by Nichole Van
“What the hell, man?” I shoved him. Hard.
He stumbled back but righted himself quickly. Being the same size had always kinda sucked. It made brotherly fighting less enjoyable.
“That’s bad, Bran.” Chiara shook her head, her shock a jolt of ice-cold water. “Like, soooo bad. So very, very, very bad.”
“I know that!” I tore at my hair.
“You can’t love her.” My sister was merely getting started. “Bran . . . just no. You can’t do that to Tennyson. The first time she broke up with him, Tenn ran off to Afghanistan to get over her. And then after his injury, Tenn needed Lucy to deal with the loss of his leg and avoid a complete mental collapse, but he lost it when she left again—”
“Don’t you think I freaking know that?!” I shouted and then swallowed, forcing myself to calm down. “Don’t you think I know that?” I repeated on a whisper.
“He nearly killed himself over her less than two years ago. This could be the final thing that sends him over the edge. You cannot pursue her. It would be a betrayal of such magnitude—”
“Don’t you think I see Tennyson’s face in that blood-soaked bathtub every time I even think about Lucy?”
“Madonna!” Chiara sagged on the bed, shoulders drooping, pushing her fists into her eyes. “This is so, so, so bad—”
“Look, you two,” I interrupted. “I chose my loyalties years ago. I may not be able to pick the woman my heart decides to love, but I sure as hell can choose what I do about it. Why are you two in here pouring salt on my gaping wounds? It’s bad enough that seeing Lucy again has ripped the scabs off of them. I’ve lived with this emotional torture for the past six years. It’s old news. Let’s move on.”
I turned my back on them both, staring out the window, shoulders heaving.
Pity. Horror. Shock.
Their emotions swirled through the room.
Bzzzz.
Ding, ding.
We all swiveled to my phone.
Stop. Hug and make up. All of you.
Silence.
“Are you sure he doesn’t know?” Dante asked into the quiet.
A beat.
“No, I’m not,” I said, “but I try to block him. I block him from feeling me.” I turned back to the window, staring over the terracotta rooftops of Florence blazing in sunset light. The distant hum of staccato Italian floated in.
More silence. This time stunned.
“You block him?” Dante.
“With your GUT?” Chiara.
I nodded.
“Does it work?” Chiara again.
I shrugged.
Dante hissed. Low. “Does Tennyson know you block him?”
I rolled my eyes. “I don’t know. I’ve never actually asked him if he can sense my undying devotion to Lucy to double-check—”
“Stop with the sarcasm. You gonna tell me what else you can do?” Tension laced Dante’s voice. He motioned toward my arm. “There is a lot more going on with you than just Lucy. Let’s get it all out in the open.”
Traffic horns drifted through the open windows. A slight breeze rustled.
“I’m fine.” I shoved my hands back into my hair. Part of me hating that Dante and I even had the same mannerisms.
“With all due respect, my brother, you are not fine,” Dante said. “You’re in love with the woman who broke Tennyson’s heart, and now you’re hiding things from us. Important things. We had a pact. A vow. We talk to each other when things change with one of our GUTs—”
I laughed. A sharp bark of sound.
“What? What’s that supposed to mean?” Dante snapped. Anger. Frustration.
“You talk about your GUT.” I tightened the grip on my hair, still staring out the window into the dying sunlight. “Tennyson and me . . .”
“What about you and Tennyson?”
More silence.
“It’s easy to talk about something when it isn’t two steps away from destroying you,” I whispered. “When it isn’t this constantly shifting morass of . . . of sound and feeling and taste . . . and even sometimes sight.”
Shock filled my senses. Followed quickly by hurt.
“How long?”
I understood his question.
How long have things been like this? How long have you held your silence?
My bed creaked as Dante sat down.
“Years, particularly the last two years. Your gift may have stabilized a decade ago but mine never did. I’m sure Tennyson’s hasn’t either. The changes just slowed down, but they didn’t stop.”
“Why?”
