Blood & Lies (A Twisted Duet Book 1)

by Bella J

  Castello pointed to Italian writing at the bottom of the sheet. ‘L’unico.’

  The one.

  22

  CASTELLO

  I had to come back.

  Thank God I came back.

  I was on my way to my bedroom when I accidentally dropped the sheets of paper that burned my fucking hand. The anger and rage that buzzed through my body was so strong, it surpassed the fury I felt when I found out that my brother had been murdered. And I knew why. I knew why I was so consumed with intense indignation…because my jealousy was fueling it.

  When those sheets scattered around me, one of them caught my eye—the one that Tatum was now clutching in her hand.

  Her very last drawing was one of me, with my scar—‘L’unico.’

  That was the moment I realized that there was no decision to be made. There never was. I had no fucking choice but to protect her, no questions asked.

  I rushed back to her room only to find Nicollo on top of her, his cock in his hand, seconds away from claiming what was mine.

  I reacted.

  With nothing but red clouding my vision, I took out my gun, aimed…and pulled the fucking trigger. And God forgive me, but when Nicollo’s lifeless body fell limp, half of his fucking skull splattered against the wall, I savored the moment. This was justice. This was retaliation, vengeance, payback—and all because my actions protected something worth protecting. Her.

  I stared at her. She was shaking, her left eye bruised and cut, blood trickling down her cheek. All this time I saw her as vulnerable, trapped between these four walls. I was so wrong. She was never vulnerable, just scared, yet strong. But right now, this woman in front of me, she was vulnerable. Seconds from being raped then having a man’s brain matter all over her face, I saw that all her strength had finally left her, leaving her helpless, defenseless, but not weak. Never weak.

  I pulled my shirt over my head and gently wiped her face clean. “This is probably the world’s most fucked up question right now, but are you okay?”

  She didn’t stop shaking. “Yes.”

  “Liar.” I tilted her chin to lift her face toward mine. “When will you accept the fact that your body can’t lie to me?” Softly I traced my thumb across the bruised skin next to her eye. Fuck, if I could kill that son of a bitch again I would.

  “What the fuck?”

  I closed my eyes when I heard his voice, and knew that we were screwed.

  “Castello, is that…is that Nicollo?”

  I turned to face Vico who was standing by the door staring at Nicollo’s corpse.

  “Yes.” I moved in front of Tatum.

  Vico’s shocked face turned pale. “What happened?” Confused eyes found mine.

  Oh boy. Here we go. “He was trying to rape Tatum. So I had no choice.”

  He narrowed his eyes. “You shot him?”

  “Yes. Like I said, I had no choice.” I straightened, my instincts expecting the worst.

  “What the fuck, Castello? Why would you fucking shoot him?”

  I slowly eased my arm back curving it around Tatum’s hip—my number one concern, protecting her.

  “I told you, he was trying to rape Tatum. So I had to act.”

  Vico pushed both hands through his hair, looking back down at Nicollo’s dead body. “Holy shit. You fucking killed him.”

  It’s when Vico looked up at me with sudden wicked resolve in his eyes that I knew the shit was about to hit the fucking fan.

  “You killed Nicollo because he wanted to rape that slut? She’s going to die anyway, Castello. Why the fuck protect her by killing your own goddamn cousin?”

  “Vico, I need you to stop.” I stepped back, forcing Tatum to move. I wanted her protected between me and the wall. “What Nicollo was trying to do was wrong.”

  A manic laugh rumbled from the back of his throat. “Wrong? Who the fuck made you judge and jury?”

  “I’m the boss, Vico. Nicollo was sticking his nose into shit it didn’t belong.”

  “By wanting to fuck her? He wasn’t hurting anyone.”

  “He was hurting her!”

  The second the words left my mouth Vico’s eyes grew wide, and I knew he had figured it out.

  “She’s hooked her claws into you, too, hasn’t she?”

  My heart raced, my mind spinning, trying to figure out how to get Tatum out of here.

