That’s when I pick up that other scent. The one just masked by the aftershave. The one that makes me a little nauseous.
Ashes of roses.
Dead roses.
Tomorrow is my birthday. The box of dead roses won’t arrive until then.
I can’t see the library doors from where I am, but I hear them open then close. Someone comes in or goes out.
The hair on the back of my neck stands on end, and my hands grow clammy. The lights flicker twice, then come back on.
I hurry toward the front desk, and I’m almost there when I see it.
A single rose petal.
Black?
They’re supposed to be red. They’ve always been red.
Is it my imagination or do I smell that musty, faint scent of damp earth? Of rot.
“There you are,” Barbara announces from behind me.
I yelp and whirl around.
She lets out a small scream too. Her hand moves to her own chest and a moment later, she laughs. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost, Cristina.”
My mouth goes dry. I try to swallow, try for a laugh, wanting to sound casual, but it comes out strange. Choked.
It’s just my imagination, I tell myself. The smell. The petal. It’s not my dead rose.
She tilts her head and comes closer, taking the heavy tome from under my arm.
“You work too hard, dear. Go have some fun. These dusty old books will be here when you get back.”
“Thanks, Barbara.”
She smiles, and again, I wonder how old she is. In her late sixties or early seventies? Even with her face lined as it is, she’s still so elegantly beautiful.
“Um…did someone get roses?” I ask.
“Yes, in fact. A bouquet arrived earlier. No note. Just a gorgeous bouquet of long-stemmed black roses.”
“Black?”
“They’re stunning. I’ll show you.” She ducks behind the counter toward the office door and then goes through it.
I’m relieved as I walk to the counter and pick up the fallen petal. Not dead. Just a petal that dropped off. That’s all.
“Beautiful, right?” she asks as she returns carrying a crystal vase with the roses. “I snuck them into my office,” she says with a wink.
“Good for you.”
“No note, so I thought why not? Strange count, though. Eight,” she adds as she sets the vase on the counter and adjusts the position of one rose.
My blood turns to ice. “Eight…roses?”
She looks at me and nods, her over-sprayed hair immobile. “But eight is better than none.”
“And there wasn’t a note?”
“No. Strange especially because I know the florist, and these roses are very expensive.” She wipes something off the counter. “Will I see you tomorrow?”
“Um…no, it’s my birthday. I have plans with my family.”
“Well, you have a happy birthday, sweetheart.”
“Thank you. Good night, Barbara.”
3
Cristina
I hurry down the dimly lit stairwell, one hand grazing the iron railing while the other grips the umbrella handle. That scent of aftershave lingers here in the hall too, but it could be anyone. The library building is a busy one.
It’s the anticipation of that box of roses that has me anxious. There should be eight tomorrow. Eight and a note that reads 0 years.
I wonder if whoever sends the flowers will bother writing a note at all.
The first box came when I was almost eleven years old. I had been living in the city with my uncle and cousins, Liam and Simona, for almost nine months by then.
When the box was delivered, I remember standing at the living room window watching the sun go down over Manhattan. I love the view from this apartment. Even when I was very young and my parents would bring my brother and I to visit my uncle’s family, I’d stand at the window of their beautiful apartment that took up the whole floor and watch the sun set over what felt like the whole of the city.
I didn’t think anything strange about a delivery so late. What was strange was that the package was for me.
At first, all I felt was excitement because I recognized the box. It was the same florist my dad used to send flowers to my mom.
Now I was getting my first delivery of flowers, but something was different.
Wrong.
I still remember the smell.
I hurried back to the living room and set my fancy box down on the coffee table undoing the ribbon while ignoring the nanny’s calls for me to wait.
By the time she stood over me, the lid was off, and I was peeling back layers and layers of fine black tissue paper. When my mom received flowers, those sheets smelled wonderful.
My flowers, though, they didn’t smell so wonderful.
The opposite.
And I had that feeling I sometimes get in the pit of my stomach when I remember the man who told me monsters don’t hide in the dark.
When I finally peeled back the last layer of paper and saw the single dead rose inside, I thought how much the box resembled a coffin.
How much it resembled the coffins my mother and brother had been buried in.
I lifted it out, and the petals fell away, some into the box, some on the floor around my feet. When I turned my gaze up to my nanny, she had her hand over her mouth.
She didn’t look upset.
She looked terrified.
“It’s dead,” I said, showing her
“It’s just dried,” she’d said in a small voice.
I didn’t think there was a difference. What was the point of having dead or dried flowers if you could have happy, living ones? I was preparing to explain this, not paying attention, when I pricked my finger on a thorn.
I sucked in a breath and turned in time to see a fat drop of blood splat into the box, half on a petal, half on that black paper. A second drop fell onto the polished white marble floor.
It was then I saw the small card inside. I lifted it out and read the two words.
Eight years…
“That’s strange,” I said. “Are they from Uncle Adam? Why didn’t he wish me a happy birthday? Maybe it’s on the other side—”
Suddenly, my nanny slapped the flower out of my hand, and I gasped. It wasn’t so much that it hurt but the shock of it. She’d never raised a hand to me before. I’d never even heard her yell, not at me or my cousins at least.