Why haven’t you told me?
Betrayal. So much hurt.
Ugh.
“Did you really need another reason to cluck and fret over Tennyson and me? There’s nothing anyone can do about it. I didn’t feel the need to add my silly troubles into the mix—”
“Your troubles aren’t silly,” Chiara said.
“They are compared to Tennyson’s.”
That was completely true. My GUT was still changing, morphing, strengthening, but . . .
“It’s manageable. My GUT. I’ve been saying it for years, and I mean it.”
“So . . . you feel things too? Like Tennyson, projecting into the future?”
“No. It’s immediate, like an empath. I ‘hear’ emotion in sound, fleeting impressions. It’s strongest with you and Tennyson. It’s not super intrusive or overwhelming. Not like Tennyson’s GUT. ”
“And what do you ‘hear’ right now?” Dante asked.
It flooded me. Strong. Pure.
“Love,” I murmured. Swallowed. “So much love. Hurt and betrayal too. Guilt. But love is the strongest.”
“That’s why I’m sitting here forcing you to have this conversation. Yes, I feel hurt and betrayed, and my guilt has never been a secret. But you’re my brother. I love you, Branwell. I want to see you happy.”
I chewed on my cheek, still facing away. This was the problem with Dante. Even when I wanted to resent him, he was just so damn lovable it was impossible.
“Thanks.” I sighed. “Thanks for putting up with me and my crap. I love you, too.”
“I know.”
A beat.
“I think you’re supposed to hug it out now,” Chiara said. “Big manly back slaps and stuff.”
We both stared at her. She shrugged.
Dante shook his head. “You willing to talk about what happened to your arm?”
“Something happened to his arm?” Chiara asked.
Now Dante had done it. Chiara would never let this one go.
“Yeah. It’s wrapped in this huge bandage,” Dante said to her. “And he’s not talking about it, which means it’s more than the result of an overeager loofah experiment or beating away crazed attack rabbits.”
Drat. Those would have been good explanations. Lucy had me so tied up in knots, I wasn’t thinking as fast as I needed to today.
“Dude, what happened to your arm?” Chiara appeared at my side, tugging on my sleeve, trying to see my bandage.
I stepped back, pulling away. “It’s nothing. Just some scratches.”
Dante and Chiara stared me down.
My sister stepped forward, crowding me into the wall. She beckoned, mimicking Dante’s actions from earlier. Spill it.
“You’re not leaving this room until you talk.” She folded her arms. “Consider this a family intervention.”
My shoulders sagged.
Again. Sisters.
“Fine. But you asked for it.” I pinched the bridge of my nose one more time. “I think a demon may be trying to kill me.”
Fifteen
Portland, Oregon
Six years earlier
Lucy
So do you cheat?” I asked.
“What?” Branwell’s head came up, sharp and fast, eyebrows drawing down over his hazel eyes. “Cheat?”
“Yeah.” I nodded. We were seated at the kitchen table in the brothers’ apartment, me waiting for Tennyson to get back from cla
ss.
“Like on a girlfriend?” Branwell’s tone scandalized, eyes flaring in shock.
Wow. That escalated quickly.
“Uhhh, I was thinking more like an exam.” I waved a hand toward the textbook in front of him—Arabic Art through the Centuries scrawled across the front. “Like in one of your art history classes or something?”
“Oh.” He visibly relaxed, sitting back in his chair across the table. “Why do you ask?”
A clock ticked in the kitchen. Sounds from the busy street below filtered up. Absently, I noticed a plant on the table casting a heart-shaped shadow.
Branwell set his pen down and tugged on his beard with a gloved hand, his gaze fixing me. Some unreadable combination of annoyance and exasperation.
It was always like this with him. Something about me bothered him, though I hadn’t put my finger on exactly what.
Did he not think I was good enough for his brother? He was protective of Tennyson. They all were and for good reason.
That didn’t stop my curiosity, however. Branwell was this remote but fascinating mountain of a man, and I found myself drawn to discover more about him.