  “It’s not that simple, Vico.”

  “Not that simple? I’m pretty fucking sure the fact that you blew half of Nicollo’s head off simplifies this quite a lot.”

  “Things changed.”

  He snorted. “What things?”

  “Everything.”

  His dark brows slanted inward as he frowned. “Oh my God. You fucked her, didn’t you?”

  I couldn’t answer him. Vico was a loose cannon right now, and I had to tread lightly if I wanted to keep him from blowing.

  “Listen to me, Vico. I think Mother is lying to us. She’s been acting strange, and Uncle Gino—”

  “Uncle Gino?” He narrowed his black eyes. “Tell me you’re not fooled by that old man. He’s been out to ruin our mother for God knows how long. You know how he tried to turn Dad against her.”

  “Did he? Or was he simply seeing something none of us could?”

  “Oh my God. She’s really done a number on you, hasn’t she?” He peered over my shoulder at her, and I shifted trying to block his view. By now my body was against hers, and I could feel how she trembled. Fuck, I really needed to get her the fuck out of here.

  “Vico, calm down.” I held my hand out in front of me, and slowly started to step to the side, my other hand guiding Tatum to follow. “I need to get Tatum out of here.”

  “What?” He straightened, and balled his fists. “You’re kidding right?”

  Another few steps and the door came closer and closer. “I’m serious.”

  “Fuck!” His loud voice boomed through the room, and I felt Tatum jerk behind me. “Nicollo was right. You don’t have the fucking balls to lead this family. No wonder Dad spent all his time training Carlo, and ignoring you. He saw it too, the coward that you really are.”

  His words were like a punch to the gut, but my need to get Tatum to safety overshadowed my need to retaliate. Every instinct I ever had came together in one giant need to protect what was mine—and Tatum Linscott was mine, whether she wanted to be or not.

  Vico stepped closer, spite and malice emanating from him like deadly threats. “I’m sorry, brother, but I can’t let you take her anywhere.”

  “Vico, I don’t want to hurt you.”

  But my little brother had already made up his mind. He launched at me, and I yelled over my shoulder, “Tatum, run!”

  With a hard shove I pushed her out the door and ducked just in time as Vico’s fist came flying toward my face. With a punch to Vico’s gut, I jerked up straight and flung my other fist toward his face, my knuckles connecting against his cheekbone. Bone cracked, grunts and roars of anger echoed.

  Vico spun from the force and collapsed on the ground. For a second I wanted to kick him while he was down. I wanted to beat him to a fucking pulp for threatening Tatum, for whipping her, and for every ounce of hate he had directed at her. But Tatum was out there running through a house she didn’t know, guaranteed to find a threat around every damn corner. I had to go find her.

  I rushed out the door and down the hall. There was only one place in this house she knew how to get to—my bedroom. So I rushed in the direction of my room, praying that she didn’t chance it by running anywhere else. My heart raced at a million miles a second, and my feet couldn’t carry me fast enough. If anyone found her—especially my mother, she’d be dead before I even had a chance at saving her.

  I ran up the stairs and the second I rounded the corner I found her running toward my bedroom door—flailing against the wall was more like it.

  “Tatum!”

  She froze and turned. “Castello.”

  Immediately she started running in
my direction, and like a scene out of a goddamn romance movie, she wrapped her arms tight around my neck while I enclosed her within mine. I could feel her heart beating wildly, the pulse resonating against my chest. Her warm breath crossed the skin of my neck, and the only thought running through my mind was, ‘I need to keep this woman.’

  “Tatum, we need to get you inside my room.” With one arm still around her waist, we both ran toward the door. The second we went in, I locked the door and bolted it shut with the extra security lever I knew would come in handy someday.

  With a heavy sigh I leaned against the door trying to get my racing heart under control.

  Motherfucker!