“I’m sorry,” she said when she saw my face, the tears welling in my eyes. She hugged me to her. “I didn’t want you to prick yourself again. They should have taken the thorns off. You’re just a little girl!”
“What’s wrong?” I asked, the words muffled by her hug.
She bent down, wiped my tears, and kissed my finger. “Nothing, sweetheart. Nothing at all. Let’s go get ice cream. Would you like that?”
“But it’s before dinner.”
“Well, it’s your birthday. We should celebrate. And I’m sure the florist just sent the wrong box.”
I’d forgotten about the rose by dinner time.
My next birthday, there were two roses in the box, and the note read Seven years.
Each year after that the rose count went up and the number on the card went down. I knew something bad was coming, and those numbers, they were some sort of twisted countdown.
Tonight is the night before my eighteenth birthday. I’ll receive my box of dead roses tomorrow. I wonder what the note will read because whoever was counting is out of time.
Or maybe it’s me who’s out of time.
4
Cristina
I tug my raincoat closer as I approach the doors to exit the library building. The rain hasn’t let up, and with the wind, I’m not sure how much good this umbrella is going to do.
Securing my backpack onto both arms, I push the heavy door and step outside, the overhang not doing anything to protect me against the wind-blown rain as I fumble to open it.
Cars speed past, angry horns honking
as the traffic lights turn from green to red, then flash yellow. The storm has knocked out the electricity. The university is only a few blocks from my uncle’s apartment, and it’s faster to walk than take the bus even with this weather.
I hurry, cursing inwardly every time I step into a puddle, water penetrating my socks and shoes, my jeans.
By the time I turn the corner to my block, traffic has thinned out. Just as I run to cross the street, a gust of wind almost forces the umbrella from my hand, turning it inside out, rendering it useless as it snaps the frame.
“Shit!” I step up onto the sidewalk as a car comes too fast around the corner, too close to the curb where water has collected inches deep. When I just manage to jump out of the way of the tidal wave it launches, I exhale with relief.
Fred, the doorman, sees me coming. I’m surprised at how dark it is inside. Apart from the emergency lights, the lobby is only dimly lit by the flashing yellow traffic light that comes in from the street.
“Power’s out?”
“Yep. Nothing to worry about. I’m sure it will be back soon, Cristina.”
At least I’m out of the rain, even if I am soaked through.
I drop the useless umbrella into the trash can and take a deep breath in, pushing wet hair back from my face.
Unbuttoning my raincoat, I listen to water drip onto the beautiful marble floor. My shoes squeaking as I make my way into the warm building and toward the stairs.
With the power out, I’m going to have to walk up. We live on the eighth floor. I slide my backpack off one arm and begin the climb.
This is a wealthy part of town, but I guess even money can’t make demands on Mother Nature.
As I climb the last few steps, a strange unease has me slowing. I stop for a moment to listen and realize what it is. It’s quiet. Too quiet. Usually, I can hear my youngest cousin, Simona, playing inside, or the baby of the neighbor in the apartment below ours crying, or music, or a television. Something. But tonight, I hear nothing. And even though I know the power is out, it still feels strange.
My mind wanders back to the events at the library. That smell of aftershave. The roses.
The rain had distracted me enough that I hadn’t thought about any of it once I’d left, but now, it’s all back.
I wonder if there’s a box of dead roses waiting for me inside already.
But no, they won’t come until tomorrow. Whoever sends them keeps to a strict schedule.
Climbing the last of the stairs, I make my way to the double doors directly opposite. Their elegance is an indication of what’s to come just beyond.
My uncle redid the apartment the year I moved in with them. He spared no expense, saying we needed the additional space, although I’m not sure we really did. It went from beautiful to exceptional where it’s even appeared in style magazines.
Something prickles at the back of my neck. My steps are hesitant as I make my way to the door. And I swear I smell roses, but are they real or is my mind playing tricks on me?
I put my hand on the doorknob. Something makes me pause, though. Someone is crying. Simona?
I push the door open quietly.
The foyer is dark, but two candles burn on the table beside the door, and I can see more of them in the living room. That prickling at the back of my neck intensifies when I hear the sound of liquid being poured. Apart from the crying, it’s that quiet.
“Good whiskey,” a man says. A man whose voice sends a chill along my spine. I know that voice. “You have good taste, Adam. I’m surprised.”
“Liam take your sister and go to your room,” Uncle Adam says. I hear the tension in his voice.
“No, stay, Liam.” It’s the other man.
“I’m not going anywhere until this asshole leaves,” Liam says, sounding pissed off.
The man—the asshole, I presume—chuckles.
A heavy silence follows, and Simona continues to quietly sob.
I close the door and steel my spine as I take the few steps that will carry me to the living room. To where this stranger whose voice I recognize is waiting for me.
For me.
I don’t know how I know it, but I have no doubt I’m the reason he’s here.
