Valentina.
The silence after a gunshot could be deafening, a void that swallows everything.
No one ever talked about how it felt to pull the trigger that took a life, even if said life had been dead long before you pulled that trigger.
I stood there, my arms hanging limp by the sides, the gun slipping from my hand to clatter on the blood-streaked floor. My chest heaved with shallow breaths as I stared at her… our mother, slumped and motionless.
So quiet in the face of death.
Her lifeless eyes stared back at me, now glassy and unseeing. Blood pooled around her head, soaking into the floor, a dark halo of guilt I’d painted myself.
“No,” I whispered, the word tasting foreign and hollow.
My knees buckled, but I didn’t fall. My body was rooted, trapped in this moment, as if time itself refused to let me leave.
What had I done?
From the corner of my vision, Isabella shifted. Her face fixed with a mask of indifference, though her lips were curling ever so slightly into a smirk that sent a chill racing down my spine.
“You did it,” she said softly, almost like a mother praising a child. “You actually did it.”
Her tone was wrong… so wrong. There was no shock, no grief. Just… satisfaction.
Her tone was wrong-so wrong. There was no shock, no grief. Just… satisfaction.
“Stop,” I croaked out the words.
Isabella tilted her head, studying me like I was some fascinating specimen. “She deserved it, you know,” she said, her voice calm, almost conversational. “Years of manipulation, months of cruelty… this was mercy, Valentina. Whether you believe it or not.”
What happened to my sweet, rebel of a sister? My stomach churned, and I stumbled backwards, away from Isabella, away from the body, away from everything.
“Don’t touch me,” I rasped as Isabella stepped closer. My hands shot up instinctively, warding her off. “Stay away.”
Her smile faded, replaced by something colder. “Valentina, don’t be dramatic. We both know this had to happen. She was a monster, and monsters don’t get to walk away.”
But I wasn’t listening to her.
How could I?
My breaths came fast and shallow, my vision blurring with blurring with unshed tears.
I shot her. I shot my mother.
The thought echoed, relentless, digging claws into my mind. My chest tightened as the room spun around me.
I couldn’t stay here. I couldn’t be here.
“Valentina,” Isabella called, her voice softer now, like she was coaxing a wild animal. “Come on. We need to keep moving. The gunfire stopped. You heard it, too. We have to find out who…”
“Shut up,” I hissed, spinning to glare at her. “Just… shut up.”
Her mouth twitched, but she didn’t argue. She merely gestured toward the door, her meaning clear.
I didn’t want to follow her. I didn’t want to be anywhere near her. But the silence beyond the room gnawed at me. The gunfire had ceased, leaving behind an eerie void that only heightened my dread.
Was it over?
Had Luca won?
Or Matteo?
My heart clenched painfully at the thought of Matteo lying lifeless somewhere, and against my better judgment, I forced my legs to move.
The hallway was littered with bodies, a grotesque plate of death and destruction. Blood smeared the walls and pooled beneath those who were gone, the metallic stench filling my nose and making my stomach turn.
I stepped over them carefully, avoiding the lifeless gazes of men I didn’t know but whose deaths weighed heavily on me nonetheless.
Isabella walked ahead, her steps confident and unbothered, like she was strolling through a garden instead of a battlefield.
She didn’t care about any of this.
But I did.
I couldn’t stop the bile that rose in my throat as we turned another corner and found more bodies… more evidence of the carnage Luca and Matteo had unleashed on each other.
“Who do you think won?” Isabella asked suddenly, her tone light, almost playful.
I didn’t answer.
She glanced back at me, her lips quirking into that same unsettling smile. “I hope it wasn’t Luca,” she said, her voice soft but laced with venom. “God, I hope it wasn’t him.”
We hadn’t forgotten what he had done to her during our time in that forsaken warehouse. Yet, she had gone back even while knowing Luca would always be where Matteo was.
They had been brothers.
Isabella’s words settled heavily in the air, a silent prayer I found myself unwillingly echoing.
I didn’t want it to be Luca either.
The thought of him standing over Matteo’s broken body made my knees buckle again, but I pressed on, forcing myself to move.
We reached the door at the end of the hallway… a massive, imposing thing that seemed to pulse with the weight of what lay beyond it.
My hand trembled as I reached for the handle, but Isabella beat me to it, pushing the door open with a creak that echoed through the stillness.
The sight that greeted us stole the breath from my lungs.
The room was chaos… men watching the chaos in the middle of the room, the floor splattered with blood.
Or what was left of them.
Luca pressed his knee on Matteo’s chest, holding him down with a knife placed close to his neck. A knife was buried deep in his back, body frozen.
And then, as if in slow motion, Luca fell.
He crumpled to the floor, his body landing with a sickening thud that seemed to echo in my chest.
But I didn’t care about Luca.
My eyes were on Matteo as he just remained there, unmoving, his eyes locked on something far away. From my angle, I could see his lips parted as if to speak, but nothing came out.
And then, like a kettle whose cover was finally removed, I screamed.
“Matteo!”
The scream tore from my throat, raw and guttural, as I surged forward. My knees hit the floor as I reached him, my hands trembling as I cradled his face.
“Matteo,” I whispered again, my voice breaking.
But he didn’t respond.
He didn’t move.
And for the first time since this nightmare began, I let the tears fall.
“Matteo… wake up, Matteo. No, no. Wake up, please. MATTEO!”