  I basically just signed both our death warrants. Tatum and I were both as good as dead. Everything just spiraled out of control within minutes. One moment, one decision, one bullet, and now everything was fucked up.

  “Castello?”

  I closed my eyes at the sound of her sweet voice. So close. It was so fucking close or Nicollo would have stolen everything from her. He would have taken all of her that was mine now. Her soul, her mind, her body, her fucking heartbeat. It was all mine, and that motherfucker was seconds away from taking it all.

  I turned, and she was standing a few feet away from me, her eye swollen, and her cheeks red with tears.

  “Tatum, I don’t—”

  “Thank you.” Her words cut me off, and I narrowed my eyes at her in confusion.

  “You shouldn’t be thanking me, Tatum. You should hate me.”

  “I did. I did hate you. And a part of me probably still does.” She lifted her eyes to meet mine. “But you saved me from him, which probably counts for something.”

  I shook my head and pushed myself away from the door. “I didn’t save you, Tatum. You’re here because of me. You almost got raped, because of me. And now? Now all hell is about to break loose, and I have no idea how I can stop this.” I walked past her to grab my mobile off the cabinet.

  “You saved me from being raped.” Her voice broke, and she sucked in a breath. “To me, getting raped would have been a fate worse than death.”

  I froze. When all this started any thought with her in it contained the word death as well. But that changed. If death should take her now, I would envy death for claiming such a beautiful creature.

  “So, you saved me,” she whispered, and my chest tightened.

  “Don’t thank me, Tatum.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I’m not sure whether I did it to save you…or to save myself.” It was the truth. I fucking blew Nicollo’s head off because he was touching what was mine. He wanted to taint and defile something that belonged to me. So who did I save by killing him? Did I save her, like she so eloquently put it? Or did I save myself by sparing me the anger, the guilt, the resentment of knowing that another man had claimed her, fucked her when the only word that resonated through my head whenever I looked at her was…mine?

  I sighed. “Don’t try to make me the hero here, Tatum, because I’m not. I might have slayed one demon for you, for me, for us—but with me comes a thousand more.”

  She stepped up behind me, and my skin came alive when she placed her hand on my back.

  “You’re not the devil, Castello.”

  I let out a halfhearted laugh. “You’re such a naïve little mouse.”

  My eyes fell closed as my body started to bustle with so many emotions it was impossible to distinguish just one. Desire, possessiveness, a need to protect, lust…and something else—something I didn’t recognize.

  “Your tattoo.” Her fingertips started to move over my skin. “Did you design it?”

  “Yeah.”

  Her fingers travelled some more. “I understand the cross, Carlo’s name.” She hesitated, her fingers pausing right where I knew it was. “But why your name?”

  My eyes remained closed, the image of what I knew the tattoo looked like flashing in my mind. It was a cross-shaped headstone with Carlo’s name on it, flames burning in the ground. Within those flames was my name—the morbid last edition Joey had added to the masterpiece on my back.

  With a deep breath, I replied, “Because Carlo might be dead and buried, but I’m the one burning in Hell.”

  I felt her stiffen, and her hand left my skin. This was all too fucking heavy right now, and I had much more important shit to deal with—like how to get her the fuck out of here in one piece.

  I turned and took a strand of her blonde hair that was tainted red with Nicollo’s blood between my fingers. “You need a shower, and I need to call someone.” I stepped away from her, and dialed the number of the only person I knew might be able to help us.

  He answered on the second ring. “Castello?”

  “I need your help, Uncle Gino.”

  23

  TATUM

  After the very welcome shower, watching as streaks of pink and red flowed down the drain, I walked out of the bathroom. Castello had placed another one of his T-shirts on the bed, which I pulled over my head.

  He was standing by the window, back turned to me, still talking on the phone. For a moment I allowed myself to see him as a man—an attractive man who took care of his body. His back was roped with defined muscles, broad shoulders insuring that he could intimidate almost anyone. The jeans he wore were stained with patches of red, the blood only making him seem more dangerous…darker. But that darkness no longer scared me the way it did. In fact, I felt drawn to it. My own darkness, which I tried to suppress and hide for so long was reaching for his, needing it like I needed air to breathe.