And when I turn the corner, the scene is unreal. Tension like nothing I’ve felt before.
Liam is sitting on the sofa his expression angry but just beneath that anger, I see uncertainty. Fear, maybe. He’s comforting Simona, my younger cousin, who has her face buried in his shoulder.
He looks up at me, his jaw tight.
My uncle is standing. He’s a large man, well over six feet and built powerfully, but just behind him stand two others. Strangers in dark suits, one with a scar running down the side of his neck.
There’s one other man. The one whose voice I recognize. Whose eyes I still remember. And I have no doubt he’s the one to worry about.
He’s sitting in my uncle’s favorite armchair. No one sits in that chair.
This man, my monster of eight years ago, is the only one whose posture is relaxed.
Leaning back against the worn leather back, he has one leg crossed over the other, right ankle at left knee. His charcoal suit is a shade darker than those of the other men and about a thousand times more expensive. I know good quality. I grew up with it.
His face is softened by the glow of candlelight as he watches me with curiosity. I think how deceptive that light is because I know the hardness inside his strange silvery-gray eyes.
And I remember that night eight years ago. I remember that he never answered my question.
“Are you a monster?” I’d asked him.
I hadn’t needed him to answer, though.
I already knew he was.
5
Damian
I watch her as I unwrap my second chocolate. The foil is the only sound in the room. That and the sniffles of the little girl.
Popping the chocolate into my mouth, I press the foil into a tight ball and flick it onto the coffee table. It lands beside the other one near the tower of chocolates wrapped in pretty blue.
The boy, I guess him to be about sixteen, fists his hands at this act of blatant rudeness. He’s young, but he’s strong. I can tell. Stronger than his father, at least.
I savor the taste and texture of the rich chocolate as I take in Cristina Valentina.
Last time I saw her, she was ten years old. She’s a woman now, and she’s as stunning as I knew she would be. Even drenched as she is, even with the scar that lines her cheek and cuts her lip, she’s beautiful.
That’s a good thing. I like beautiful things.
Swallowing the last of the chocolate, I turn to the boy. “Now you may take your sister to her room.”
“I’m not going anywhere,” Liam Valentina says.
Looking at him, I see how he doesn’t actually resemble his father much. He takes after his mother, who left years ago. She wanted to take the kids with her, but that was one of my gifts to Adam. He got to keep his son and daughter.
I watch Adam’s response.
Adam Valentina. Younger brother to Joseph Valentina, Cristina’s father. He’s been Cristina’s guardian since the unfortunate night of Joseph’s suicide eight years ago.
His hands are fisted at his sides. I know he’d love nothing more than to pummel me. But that’s not happening. Even if my men weren’t here, I know too much about him for him to dare. He’s putting on a show for his son’s sake or for Cristina’s sake. I don’t know which. Don’t really care.
He shifts narrowed eyes from me to his son and back. “Take your sister and go, Liam.”
“Dad—”
“Go!”
Reluctantly, Liam rises.
I smile at the boy. “Good night, kids.”
Liam looks like he’s about to explode when Adam barks once more for him to go.
“Liam, I’m scared.” It’s the little girl. Simona. She wants out of here.
Liam looks down at his little sister and nods, and they both disap
pear down the hallway.
I shift my gaze back to Cristina. She’s watching them go, her forehead creased with anxiety. Her hair, clothes, shoes are all soaked.
“Did you walk from school?” I ask her, unfolding my legs.
She turns to me, opens her mouth, those violet eyes fearful yet curious. I wonder if she remembers me. If she remembers that night.
Her little pink tongue darts out to lick her lips, and for a moment, I’m captivated.
“You don’t have to answer him, Cristina,” her uncle says, stealing that pretty purple gaze from me, and for a brief moment, a murderous rage burns through me.
I lock eyes with Adam Valentina.
“Take a seat, Adam.”
His lips tighten into a thin line, and I can see he wants to lunge at me. He won’t, though.
Because he, like most men, is weak.
Because he, like most men, can be bought.
“I hate having to repeat myself.” When he still doesn’t sit, I give a nod and Tobias, my most trusted man, encourages him into a chair.
“Uncle Adam?” Cristina asks.
He turns toward her, and the change in his expression is instantaneous. Tenderness. Affection. Hmm. Not sure about those. Regret? Maybe.
Does he love her? Not enough.
Shifting my gaze back to Cristina, I take her in. She’s tall for a woman. Maybe five-feet-seven inches. She’s not wearing heels. In fact, she’s wearing the ugliest pair of sneakers I’ve ever seen. And still, there’s an elegance to her. Something delicate and decidedly feminine about her.
She takes a step toward her uncle, the wet shoes squeaking, but she stops the instant she sees the box on the table. She almost winces as though she’s been hit.
Her mouth falls open, and her now panicked gaze shifts from the box, to her uncle, to me.
“It’s you?” She pauses, pointing at the box that should be very familiar to her by now. “You’ve been sending them all these years?”
Unholy Union Page 2