“So with a supernatural gift like yours,” I said into the silence, “I was wondering if you like, I don’t know, store all the answers to test questions on a tissue that you pull out during an exam. Pretend to blow your nose, hear the answers, you know . . . ” My voice drifted off.
A long pause.
“No, Lucy, can’t say I’ve ever seriously considered it.” Branwell leaned forward on his elbows. “I’m not a cheater. Never have been. Never will be.”
Sixteen
Florence, Italy
2016
Lucy
I still can’t believe you’ve had a demon attacking you for nearly twenty years, and you never once bothered to mention it,” Chiara said for the third time in the last fifteen minutes.
I was with her. Branwell really should have told someone years ago.
We were seated around the dining table in Chiara and Judith’s open-concept kitchen—me, Branwell, Dante, Chiara and Judith.
High-beamed ceilings soared above comfy, modern furniture in the large kitchen-dining-family room. The great room was decorated in a homey mix of chrome, wood and natural fabrics. An enormous marble island separated the living space and the kitchen. Basically, gorgeous European style. Night had fallen outside, but the room was warmly lit and sparkled with light.
Earlier, Chiara and I had been sitting on the couch—me, sobbing over the events with Grace and trying to remain positive that we would find her, Chiara providing moral support and much needed therapy—when I heard their voices.
Branwell and Dante.
They were in the room below us, arguing in staccato Italian. Muffled enough that no words came through, just their angry tone. It had gone on for several minutes and then a text binged. Chiara had glanced at her phone, apologized and disappeared downstairs too.
They talked for at least another hour, voices low and tense through the floor.
Something had clearly gone down. Instinct said it was all related to Branwell’s secrets which had finally been outed. Well, at least I hoped that was the case. Because if they were arguing about me or the situation with Grace . . .
I didn’t think my heart could handle that.
That said, Chiara and Judith were as kind as ever, reminding me why I had loved them so much. And before dinner, Dante had gone out of his way to look at Grace’s blanket again and reassure me she was alive.
I could already see how this was going to play out. I would get a delicious taste of the D’Angelo family, stir up a ton of old feelings and then clear out of their lives, taking the tattered pieces of my heart with me.
Finding Grace was worth any price, no matter how high. But this one was steep.
“I’m seriously appalled you didn’t tell us,” Chiara continued.
As Nonna was gone for the night, we had opted for delivery pizza. Because even in Italy that was a thing. I snagged another slice of cheese and pepperoni bliss and dragged it onto my plate.
“We don’t know it’s a demon for sure,” Branwell said. “It could be a ghost or . . . hobgoblin. Who knows.”
“Hobgoblin? Really?” Dante raised an amused eyebrow.
“Well, it’s something,” Chiara said around a mouthful of oily crust. Though it came out more like ‘Welf, ith fomesing.’
Branwell picked up a bite of pizza with chopsticks, careful not to alter the food in any way before it hit his mouth.
He had held up a hand for silence before we started eating and soundlessly cut his pizza into small pieces. Altering their sound in that moment, ensuring that he could hear us talk just fine over dinner. Branwell’s standard routine.
Judith nodded. “Whatever this thing might be, it is something tangible that can’t be explained away or ignored.”
“Understanding what it is would be the first step in stopping it or, at minimum, controlling it.” Dante snatched another slice.
Chiara swallowed her food. “If we could do that, it might alleviate Bran’s anxiety over touching shiny things.”
Branwell snorted. “Make me less OCD?”
“Exactly.”
“For the record, I’m not clinically OCD. Just cautious about hearing nasty things and preferring not to be clawed by supernatural entities.”
We ate in silence for a moment. Man, Italian pizza was so good. I had forgotten exactly how good. Cheese and garlic and carb nirvana. It soothed my fraught emotions better than anything else.
Well . . . almost.
I deliberately squelched the memory of Branwell’s comforting arms earlier in the day. The soothing thump of his heartbeat, the gentleness of his hands as I sobbed—not once, not twice, but four times on his chest.