  He moved, and the tattoo on his back seemed to move with every muscle. For the first time since this all started I was finally able to make sense of the man. The tattoo was his art, his design, and also the image of what he carried inside him every day—the image he now carried on his back, that moved with him. Carlo’s name was inked with intricate, beautiful calligraphy letters, while Castello’s name was bold, broken, and bleeding into the flames. He loved his brother, but hated himself.

  There was a single crack in the headstone right at the top of the cross. The flames that engulfed the cross from the ground were blood red, angry shades of orange, its only goal to destroy while his name suffered its wrath. To others it would seem morbid and grim, but to me it was beautiful. That image was a reflection of his soul. The crack, the flames, the red—it was everything he thought he was. But after what happened, him killing his own flesh and blood to save me, now I knew that something resplendent inside him was waiting to be set free. He just never had a reason to find the beauty he suppressed without even realizing it.

  “Please…hurry. I don’t know how much time we have.” Castello hung up, and tossed the phone on the bed. His jaw ticked, every muscle in his body pulled tight.

  “Fuck!” His fist hit the wall, and I flinched at his furious outburst. Guilt bombarded me, joining hands with the fear that already threatened to consume me. Castello was losing everything. His entire life was on the line, all because of me. Why? Why would he do that? Why would he risk himself for me?

  Castello turned to face me, blood coating the knuckles of his right hand. I remained still. I might see him in a completely different light now, but I still had a lot to learn about the darkness he carried with him.

  “Why are you doing this?” My voice sounded hoarse and uncertain.

  He fell back against the wall and stared up at the ceiling. “I don’t know. Right now I don’t know anything.”

  I believed him. I believed that he wasn’t sure why he was saving me, just like I wasn’t sure why the thought of being rescued and going home no longer appealed to me.

  I shifted from one leg to the other. “How long before Vico comes looking for us?”

  “It’s not Vico we need to worry about.”

  “Your mother?”

  “Yeah.”

  My body had been strong long enough. With shaking legs I sat down on the bed. “She really hates me.”

  He didn’t respond. H
e didn’t need to. I saw it the night in the dining hall when she wanted to slice her blade across my throat. Her deep rooted hatred for me was everywhere—her face, her eyes, the way she fucking breathed. I could see that killing me was the only way for her to get relief from the ghosts that tormented her.

  “Is she going to kill me?”

  The mattress dipped behind me, but I didn’t turn toward him. “She will want to, yes. But it’s not that simple.”

  I snorted. “It sounds real simple to me.”

  “We have rules, Tatum. Laws of our own that we have to abide by. I’m the Boss, head of this family, and no matter what happens she can’t go against me.”

  “And Vico?”

  “He’ll challenge me—especially since I’ve spilled blood of my blood.”

  I couldn’t fight the shudder that wracked through me. “Will he win?”

  “He might.”

  I turned to face him. “He might?”

  There was a long pause before he finally answered, “There’s a big possibility that he will win, yes.”

  “Because he’ll have your mother’s support.” It wasn’t a question. I knew she’d support anyone who could guarantee her my head on a plate.

  “Yes.”

  I closed my eyes, my stomach twisted tighter than a vice. “And then? What happens then?”

  Another pause, this time more deafening, a shattering silence. I heard him inhale. “Then I’ll join my brother in Hell.”

  A tear slipped down my cheek. “And I’ll be right there next to you.”

  His phone rang, the sound making me jolt. I turned around as he reached for it, and when he looked up at me with apprehension in his eyes, I knew who it was.

  He answered, putting the phone on speaker.

  “Madre.”

  “Castello, what the Hell are you doing?”

  “I’m doing what needs to be done.”

  “By saving that wretched woman? The woman who is responsible for your brother’s death?”