is no longer Lotus,” he blatantly states. “She isn’t giving up her power trip for anyone.”
“Promises are bullshit with Goro!” I furiously roar. “They’re still gonna hit the palace! You need to ramp up your security in Gifu and be prepared for war.”
“I have,” he pleads. “But if that leaves this room, Iris will end me. I am doing the best I can. Iris is heavily involved in some things you know nothing about, and her focus isn’t here.”
“… Like what? Tell me what I don’t know about!” I shake my head. “I cannot keep her safe if I do not know.”
“I don’t know if you know this, but you’re in a cell.”
“And Cruz is coming to see me in a bit,” I pause for a moment, studying his fa
ce. “Let’s go back and try this sentence again—The Lotus refuses any notions of the Goro…” I furiously assert, “What about The Chairman?” His dark eyes blink several times to mine. “Answer me, Masa.”
Knowing I have him in a corner, he confesses, “…The Chairman is funding the event.”
“Because he doubts me?”
“Iris is his only granddaughter.”
“Did he fund her abduction with the Bratva too?” I yell, angrier than I’ve ever been. “Is he testing me?”
“He wants to know if you are worthy enough man in your custom-tailored suits and fine Italian loafers to take care of his flower.”
“I am a made man in the goddamned Commission. I am more than enough man to take care of his granddaughter and him!” I rebuke fuming. “And you know that!”
“I do,” he assures. “But Keishi is old school. You fight for honor and earn the reward.”
“Is the Goro gang in bed with Lotus?”
“We agreed to a couple of points on a few shipments to help them out,” he informs. “You know, competition is good for the market.”
“I’m not a rat. Your secrets are safe with me,” I maintain. “You want to fight me?” I ask, stealing a smoke. “Because I am the crazy motherfucker with steel rods in his hands, and I’m just pissed off enough to do it!”
“Do you want to fight Diablo?”
“I don’t want to fight either of you.”
He extends his legs and crosses his feet and arms at the same time. “Who do you want to fight?”
I brought Diablo Cruz over here believing I could use him to our advantage, but after being in a cell for five days, I realized one thing—I don’t have just cause to kill Diablo Cruz. He killed my sister, but I have zero feelings concerning it.
I didn’t love Val.
And I don’t hate Diablo.
Those two things together mean my monster won’t come to play. Love + Hate = One pissed off motherfucking Sal.
Maybe that makes me an asshole.
Maybe that means I am prioritizing based on one flower’s needs.
“Hand over Enzo Gennaro, and I’ll give you a blood bath,” I seethe with madness. I’m behaving better, but I’m nowhere near sane. Grins. “I’d eat his fucking heart after I split him in two.”
Diary of a Submissive (a Tomb of Ashen Tears Book 4) Page 76
