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It was his fault, but I knew better than to talk back. I wasn’t Luca. I would never challenge my father the way my older brother did.
He tightened his hold on my throat, and I gasped for air.
“Dad,” Luca said from behind him.
I had never been more thankful to hear my brother’s voice.
“Stay out of this, Luca,” he boomed. “This is between Marcello and me.”
Luca hated me when we were kids and even tried to kill me once. For most of my life, he treated me like I was another responsibility. But after our mom died, he often stepped in front of me, defended me against my father’s attacks. I had assumed he’d made a deal with my mother that was unbreakable in his mind.
My brother moved toward us with a purpose, dressed in a navy blue suit and brown wingtips. For someone in high school, Luca already looked like a man, like the leader of our family’s company.
“What did Marcello do?”
My dad pointed his finger at the paint on his clothes, then waved his hand at the mess on the floor. “Marcello was about to accept his punishment.”
“Dad,” Luca groaned. “Not today, of all days. Can’t this wait until tomorrow?”
“Don’t challenge me, son.” He gritted his teeth. “Your brother disobeyed my orders, and he will deal with the consequences of his actions.”
Luca stripped off his suit jacket and handed it to me. He held my father’s gaze as he unbuttoned his white oxford. “Then let me take it. Let this be an example for Marcello not to do it again.”
He was right.
Every time Luca accepted the punishments on my behalf, I never repeated the same mistake. I didn’t want him to suffer for my actions.
“Leave, Marcello,” Luca ordered as he unbuttoned his shirt.
His chest and back were scarred beyond repair, much worse than mine.
“No,” my father said with a bite to his tone. “He has to watch. That’s his punishment.”
I took Luca’s shirt from his hand and sighed.We should have been celebrating the life of the greatest woman who ever lived. Instead, my father was only proving how much he was fucking up our lives.
He’d adopted Bastian and Damian, who were probably snapping the necks of rabbits in the backyard. They were just as fucked up as my father and Luca. The four of them were like peas in a pod. I was the one who didn’t fit into the equation.
As my father gripped the Fendi belt in his hand, Luca sank to his knees. I wished I could be as fearless as him. Luca looked up at me, his eyes never leaving mine as the belt cracked open his skin. He balled his hands into fists and clenched his jaw. Not even a single sound escaped his mouth, as if he had trained himself not to feel the lashes.
My stomach ached as he tore open old scars, creating new ones, and by the time my father finished, I wanted to punch him.
If he wasn’t one of the most powerful men in the world, I would have run from him. I would have stolen enough cash to leave this stupid town and never come back.
But I would never leave Luca.
I owed him for enduring most of my punishments. So I vowed to never step out of line after that day. For Luca, I promised to never cross my father. It was the least I owed him for coming to my rescue.
My father rubbed his hand over his face, then he stormed away from us as if the room were on fire. I handed Luca his shirt. He winced as the fabric molded to his back, clinging to his open cuts.
“I’ll do whatever he wants,” I said. “You won’t have to take another punishment for me.”
Luca yanked his suit jacket out of my hand and slipped it on without a word. He stared at me for a long, hard moment, his lips parting. A moment of silence passed between us before he spoke.
“There will come a day when I need something from you,” Luca said in a hushed tone. “Something you won’t want to give me, but you will do it, anyway.”
“Like what?”
He shrugged. “You’ll know when the day comes.”
