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His door slams shut, and I lean my head against the cool leather headrest, my eyes closed, unwilling to face them again. We begin to move, but I don’t pay any attention. Instead, I close my eyes and let my mind drift off to yesterday, when my free life ended so abruptly and everything I ever dreamed of vanished.
Chapter 2
Thalia
24 Hours Earlier
Dread washes over me. That feeling of waves continually crashing over my head, preventing me from swimming to the surface, forcing the air in my lungs from my body until it’s replaced with sea water. The feeling has been niggling at the back of my mind for almost a week, causing me to wake up in cold sweats in the dead of the night. It began the night my brother Evan came home drunk and covered in blood.
I’m not naïve to what my brother does. Or any of my family members that came before him. My father never hid the dark side of where our money comes from, but since his death, my brother has taken that darkness to deeper levels of hell. He’s been hell-bent on securing something big for our family, but if the terror snaking through my veins is anything to go on, I know it won’t end well.
“Here you are,” my sister Clio huffs as she stomps in, disturbing the quiet peace of the sunroom. I’ve been sitting quietly with my tea and book for the better part of the afternoon, reading about a handsome billionaire and his shy secretary. “What are you doing?”
My gaze drifts to the book in my hand and then back to her, a bewildered look on my face. Really? She must ask what I’m doing, as if it’s not obvious. As if I don’t spend most of my days here. Another huff from her. She sounds like a dragon trying to ignite a flame. The thought makes me smile.
“Is there something you need?” I ask her. It’s mostly just to get her to leave me alone. The sooner she tells me why she’s frustrated, the sooner I can get back to my hot, sexy billionaire and the innocent virgin he’s ensnared in his grasp.
“Brother needs you in his office,” she tells me, her face twisting into something akin to disgust. That tells me it can’t be good, whatever he has to say. Or she doesn’t agree with him on something. The latter seems most possible. Ever since he took over the family business with our uncle at his side, she’s been actively voicing her disproval of his actions. I think she’s bitter because she didn’t inherit anything from our father, despite her being several years older than Evan. The oldest of the three of us.
She’s a woman, and women can’t inherit a mafia throne when a living male is alive. At least in our family. If it wasn’t my brother, then it would have been my uncle or one of his sons. That’s the way our world works.
Sighing, I set my book down after marking my spot, careful not to bend the pages. I leave it on the chaise and dutifully follow Clio, who is already storming from the room. Fuck, she’s got a stick shoved so far up her ass she’s probably tasting wood.
I’ve never been close to my family. My uncle is the only one who has ever truly paid me any attention. I’m the youngest, which comes with its own set of issues, but I’m also the reason my mother is dead.
The doctors couldn’t save her. She hemorrhaged before they even got her to the operating table. I was born blue, not breathing. My mother begged the doctor to save me over her, and despite my father’s blatant protests, they did. They regretted that decision some weeks later when my father murdered them in a drunken rage. At least that’s how he used to tell it to me every year on the date of my birth.
I’d call it a birthday, but birthdays are supposed to be a time of celebration.
He’d sit me down and remind me of what I’d done. My own father made me the villain of his life, and because of that, he pretty much outright ignored me. Except that one day a year. The day my life was traded for hers.
I wonder idly if he would have felt the same way if I’d been born a boy. Or if I didn’t look so much like her. I glimpse myself in one of the hallway mirrors. My soft raven hair is in wild curls around my face, a stark contrast to my pale skin. The dark color makes my blue eyes appear almost supernatural.
Unsettling.
“Come in, Thalia,” my brother calls when I knock softly on the dark stained wooden door that leads into our father’s old office. Swallowing back the bitter taste that has risen in my mouth, I turn the handle and walk inside. “Close the door.” He gives me the order without looking up from the papers scattered across his desk.
There is an empty tumbler of whiskey at his side with two empty bottles.
Wonderful. I can already see how this is going to go.
“Clio said you wanted to see me.” I tilt my head to the side, eyes cast demurely at my feet, voice barely above a whisper. I have learned that the more obedient an act I put on, the less likely I am to be punished. Father would go into fits if I spoke back to him, reminding me of my place. In his eyes, I wasn’t his daughter. I was a murderer.
My siblings, who were also young when my mother died, don’t seem to share the same fury and vitriol as my father, but that doesn’t mean we’re singing Kumbaya by the fire every night either. Since my father’s death, I have gone mostly unnoticed. Nothing more than a wisp in the shadows to them, and that’s fine with me. Exasperation dispels itself from between my lips as he looks up at me, a tired look in his eyes. They aren’t blue like mine, but lush green, akin to Clio’s. They both take after our father. Olive skin tones and rich brown hair.
“As you know, I took over Father’s business ventures when he passed.” He lets that hang in the air for a moment, his eyes on mine. I nod dutifully, aware of the stature my brother now holds. He clears his throat awkwardly, as if the conversation we’re about to have will be just that—awkward. “Father left the business in horrible shape, and I had to borrow some money to set things right again. I put a great deal of money into some new investments.”
Why is he telling me this? I have nothing to do with the family business. Father made sure of it, and since his death, Clio and Evan remind me incessantly that nothing is mine. Nor will it ever be.
“Okay…” The word flows from my lips hesitantly. He’s telling me this for a reason, and it isn’t because he wants my help. Father made it known that my only worth to the family was to one day marry into another family that could bring more business deals for him. More money. Prestige. All for the family. One which he made crystal clear I was barely a part of.
Is my brother about to marry me off? I scramble to think of who he has planned, since there have been no suitors of any kind.
“Unfortunately, those investments didn’t pan out, and now the money has come due.”
A mocking laugh slips from my throat. “And you don’t have it, do you?”
My brother sneers, his lips curling up in disgust. “That is none of your business.”
