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No one responds, though I sense them around me still. My escort steadies me, guides me inside, the wind cutting off abruptly.

Déjà vu.

How many times have I been slammed down into a chair with my hands bound and either a blindfold or burlap sack yanked off dramatically?

As my memories have slowly been trickling back, I can say it’s kind of ridiculous. Mostly because I’ve gotten myself into this situation every time. The tune of my soundtrack is a broken record.

Only difference is they don’t uncover my head.

And I don’t tell them to go fuck themselves.

“I get why you’re being careful. I haven’t exactly acted in good faith toward anyone. You could say I haven’t been myself, but that’s actually a load of crap. We all know I was messed up back then. Got even more messed up.”

“His sales pitch is really bad,” Ciro whispers.

“He’s convincing me,” the deeper, calculating voice says, “That he’s not to be trusted.”

“Let him finish,” the first voice I heard from the house. Resonant, a hint raspy like someone who sneaks too many cigarettes and doesn’t think anyone will notice. “If he digs his own grave, we can just throw him in.”

“There was a cliff right back there, I could throw him off right now,” Fyodor offers a little too enthusiastically.

Damn. That’s cold.

“Chill out, Drago,” the analytical one says. Several snickers precede Fyodor’s low growl. “We’re not killing you just yet.”

“Thing is, I already died. Multiple times over. My parents’ deaths, even if I can barely remember their faces. I remember the pain. The loneliness. Every mission I did for that lunatic, Dom, killed me a little inside. When my brother sent me away, I felt lost. When I thought my twin was dead, I snapped. Then it was death, death, death. Adil Abas and Mocro. Attacking Vanya and Ciro in Russia. Trying to kill them.”

I swallow, my mouth drying out.

“I died again that day. Bled out in a ditch. And someone rescued me. Revived my body and used it to kill others. But I wasn’t living. And she fucked up. Because that cunt Ananke unwittingly gave me to the woman who brought me back from the dead.”

The room feels vacuous, horridly silent.

“It took someone scrambling what little brains I had left to jumpstart my heart,” I fumble my way through the gut-wrenching feelings. God, I sound like a fucking sap. And we are running out of time. “And it took her shooting me in the chest to free my mind from Ananke’s control.”

“Who controls you now, Ero?” the deep voice asks softly.

“The man who wants, more than anything, to save the love of his life.”

A hot tear streaks across my cheeks.

The bag slides off but I keep my eyes down, my eyes closed.

“And what will you do to make that happen?” Cool-and-Cunning hums.

“Give up my life, if necessary.”

I raise my eyes.

Alessandro’s hazel gaze hammers into me. Standing ahead of him and to the left, Adriano crosses his arms, studying me. The shift in power between them feels…right somehow. Equal.

Ciro and Vanya stand to either side of me, waiting for the two eldest brothers to speak. Alessandro defers to Adri, tilting his head.

“You’ve done some fucked-up stuff, Ero,” Adriano starts, his expression lightening slightly. “But if you failed this family…”

He waves his hand and Fyodor snaps the zip tie around my wrists.

“This family has just as certainly failed you, too many times.”