Page 46 of Angelic Vengeance

Before I could make it out the door, Francesca spoke up. “Twenty, about five-foot-seven, strawberry blonde hair, brown eyes, loves pink, looks super sweet but could kill you with her lip-gloss?”

I froze in the doorway, turning to look at her over my shoulder. “How…?”

Francesca went back to flipping through magazines. “Yeah… I think you two got some catching up to do.”

My leg bounced up and down with anticipation, the frown on my face deepening by the second. I was nowin Francesca’s apartment, sitting alone on her couch and waiting. There was no way this was real. It couldn’t be.

As the front door clicked shut and footsteps echoed in the hallway, a heaviness expanded in my chest, yet I still expected to see a girl I didn’t know walk in.

Instead, the oxygen left my lungs.Natalia.

I immediately stood, and we both froze in our movements, neither one of us believing this was real.

Five lost years.

My eyes burned and my throat felt heavy. She probably wanted nothing to do with me after I disappeared on her. Still, I forced my voice to come out steady. “I know this is fucked up but–”

Natalia closed the distance and hugged me so hard I fell back a few steps. Her arms clawed onto me and I immediately wrapped her in my arms. My chest ached and my eyes burned with regret. I never cried, yet the one tear that did escape, burned my skin on its way down to my chin before falling to the floor.

A soft sob escaped her. “I thought….”I thought you died.“What happened?”

“It’s a long story.” We pulled back to look at each other. I gave a shaky smile. “What aboutyou?”

She smiled back. “Long story.” Thesamesoft, brown eyes. Thesamestrawberry-blonde hair. Thesamedimpled smile. Thesameheavenly aura.My sister. “We have all the time in the world though, right?”

I smiled wider. “Always.”

Everything was forgiven; forgotten. It was like no time passed, and we were teenagers again, catching up at a local coffee shop.

I told her how I started working for the government as an assassin, went rogue after Francesca saved mylife, found out those I worked for were all corrupt and disappeared. I told hermostlythe truth; only leaving out the unnecessary parts of how I got there in the first place by being kidnapped and trafficked, and having to kill everyone in the end.

Then it was Natalia’s turn. Before I disappeared, I remembered she had a roommate at NYU, Kali Su, and that she invited Natalia to a charity event hosted by her family. There, she ran into the DeMone and Moretti family. Everyone laughed and found it funny how Natalia’s surname was also Moretti. It wasn’t funny anymore, when later that week, SUVs and armed men showed up at Natalia’s campus, demanding she go with them.

Turns out the shared surname wasn’t a coincidence, but the result of an accidental pregnancy from a not-so-accidental affair eighteen years ago. Because Natalia was the long-lost secret daughter of Salvatore Moretti – mafioso and Capo of the Moretti crime family.

CHAPTER 17

Present

RAINDROPS SMASHED AGAINST THE WINDSHIELD of Zach’s G-class as I waited for his return. They flowed over the glass like a waterfall, blocking my view of the outside world. I didn’t like being unaware of my surroundings, but somehow, being in Zach’s car brought me a certain level of comfort.

My eyes still burned as my own vision blurred, but I refused to let the tears fall.I didn’t cry. Inevercried. What was wrong with me?

I’d anticipated anger and pain to consume my chest because of my failed mission, but instead, all I felt was disappointment. Juan had been my last trace, and now he was dead. Yet Ruiz, the puppet master pulling the strings, was still out there somewhere.

There was a hole in my chest, that I could feel enlarging by the day.

Even as a kid, I remembered this…heaviness, though I didn’t remember when it started.

It had always been there.

The knowledge didn’t bring me any peace, and I couldn’t find it in myself to stop the pain.

Something was missing.

My body, my heart, my fucking soul – were aching for…something.

My head throbbed, my body was tired, and I could feel everything, yet nothing at all. It had been such a shitty week, I just wanted to catch a break, eat a burger and get some sleep.