Page 27 of The Beast Who Begged Me

“Christ,” I say, sickened, and dump the contents out on the floor.

“What is it?” Caligula mumbles.

There’s a t-shirt, pajama pants, and a pair of underwear that’s been cut open. If it was that goddamn nurse, I’ll⁠—

I pause as I see something half-hidden under the ruined clothes, and shove them away with my toe, revealing an envelope.

I crouch to pick it up.

“Give that to me.” Caligula is wide awake suddenly, sitting up on the bed, watching me with alarm.

“What is it?”

“It doesn’t matter.” He holds out a hand. “Give it to me.”

“What is it?”

“Dami. Give it to me.”

It’s the fear in his eyes that makes me open it. If he’s afraid of something, I’ll protect him from it. But I need to know what it is first.

I open it up and read it. I’m not great with written Italian, so I read it again, slower. The second time, every line goes in like a nail.

“What the fuck is this?” I demand. I look over at him. His face is like granite, and I’m looking at a stranger.

No. Not a stranger. I’m looking at Don Clemenza.

“It’s a letter from my Nonna Mellie,” he says calmly. “Proving that my father did not kill yours.”

“Bullshit.” The word explodes out of me. “It’s a forgery. It’s a trick. A mother covering for her son.”

Caligula says nothing.

“Then she was wrong,” I try. “Or fucking senile. She wanted it to be true, so she wrote it down that way, but it doesn’t prove a goddamn thing.” I’m crushing the letter in my hand, and I open my mouth to keep arguing, but…

There’s nothing to argue about. I already believed it the first time I picked the words out. There’s a sound in my ears like the sea, a whooshing that gets louder and louder.

For twenty-one years I built my vengeance on one belief: Cesario Clemenza killed my father. I spent money and blood and years on that truth. And then the auction. The basement. The cage on him, the collar, the things I said, the things I did, the very worst of me poured out all over him…

One thought bobs up through the chaos. If it wasn’t Cesario, then…

I can’t hold onto the thought and it recedes with the ocean in my ears, the tide going out until there’s nothing but silence. “How long?” I ask. “How long have you had this?”

“I found it in the basement. The night of the fire.”

My throat closes up, so I sound strangled when I ask, “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Caligula looks at me for a moment too long before replying. Something moves behind his eyes, there and gone, too quick to read. “Because information is currency,” he says at last, cold enough to leave frostbite. “I thought I might need it someday. Another leash around your neck.”

And that’s right, isn’t it? That’s how it should be. That’s what I know instinctively. You don’t show mercy to a man who did what I did.

You only use him.

He told me himself, back at the hospital. I don’t forgive my enemies.

The crushed letter falls out of my hand. I watch it tumble to the carpet, and everything goes very simple and very quiet.

My gun is on the nightstand where I set it before bed. I pick it up with my ruined hand, the tattooed one, the one bearing the mark of everything I gave to a lie, and I raise it to my head.