Page 23 of Refrain (Beautiful Monsters #2)

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

ESPI

Some people claim that blood is thicker than water—but they don’t know my family. To my brother, Dante, blood can be poison. He learned to cut it out and never look back.

Call me na?ve, but I just never thought he’d do the same to me.

Even now, I can’t seem to call it what it is—him skipping out for nearly half a year. Abandonment? No. It’s just Dante being Dante.

He’ll come back. He always does.

Though maybe I’m as delusional as Arno. Rather than drown my memories with booze, I exorcise them in streaks of paint over canvas. Black for hate. Red for anger. Blue for pathetic, old Espi, the one always left behind.

It’s only when I’m knuckles-deep in acrylic that I let myself think about what I’m doing.

It’s not too late to take more jobs and save up enough to skip town.

Run. Hitch a one-way ride on a plane and never look back.

I could pull a Dante-esque move, only I wouldn’t be self-righteous enough to pretend like I was doing it out of anything other than selfish greed.

I’m almost twenty-one years old, and I don’t know what it feels like to want something. Not really. Something real. Something worth turning my back on the whole fucking world for.

Maybe if I find it, I’ll finally understand what it’s like to be him.

Or maybe I’ll just learn what it’s like to be Espisido. Someone other than the punk kid stuck doing the dirty work or holding the short end of the stick. Someone who crawls through life alone no matter how hard it knocks them down.

Like her, Miss Yellow. She’s here beneath my fingertips, judging me from the surface of a canvas.

Yellow paint forms the base of her features, sharp and focused.

After picking up a brush, I use hints of green and red to flesh out the details, extending the line of her mouth until she’s no longer judging me.

Just watching. She stares beyond my head, seeing what I can’t. Like the figure I catch from the corner of my eye, lurking beyond the screen door that leads into the backyard.

The man standing there is tall, towering nearly to the doorframe. A jacket shrouds his body, the hood drawn low over his face. The line of his jaw is visible, moving as he speaks.

“You’re still smoking,” he says. “I can smell that shit out here.”

Sure enough, there’s fresh ash smoking in a bowl on my table. I step back from my easel and swipe my hands along my pants. Then I grab the makeshift ashtray and pitch the ash into the trash.

“I didn’t think you’d know where to find me,” I admit without facing the door. I eye my shadow instead as it flickers along the wall opposite from where I stand. “Considering you haven’t come around in six months—”

“I’m always watching out for you,” he says. “You know that.”

“Do I?”

He doesn’t answer. Nervous energy builds in my muscles the longer the silence wears on.

Finally, I sigh. “You can come in.”

My back door always creaks, and I use the sharp squeal as cover to flick my lighter.

At the same time, I snatch a fresh cig from a pile on the table.

Two puffs don’t make it any easier to face him.

The cold air ghosting the back of my neck warns me that this isn’t a hallucination, at least. That’s a good sign. Maybe.

Dante keeps his distance, watching me from his side of the room, I bet. Tallying up the differences in the punk he left behind and whoever he sees now.

“I’m not going to make excuses,” he says.

A bitter laugh comes out of me. “You might want to tell Arno that.”

“There’s something I’ve got to take care of,” he says like I didn’t speak at all. “Something I don’t want you being a part of—”

“I’m always a part of it.” His life. His mistakes. I’ve always been caught in the wake of Dante Vialle. To be fair, I’ve never complained. Until now. “And you never give me an answer.”

I look over my shoulder and find him standing awkwardly near the door, ready to slip out of it at a moment’s notice.

Before he can, I take notice of the things I couldn’t before.

He’s bulked up some, and his hair is longer, falling into his eyes, the main feature we share.

His narrow in a way that signals that he’s not here for idle chitchat.

“So, what is it?” I ask. “What reason are you going to spew for bailing on me now?”

“Espi.” He shakes his head. “Look. I know you don’t understand—”

“Just tell me what you want.”

He sighs. Then he nods. “I need you to warn Arno that whatever he’s sticking his nose in will only bring him trouble.”

Like that narrows it down. Arno sticks his nose into everything.

“Why not warn him yourself?”

His mouth twitches into something that could be called a smile on someone else. “You know Arno. It takes more than talk to distract him from one of his schemes. ”

“But I can?”

He shifts his weight, crossing his arms over his chest. “He listens to you.”

“And if I don’t?”

His mouth falls flat. “Nothing good. Trust me on that.”

“It’s kind of hard to do that lately,” I admit. God, I sound like such a whiny punk. So desperate for my big brother’s attention.

But hell, if I knew it would work, maybe I’d play that role to its fullest. Beg.

Stick around .

“I’ve got to go,” he says, reaching up to adjust his hood. It’s raining out, and droplets of water splatter my kitchen floor. Near the door, he pauses, rocking on the balls of his feet. “It won’t be this way forever,” he adds. “I promise. But this…this is something I need to do.”

He’s gone before I can even get a word in edgewise.

I utter my reply anyway, letting the rain snatch the words away. “Isn’t it always.”

I wipe the counters down and reshuffle the stuff on the table—anything to delay the inevitable.

Arno gets antsy if I don’t poke my head into the club at least once, but tonight, I’m not in a hurry to make my customary appearance.

After today, I can’t stomach Arno’s paranoid bullshit, but he’s not the person I picture waiting for me at Mulligan’s.

She’s still beneath my fingertips. Yellow paint. Yellow eyes. Yellow—now dark—hair.

It doesn’t take remembering what happened to Vlad to suspect that tangling with her isn’t a good idea. Though it’s not like I’ve had a lot of those lately, either.

I take a seat at the table. I could find another job tonight, if I wanted. With this new gang on the loose, it seems there are plenty of gangbangers willing to be patched up off the books.

I could always chase after Dante, or better yet, I could make some money. Enough to buy a plane ticket in addition to Domi’s. France. London. Someplace far from here.

No matter what, I won’t get distracted again.

Not by Dante.

Not by her.