by Dani René
Liam
Regret tasted bitter.
I hated myself for I was as much of an accomplice as my brother. I didn’t regret Hilda’s death. She deserved it. But Snow was innocent and I broke her heart.
“You poisoned her?” I couldn’t believe my ears as my brother confessed his crime. “The plan had changed. We talked about this, Duncan!”
“She was going to be a witness, Liam. Don’t be stupid. I’m saving our asses. Fucking good riddance. Michael is dead. Hilda met her end. And Snow will be gone soon enough. We’ve wiped out their family. Wasn’t this always our plan?”
“I told you to keep Snow out of this,” I hollered. “Bring me the antidote!”
“You foolish man. She has turned you weak. Don’t tell me you’re in love?” Duncan mocked.
I leveled him with a glare. “I don’t care what you think.” I picked up Snow and placed her on the bed. Her black hair spilled over the white pillow, a stark contrast. Her red lips were slowly turning a dull color and her skin grew paler. Her brows her furrowed as if she was in pain, even in her state of unconsciousness.
I stroke a finger down her cheeks, silently apologizing for all the pain I gave her, before stepping away from the bed.
“Where are you going?” Duncan held me back.
I wretched my arm out of his grasp. “To get the antidote.”
Snow only had a few minutes left before the poison took over her whole body. If I gave her the antidote now, she’d be saved.
“Don’t do something you’ll regret.”
I stood in front of me, matching him head to toes. “Don’t do something you will regret, brother.”
Without waiting for his response, I went to my room and found a vial of the antidote. I went back to where I left Snow and my brother.
I found him pacing the room. “She’ll put us in prison,” he hissed.
“I’ll talk to her. Just give me time and we’ll find a way. I’ll make her understand us and why we did what we did.”
“I can’t let you do this,” Duncan warned.
“And I can’t let her die.” No, I really couldn’t.
Little Snow White owned me.
I took a step toward her when my brother stopped me, with a gun in my face. His eyes were completely deranged, as if he had lost the last string of his humanity. “I can’t let your dumb mistake put me in prison, Liam. Not after everything we’ve been through.”
“You’re threatening me?” I asked, slowly. He didn’t back down.
“Brother…” I tried to reason with him, but it was hopeless.
He lunged forward, going for the vial in my hand. I stumbled back, but Duncan didn’t stop. He fought, trying to claw at my hand. “Stop! Duncan!”
He shoved the gun into my chest, growling. “Give it to me!”
We both struggled against each other. Me protecting vial and him trying to take it from me. “Brother, stop. Fucking stop!”
I reached for the gun, trying to move it away from us.
Duncan went crazy, pushing against me. We were both breathing hard, yelling at each other when the sound of the gun going off exploded through the room, the wall echoing with it. Our eyes widened and my chest rattled with a shaky breath. Duncan stumbled away from me and he fell to his knees, blood coating his shirt.
“No!” I roared, dropping to my knees next to him. He clenched his chest and I tried to put pressure on the wound but he was bleeding profusely.
His body spasmed. “She… is… dying… only three minutes… left before the poison…takes…over.”
My heart stuttered. I looked back at Snow and then at my brother. Duncan smiled shakily. “Go… to… her.”
I clenched the vial in my hand and made a choice.
I left my brother’s side and went to my Snow. I emptied half of the vial into her mouth, but some of it spilled down her chin. “Fuck,” I swore before pouring the rest into my mouth.
I leaned down and kissed her, forcing the antidote into her mouth and down her throat.
I kissed her while my brother laid dying on the floor.
Snow took a shuddering breath as my brother breathed his last.
Six hours later, Snow opened her eyes. She blinked and then glanced around the room, before her gaze landed on me. I was sitting by her side, on the bed. In my room.
George had helped me clean the other room where Hilda and Duncan took their last breath. He had taken the bodies away while I stayed with Snow, keeping an eye on her. I was worried that I had taken too long to give her the antidote.
But as the hours passed, instead of dying, I saw that she was only… unconscious.
The moment our eyes met, hers filled with tears. Her chin trembled. “Is it true?” she whispered, her voice cracking.
I nodded, my thumb stroking her cheek. “It’s all true, Little Snow. I’m sorry.”
She let out a sob, curling into me.
I was not the hero in her story.
I was the villain, but she still sought me out. She still found comfort in me.
And I vowed to gain her trust again.
This time, I wasn’t going to break her heart.
Epilogue
Snow
Two years later
If you had asked me two years ago if my life would be like this now, I’d laugh and said you were crazy. Two years ago, I had plans to go back to the boarding school and living a boring, quiet life.
Now?
Well, my life was not so boring and neither was it quiet.
A loud cry filled the cottage and I rolled my eyes, stepping out of the bathroom with a towel around my body. “I was only gone for ten minutes.”
“He wants milk.”
“He always wants milk,” I muttered.
Liam gave me his signature crooked grin. He handed me our son, Elias, and I settled into his lap. His arms curled around us as Elias latched onto my nipple.
