“Let’s go. You can’t sit here like a fucking stalker all day. You either want her or you don’t. You can’t have it both ways,” Sebastian says to me, startling me from my thoughts, and I don’t answer him. Instead, I start the car, and without looking back, I drive down the street, making our way to Allure.

Now that everyone in the fold knows exactly what a piece of shit Dominic is, we have more flexibility in what we can do to flush him out and we are starting with Allure. Our team is already there, positioned inside and out, because we are going to annihilate the place. It is a shithole anyway, but we will take everything from their office, smash every glass and mirrored surface, destroy it before we turn it to ash. And I can’t wait.

I have so much anger inside my body that I am at breaking point. Leo is so upset at me for letting Little Red go that he doesn’t come out of his room. Maria tries to get him to eat, but he picks at his food like a bird. He has regressed to the point that Legos don’t seem to entertain him anymore, and he hasn’t spoken again. His sweet voice is only reserved for her.

Likewise, Maria is huffing around the house like a scorned woman. The entire family hates me; even Sebastian thinks I am an asshole.

And maybe I am. But one thing I know for certain is that Dominic needs to pay for everything he has done, and I am going to collect, even if it is the last thing I do.

34

Annie

The safe house is cold, quiet, and lonely. Although full of furnishings and heavy drapes, it is dark, desolate, and defeated. Just like me. It has been two weeks since I arrived, and no amount of sleep and Italian cooking can remove the empty feeling I have in my chest.

With the stitches all removed and my physical healing near complete, I am back to my old self, apart from the small ache that sometimes occurs in my shoulder, right where a bright red scar now resides.

Dante always used to compliment me on my unmarked skin, and now it is tainted. The way he looked at me in the hospital, with pity and disgust, is burnt into my brain, the image not something I will forget in a hurry. The fact that I put it there by lying to him sits heavy in my gut, twisting and turning, keeping me up at night until the wee hours of the morning until exhaustion finally pulls me under. Dark circles are now a constant under my eyes. I stifle a yawn, my fifth already this morning.