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The hot spray of blood against my face registered before the bang. I brought a hand slowly to my cheek and wiped, barely noticing the blood dripping from my fingers. The man who’d been holding the gun, the one who’d killed Miguel, slumped dead to the floor.
The other guy from the warehouse, the one who’d tried to stop his friend, scrambled back, bringing his hands up like it could stop what was coming. The bullet entering his head sounded wet. It blew out the back like his skull was an overripe fig, and he fell to the side. My head spun, and the room tilted. I couldn’t catch my breath.
“Never say never,bambina.It makes me want to prove you wrong.”
Renato stripped off the gloves and handed them and the gun to Elio, the shadow at his side. He handed him a small towel in return, like wiping up blood from a head shot was just a regular Thursday morning in this family. It probably was. Then he took the gun back, and I knew in my bones, it was my turn.
“It’s a shame that you ended up where you did tonight, Charlotte. You seemed like a good person, and good people have consciences that bother them. It’s a loose end, and I don’t like those.”
Seemed? I was already dead to this man.Fight, Charlie. Fight!
“I don’t have a conscience. I don’t care that you just shot that guy, he deserved it. I only care about my sister,” I burst out. I was dizzy. I could have fainted, if not for the urgency beating through me.
“And she has proven herself to be a liability, I’m afraid,” Renato continued. He looked totally unmoved, blood drying on his cuffs where the gloves hadn’t covered. There was a light spray across one of his high cheekbones. With the light from the fire and his dramatic coloring, he really did seem like a king of the underworld at that moment. A monster wearing a man suit.
“I’ll keep her quiet. She’ll do what I tell her. I’ll make her understand.”
“I’m afraid your word isn’t enough,” Renato continued.
I was panicking, scrabbling like that rat in the maze that I so empathized with. Trying to find an exit, only to keep coming up against obstacles.
Tears rolled down my face, burning hot and desperate. Before I could overthink it, I grabbed his arm. It was taut beneath his jacket sleeve. I held on and met his dark eyes. Behind his head, the portrait of the serene woman beckoned, and the light glanced off the cross on the wall. Without another thought, I lowered myself to my knees and knelt before him, head bowed.
“Dear God, who art in Heaven…” I started, the words of the Lord’s Prayer deserting me when I needed them most. I grasped for the next phrase before changing tack. “Do you believe in God?” My voice shook. I was really scraping the bottom of the barrel expecting this monster to fear heavenly retribution, but I’d leave no stone unturned.
Renato was silent for a long moment. I could tell that the swerve in tone had thrown him. This might be futile, but he hadn’t shot me yet. My time left on Earth had narrowed down to heartbeats. Every single one I could win was a victory.
His voice was mildly curious. “And if I said yes?” he mused.
“Then, I’ll swear on everything in this world and the next, on Heaven and Hell and all the worlds in between, we will keep this night a secret and never speak of it again. I swear to God.”
I held that pose. When I was a child, my parents had taken me to the small Catholic church in our neighborhood. I hadn’t understood much, but I’d gotten that when you wanted something or needed help, you asked God. When my Ma died giving birth to Lucy, we’d had a small funeral at that church. I’d prayed for God to make her welcome in Heaven and to help my Da. He was so sad.
Then, my Da had died, and I’d prayed for him to return every night for a year from my narrow bunk at Mercy House. I’d prayed for him to return when the nuns had disciplined us for impure thoughts with cold showers, or hours of Bible study. It had taken me a while to understand that he was never coming back. I hadn’t prayed since the night I’d realized that if anyone was listening, He didn’t care about the Burke sisters.
But I prayed now, before the man who held both Lucy and my lives in his bloodstained hands.
My new God.
He stilled, seeming fascinated by my approach. I had my eyes closed; I couldn’t look at him as he stood over me, gun in hand, and decided our fate.
Slowly, he crouched before me. “What would you do to save your sister?”
“Whatever I have to,” I said without hesitation.
Renato’s dark eyes stared down at me for a long moment before he spoke again. “I’m afraid I’m not really a believer, Miss Burke. That was my mother’s domain.”
His mother. That had to be the beautiful woman in the painting. I could see a strong family resemblance now that I knew their relationship.
Straightening up, he towered over me, his judgment cast.
“Then I’ll pray to you,” I implored. “Worship you instead…accept your word as my gospel…if you’ll give us a chance to live. Please…please. I’ll do anything, whatever I have to, please.”
Renato was silent. I steeled myself as I raised my eyes to his. He was so close that I could see the sparkling variation of browns in his warm eyes. Really, those eyes were far too soulful and real to belong to a monster. It wasn’t fair at all. His mouth was slightly upturned, like he was amused somehow, by my prostrating myself and begging him for mercy. I had no pride; I had no dignity. I couldn’t even pretend to have any. There was nothing I wouldn’t do, forher.
That was my truth, and I let him see it. Something passed between us in that moment. Something intimate and born from darkness and desperation. It was a second where you could take the measure of a person’s soul and know its worth. It was the most intimate moment I’d ever experienced with another human being, and it was terrifying. I didn’t want to see what he hid in the dark recesses of his black soul, but I couldn’t look away. To flinch meant certain death.
Renato swallowed. I suddenly realized he was as unsettled by my unerring inspection as I was his. Maybe I wasn’t the only one who kept people at a distance.