Liam’s lips brushed against my temple, a tender kiss. I leaned more into him. Twenty minutes later, Elias was full and asleep in my arms. I placed him in the bassinet beside our bed and I straddled my husband. His eyes were no longer dead. There was warmth in them now. Love for me and our son. But I still saw the grief that he hid so well.
Deep inside, Liam was tormented with guilt.
Two years ago, when I woke up, I didn’t know how to react. I cried, I raged and I hated Liam. It took me months to finally come to terms with what happened. And in those months, Liam was patient with me. He explained his side of the story.
It took me a long time to understand him, but in the end, I realized how badly my father had messed up all our lives.
I didn’t know what took place between Duncan and Liam after I passed out. I found out Duncan had died and George told me there was an accident. He didn’t have to explain; I already understood what he meant.
Liam never spoke of it.
Neither did I.
We also never spoke of our pasts. I never brought up my father and he never spoke of his sister or brother. We moved on… and we learned to live together despite our past.
We learned to love each other, despite our past.
After I had woken up, Liam told me we were going away. He sold the King’s Estate and we settled here. In a cottage, far away from the rest of the world, where it was only me and him… and our baby. Of course, our wolves came with us. I could hear them howling in the distance, not too far from our small cottage. They loved running through the woods at night.
“I’m a little jealous. Our son has been hogging your tits,” Liam drawled.
“He’s asleep now.” I winked. He cupped my heavy breasts, causing milk to leak from my nipples.
Liam leaned forward, sucking one taunt nipple into his mouth. I gripped the back of his head, holding him close to me.
This wasn’t a perfect love story.
It was a twisted tale, an imperfect love…
But it was enough for us.
Part VII
The Girl Without Hand
s
India R. Adams
A Giordano Mafia Novella
Credits
Editing by: Kendra Gaither @ Kendra’s Editing and Book Services
Anthology Cover by: Jay Aheer, Simply Designed
Girl Without Hands Cover by: Cat Imb, TRC Designs
Formatting by: Dani René, Raven Designs
Proofread by: Annette, Book Nerd
Produced by: India’s Productions
Blurb
To recognize captivity, you have to know you’ve been captured.
I didn’t.
The first time he snuck into my bed, I was only seven.
I had a knife.
Father shouldn’t have craved me as he did, so I sunk the blade into him…
I was a child of many demons, all of whom they had created.
No one missed the child that disappeared from sight because they knew where I was—where I’d been hidden away—for when they wanted the girl with no hands.
To understand you’ve been freed, you have to learn what freedom even is.
Could I learn?
This is a dark story that I wish I hadn’t lived, but had I not, I never would have known the Angel of Death.
Serious Author Warning
When I was invited to this project by Dani, I was so excited because my mother had a children’s theater and loved all children’s stories, such as Grimm Brothers and Hans Christian Anderson. Hence, why I already had a Grimm’s Fairy Tale book on my shelf to choose from.
My mama passed away right before I finally got to publish my first book.
As I usually do, I researched my project. Digging deep enough, I found a claimed base—where The Girl Without Hands originally came from—before the Grimm brothers made it their own. To honor the story, I kept some of the horrific tones and added my own spin. Hence, this serious warning.
A beautiful Alpha reader of mine told me that I may have to ask my readers to trust me on this one. That, early on, there was a point she wanted to stop reading, but took a leap of faith because she knows I always have a purpose.
If you keep reading, I promise there’s a happy ending.
In this book, I push my characters to their limits. I pushed my limit. And, what has come of it—healing and beautiful deep breaths—and a sequel— I am grateful.
If you have serious triggers with rape or incest, skip this story!
If you wish to read on, remember… damaged souls are worth saving.
To those who can see no escape…
Hold on to the glimpses of light until you can find your way.
Chapter One
The Ruined One
Should a child cry out for her mother when the danger comes? Of course. But what if that mother is no more? What if she had been snuffed long ago and buried where the other bones lay? Her name was Isabella, and she was more beautiful than any of the queens in the fairytales she taught me how to read. Our days were long, sometimes ruthless, even if we only had each other.
For a beautiful while, she was able to hide from me our horrid truth - that we were captives of the cruelest of the cruel—darkest of the dark—with no chance of escape. Only death itself could set us free. When I was young enough to still be unaware of the true meaning of malice, I would swing on the swing set, in the wide sparse field behind the large home that I didn’t yet view as the prison it was. No. Instead, I innocently stared at mountains off in the distance, unaffected by the madness taking place all around me. The tall brown and green grass was a buffer of sorts, sparing me from witnessing the gruesome acts my mother was being forced to endure.
The memories of the grunts and moans now haunt me for many reasons.
In the grass, hidden by nature, the pack of seven men would leave her behind so they could go and boast with each other about another ‘wild fuck’ with the daughter of a mafia king. None of their words struck my heart because, at the time, the syllables carried no meaning. My mother was still fighting hard to shield me—trying to find a way to save me—from a merciless future.