So predictably pathetic.
I darted a glance at him. He had changed his clothes, but it didn’t help. Branwell still looked like the human version of a hug. Big. Burly. Cuddly.
I was in such trouble.
“I haven’t encountered anything like this demon in the family records.” Chiara broke the silence. “It would stand out—one of our ancestors having physical attacks in their visions.”
Chiara worked as a historical researcher for D’Angelo Enterprises and, understandably, had a deep fascination with her own family history. Given the nature of the D’Angelo curse, their ancestors kept copious personal records and had amassed a substantial library of esoteric texts, most of which were housed in the family villa in Volterra.
“With previous D’Angelo heirs, the visions and scenes—everything—have always been mental rather than physical,” she continued. “Dante has died how many times in his? But they’ve never left a physical mark.”
Both Dante and Branwell nodded their heads.
I tucked my wayward curls behind an ear. Tennyson had told me years ago about Dante’s ability to experience past life regressions, some so powerful they pulled others in, like Branwell.
“What are your thoughts on it, Branwell?” I asked.
Branwell met my gaze, hazel eyes unreadable. He shrugged and set the chopsticks down next to his pizza pieces.
“You guys are all missing the bigger picture here.” Branwell sat back in his chair, tugging on his beard. “Both Dante and Tennyson have touched and examined the same items that housed the . . . whatever this is—”
“We should give it a name, this demon-ish thing.” Chiara tapped her lips.
“How’s about we don’t anthropomorphize the demon, Chiara.” Branwell.
“Yeah. That’s the first step toward claiming it as a pet.” Dante.
“Oh, could I?” Chiara’s eyes perked up.
I had missed this family so much.
“Dark Vader,” I said.
Chiara bobbed her dark head. “I like it. Solid villain reference.”
“Frankenblob.” That was Judith.
“Voldesmart.” We all looked at Chiara, eyebrows raised. She unfurled
a free hand. “Because Branwell says the scrapes sting real bad. They smart.”
Ah.
The brothers rolled their eyes. I groaned.
“Chucky.” Branwell picked up his chopsticks and tapped his plate. “So, as I was saying, the problem with Chucky—”
“What?! You don’t just get to decide its name like that.” Chiara gave a very Italian wave of her hand, a practiced mix of frustration and exasperation.
“Seriously, Bran. We should at least put it to a vote.” Dante elbowed him. “Besides, why are you assigning the demon a gender?”
“Yeah. So sexist.”
“My demon. My problem. My name.” Branwell punctuated each word with a jab of his chopsticks. “You wanna name a demony-thing, go find your own.”
I laughed a much-needed laugh. Branwell jerked his eyes to mine, staring like . . . I don’t know what. Surprised, perhaps?
But . . . I loved this family so much. I had forgotten how fun it was to simply hang out with them and talk about crazy-loony stuff, like demon-naming rights.
The D’Angelos were my tribe.
I held Branwell’s gaze, that ache in my heart growing. The place that would always be empty without him.
My chest tightened. Leaving him again—
I looked back down at my pizza.
Branwell cleared his throat. “I’ve obviously spent a lot of time thinking about Chucky. And I have reached the conclusion that the problem with Chucky is less his attempts to hurt me and more the fact that he exists at all.”
A beat.
“I’m not sure I follow you.” Chiara reached for her glass of water.
“Chucky proves that there is a larger supernatural world out there. A world we have never really encountered or interacted with on any conscious level.”
Silence.
Dante pushed back his empty plate. “Good insight. We have supernatural-ish abilities. Ergo, it’s not a huge stretch to believe other supernatural-ish things exist, too.”
“Yes!” Chiara fist-pumped. “I call dibs on any and all hot vampires.”
“Honestly?” Dante gave her a flat look. “I say supernatural and your instant Pavlovian response is ‘hot vampire’?”
“Do you know women at all?” Chiara deadpanned.
