Page 3 of Embrace the Darkness
I screwed on the silencer as I listened in on what was going on in the other room. Tom was talking about going downstairs to get something, then teased Tina aboutround two.I scrunched my nose.
I peeked out to see Tom leaving the room in only his boxers. Tina was laying on her stomach, playing on her phone. Her back was to me, which was giving me a direct view of her skanky ass.
I pushed open the closet door soundlessly and stepped toward the bed. The floor creaked beneath my foot. The sound wasn’t loud but still pierced the silence like a bowling ball tossed through a china shop.
I froze.
“Back for round two, baby?” she teased, turning around. Her eyes widened when they met mine. I was too quick for her to react in any other way. Raising my gun, I struck her as hard as I could across the temple. Her body flew back on the bed, unconscious, blood trickling down the side of her face. I took a seat next to her legs on the bed and waited.
Tom had a smile on his face and a bounce in his step when he returned.
Until he saw me.
His smile fell as he stood frozen in shock. He noticed my gun before his focus shifted to Tina behind me. Fear took root in his light brown eyes. He lifted his hands, palms out. I knew he was going to try toexplain,spewing nothing but excuses. It was what any cheating, lying bastard would do. What he didn’t know was that he was already dead to me. He opened his mouth to speak; I took aim just like my father had taught me and shot him in the knee.
He yelled out in pain, falling to the floor. Time ceased as I stood to make my way over to him. I didn’t rush, even though I probably should have with how loud he was being, but I couldn’t bring myself to move any faster. I wanted him to suffer.
If I hadn't been so pissed off, it would have been comical the way he was rolling on the floor, cradling his knee, writhing in pain. I used the toe of my boot to push him onto his back and held him there. I aimed my pistol again, then started emptying the clip into his groin, pulling the trigger over and over again. His body jerked beneath my foot, his screams filling the room. I kept pullingthe trigger, counting each release until I was down to the last bullet. I put that into his head.
The screaming came to an abrupt stop, but it still rang in my ears. I glanced over at Tina. Still lying there unconscious, her chest rose and fell with even breaths.
With empty pistol in hand, I walked back to the bed, only slowing to scoop up the silk tie Tom had been wearing that day off the floor. I set my gun on the nightstand next to the bed before I rolled Tina onto her stomach.
I climbed onto the bed to straddle her back, pinning her arms beneath my legs. Wrapping Tom’s tie around her neck twice, I got a good grip and pulled it tight with all my strength.
She came to when her airway was cut off. She thrashed beneath me. I pulled the tie even tighter, until my muscles burned and my arms started to shake. She struggled longer than I'd thought she would.
Long after her body stilled, I released my hold on the tie. With labored breaths, I climbed off of her, grabbed my gun, and calmly made my way downstairs.
CHAPTER 2
Whenever the discussion of my family came up with Tom or even Tina, I either was tight-lipped or lied. As far as they knew, I was an orphan. Yeah, that was a load of crap. I had a huge family. Some of them I missed and some I could go the rest of my life without seeing ever again, but keeping who they were a secret was imperative. So it was best to pretend they didn’t exist at all.
Pulling my cell from my purse, I sat on the couch, sinking into myself. I closed my eyes to help calm my racing heart. What I'd done was unforgivable. I understood that. But I wasn’t looking for forgiveness. There was zero guilt on the emotional rollercoaster currently doing loops and steep drops in the pit of my stomach. I was stressing about what was going to happen next, or rather, what I needed to do next.
Upstairs, the bodies… I was completely out of my depth when it came to cleaning that mess up. I didn’t even know where to begin, nor was I going to try. If I did, I might as well take my own ass to prison. I wasn’t accustomed to feeling helpless. I hated it.
What I hated even more was who I needed to go to for help. I stubbornly didn’t want to call him. Not to sound dramatic, but my normal life would be over. He’d make me return home.
Who am I kidding? It was over the moment I reached for my gun.
“Damnit,” I seethed, opening my eyes to look down at my phone.
Almost six years ago my father had asked me if I wanted out—of the family, that is, and I'd said yes. My plan had been to go to college, then create a new life somewhere along the West Coast, preferably California. Walking along a warm beach while sipping a margarita had been my dream. With a sizable trust fund, I'd left New Haven behind and been working toward that dream here in Hartford ever since.
No one in my family was allowed out, especially the women. Our lives were at the mercy and complete control of men. It was archaic, fucked up, and had never sat well with me. I wasn’t wired to be at anyone’s mercy but my own. Which was why I'd rebelled,a lot. If Stefan hadn't been my father, I probably wouldn’t have lived to see my teens, or at least been beaten into submission a long time ago. I should have been grateful that wasn’t my fate. A huge part of me was, but a tiny glimmer wonderedwhat if, maybe even wished my life would have stopped before I'd reached my teens, because my life growing up hadn't been sunshine and rainbows either.
My father was Stefan Quinn, the boss of the New England Irish mob. He wasn’t a good man. In fact, he was a monster, and now I was about to call that very monster for help.
Okay, now I’m feeling a little regret. Purely selfish regret though.
Was I even sure he’d help me?
Yeah.He cared about me, I guessed, even if he had a shitty way of showing it. Before I'd left home, I'd been in a really bad place. It had been just afterthat nightand… well, let’s just say I'd rebelled on a whole other level in hopes I’d push him enough to kill me. It had been dark times at Quinn Manor, and it had ended with him asking me if I wanted out. I'd left six years ago without looking back. Apart from an occasional email here and there I hadn't spoken to Stefan or anyone else in my past life in over a year.
I gripped my phone in my hand until it hurt.
I can’t do it!