In fact, the men never appeared to me as humans. They felt like faceless moving shadows that stirred throughout the space around me. I knew they were older, but even at my young age, I was already blocking them out. Maybe, deep down, I sensed the danger that endlessly followed in their wake.
Once the pack of men went back inside, a worn woman with a brilliant soul would weakly drag herself from the tall grass, always thankful to see me waiting. At the time, I believed she was relieved because she adored me. I was clueless that she was thankful to still be the pack’s main focus.
With her old summer dress torn and clutched in her trembling hands, Mother was covered with a white glue-like fluid still clinging to her skin, hair, reddened breasts, back, buttocks, thighs, and in between… “Scarlett,” she would call out to me with a relieved kindness that should not belong to the scorned. “Would you please start the water?” English being her second language, she spoke with a foreign, regal tone that brought me comfort.
Having helped cleanse her many times before, I happily jumped from my swing to run to the outside spicket, more than willing to tend to the woman who loved me with her heart and soul. I cherished the moments the men weren’t around. It meant I got my mother all to myself. When they were around, she usually stayed quiet and reserved. All I understood was that she wasn’t telling me wonderful stories to pass the time.
With a full bucket of splashing water, I would return to the depleted woman who lay panting on her side. Gently and with great care, I would rinse her used body, unknowingly helping to bathe the shame away. Unaware of what I was touching, my soft little hands would scrub her clean. Then, once done, she would crawl to a dry spot on the ground and rest while I put away the bucket.
Upon returning, I would lie next to her, and we would stare at the sky. Snuggled to her side, I would ask, “What do you see in the clouds today, Mother?”
A breeze carrying mountain fresh air would blow through her drying black hair, that once shined like the horse on the cover of The Black Stallion book. “I see the angel of the night, waiting for the sun to fall, so he can come down to earth and find his Scarlett and take her away.”
Her words held such feeling, but, unbeknownst to me, she was praying for the Angel of Death to come and collect her child. She’d rather me dead than to be in the pack’s brutal grip.
My mother, Isabella Giordano, spoke with a thick accent of the Italian language I was forbidden to learn. Her ‘roots’ were not to be mine. The pack wanted no reminders that this daughter was tainted by the blood of an enemy. They didn’t even like that my mother named me Scarlett; therefore, they would only refer to me as Scar or Little Shit. It didn’t seem to matter that none of the men had any way of knowing who exactly my biological creator was, due to their constant rapes. Unified, they regarded me as their ‘property,’ and, no matter how many times my mother pleaded, they refused to ‘sell’ me.
Whenever I asked why she wanted me sold—an action I could not comprehend—my mother would whisper the only Italian she dared, “Vita Mia,”—My Life—“because, away from here, there is a chance for you to be found.”
Found. One simple word with life-changing meaning.
Mother and I shared a small bed in a barren room. With bars on the one window we had, our view faced the mountains. Our door was always locked from the outside. I had a few crayons and coloring books, and every now and then, another fairytale book was thrown at us. I didn’t know I was going without. I didn’t know what the word abundance meant. I had never experienced a plethora of anything except my mother’s love. My mother would hold me in her lap and read to me, pointing out the words to help me learn my letters.
Bath time was my favorite. In our adjoining bathroom, Mother would hold a plastic cup of water over my head and smile. “Okay, Vita Mia, close your eyes and pretend to be a free mermaid under a waterfall.”
Giddy for the opportunity to use my imagination, I squealed and tilted my head bac
k, eyes closed, ready to envision every page she had just read in one of my precious books. With my legs held together, I would wiggle them like a huge mermaid flipper, loving how my scales sparkled in the moonlight.
Since dinner wasn’t usually brought to us, my mother would fill that same plastic bath cup and say, “Okay, Vita Mia, let’s pretend you are drinking the most delicious soup, and it is filling your belly with a warmth that makes you sleepy and happy and ready to dream of the world waiting just for you.”
Naïve, and luckily so, I would close my eyes and drink the warm water, imagining the full sensation in my belly. It would work. Happy and satisfied, I would yawn and crawl into bed without a complaint as rumbles of hunger echoed in our room. My mother would drink warm water, then join me, wrapping me tightly in her arms.
Sometimes, I was blessed and got to have her hold me all night long. Most of the time, late into the evening, she would be yanked from our bed and thrown to the floor, where my fathers would grope and undress her. Since it was common—all I had ever known— and my belly was full of warm water, I would sleep through much of it. As I got older—crossing from a toddler to a little girl, that became more challenging. I can’t be sure of my age, because Mother lost track of the days and years that passed us by at its cruel pace, but I believe I was around the age of six when her struggles were no longer easy to overlook. Without my permission, my innocent ignorance began to slightly clear. Her cries became more noticeable. Her apparent suffering started tugging at my heart, even though I had never known my fathers to be kind. I never had an example of anything to compare their actions with.
