“By the time I got there, it was too late. Mom was dead. My sister was gone. He was executing my other brother when I discovered Magnus was still alive. He was the last on the list because his bedroom was the farthest down the hall. I was young and weak at the time, so I struggled to carry him.” I could still remember the way he felt in my arms, the way I clenched my teeth together so tightly as I strained my arms. It was the last time I allowed myself to be physically inadequate. I hit the gym every single day, no exceptions. “I dropped him on the stairs. He hit his head and woke up. Thankfully.”

She continued to breathe hard, hanging on to every word of the story.

“That got my father’s attention, so he came to the top of the stairs. Gun in hand. Hatred in his eyes.” I’d never forget the way he looked. It was forever seared into my brain. He was actually angry that I’d halted his plan. Angry that I got my little brother to the door. Angry that we wouldn’t die like he wanted. There was no love. There was no remorse. Nothing. When I tracked him down later, I showed him no remorse too. “Magnus and I got out the door and missed the bullets. We ran for our lives down the street in the pouring rain, the sound of gunshots following us until we turned into an alleyway.”

With wet eyes, she was completely absorbed in the story. “Then what happened?”

“Magnus and I lived like rats in the street. We couldn’t go to the police because they would just put us in an orphanage, which would make it easier for our father to find us. We took food out of the dumpsters so we wouldn’t starve. We stole from people so Magnus could get me to the doctor when I got pneumonia. We lived that way for a long time, scrounging for food, trying to survive, growing weak and emaciated.”

Tears broke and dripped down her cheeks.

“We eventually got into the drug trade—and the rest is history.”

Her makeup ran. Her cheeks puffed. Her eyes turned bloodshot. The story haunted her as if she’d been there, digging through that garbage with me. Perhaps now she would understand. Perhaps now she would accept me as I was. “You…you killed him?”

I nodded. “Eventually.” When I had the money, the resources, and the strength, I came for him. “It took a long time. A decade ago. Like a coward, he was hiding in the middle of a forest in Romania. He must have known that we would grow into strong, ruthless men. He must have known what we would do to him.”

“What did you do to him?”