Breathless & Bloodstained (The Chicago War #4) (26 page)

“Abriella,” her
brother said, “I asked you a fucking question.”

“I had to stop at
the flower shop. Some last minute thing came up with the arrangements for Mom’s
funeral. They wanted to make sure it was okay.”

“So?”

That one word
right there, so uncaring, cold, and distant, was why Abriella hated the very
breath her brother was still capable of breathing.

No, she wasn’t
happy with Tommas. She was angry over his error that cost her someone she
loved. She was mad that the mistake happened at all.

More than
anything, she wished his plan hadn’t failed. She wished that she was burying
her brother tomorrow and not her mother. Abriella couldn’t find it in herself
to feel guilty for those desires.

“So, I’m not
allowed to go anywhere without my babysitter,” Abriella said, letting the
sarcasm haunt her voice. “And since the funeral is tomorrow, I needed to give
my okay today. Darryl had to come here to get you. He decided to kill two birds
with one stone.”

Joel pushed up
from the bed. “Wonderful. Everything is taken care of then?”

“What do you
mean?”

“Sara’s
arrangements. That’s all done?”

“Yes.”

Abriella
practically had to force the answer out.

“Is my suit
dry-cleaned?” Joel asked.

“Waiting in your
office.”

Joel picked his
bag up from the floor, ripped the hospital bracelet off his wrist, and then
tossed the discarded piece of plastic on the bed. “Great. I’m ready.”

The closer he came
to Abriella, the more she wanted to rip his fucking throat out. Her anger and
sorrow was damned excruciating, but she was holding it in. She hid it well
enough to manage day by day.

Abriella was ready
to fucking blow.

Maybe she should
blame Tommas.

Maybe it was all
his fault.

But she hated Joel
far more.

Abriella hated her
brother for his untrue ways, his manipulations, and his games in the war. She
despised the fact that Joel had stained his hands with almost every death over
the last few months in one way or another. She detested his lack of empathy,
his greed for nothing more than power, and his selfishness.

He made her sick.

This time, just by
fucking
surviving
, Joel had pushed Abriella a little too far.

“What are you
waiting for?” Joel asked.

Abriella put her
mask back on, letting her brother believe that she was just another one of his
compliant little sheep. “Nothing. Let’s go.”

For a mid-April
day, the rain held off for Sara’s funeral. Abriella found herself silently
grateful that the sun was able to peek through gray clouds and color up the sky
as her mother’s casket was lowered into the ground. Her mother deserved a
little beauty for her final resting place. Something more than wet dirt and
pretty flowers.

Sara was
everything that Abriella had never wanted to be. Her mother had made mistakes.
She’d been called a whore for most of her life. Her past transgressions had
been held over her head as the people they called family whispered behind her
back. She was shunned, shamed, and mocked.

Unfortunately,
those were the things that some people would remember about Sara Trentini
before anything else.

Abriella, on the
other hand, would remember a strong, enduring woman who cared and loved far
more than should have been possible. A woman who offered forgiveness and
friendship to those who didn’t deserve it. A kind soul who gave life to three
children, and despite how they had come to be, she never stopped loving them.

She would remember
her mother. That woman … that imperfect, tender, devoted woman … was who
Abriella wanted to remember.

And maybe being
like Sara wasn’t such a bad thing.

At Abriella’s
right, Alessa stood quiet and still. Tears streaked down her sister’s cheeks
while her hand held tight to Abriella’s. Placed atop her eight month pregnancy
swell, Alessa’s other hand rested with her husband’s, their fingers
intertwined.

Thankfully, Joel
had managed to reign his asshole in for the day and allow his younger sister
and her husband the chance to be at the funeral and burial.

At Abriella’s
left, her father stood like a broken statue. Full of cracks, withered,
weather-beaten, and ready to fall. Peter hadn’t said more than a few words
since news of the car shooting and accident had come to the guests at the baby
shower the week before. He barely moved, ate, or slept.

Abriella
constantly worried about her father. Peter seemed lost without Sara.

The sound of a
metal spade shovel being driven into dirt woke Abriella from her stupor. She
watched the two groundskeepers as they started throwing shovelfuls of dirt into
the grave. Most of the funeral had passed Abriella by without her even
noticing.

On the other side
of the grave, Joel gave one last glance at the grave with his usual disinterest
present, and turned on his heel to leave.

He was the first
person to go.

Shortly after, the
other guests began to take their leave as well. Some stopped to give the
sisters and their father a supportive word or hug. Abriella recognized the
faces of her friends, Lily and Evelina, their husbands, and other people, but
she couldn’t muster up the ability to thank them or even smile.

“You ready?”

Abriella heard
Adriano’s question directed to his wife, but barely.

Alessa squeezed
Abriella’s hand. “You okay?”

Faintly, Abriella
nodded. “Yeah.”

Liar
, her
mind taunted.

She was two
seconds away from shattering, from letting all her anger and distress out, or
from breaking down completely. So close.

“Call me, okay?”
Alessa asked softly.

“Sure,” Abriella
whispered.

Once her sister
was gone, Abriella was left alone with just her father and the sounds of
shovels digging into dirt over and over. Quietly, over the spades slicing
through the mound of earth, soft, choked sobs began to echo. Abriella glanced
up to see wetness streaking down her father’s cheeks. Peter didn’t try to hide
his pain, he simply let it be free. Abriella wished she could do the same.

“I miss her,”
Peter said brokenly.

Abriella’s heart
splintered. “I know, Dad.”

“I didn’t tell her
enough. Not nearly enough.”

She didn’t have to
ask what her father meant. His heartbreak and grief was so clear to see that it
only added to her own pain.

Drawing in a deep
breath, Abriella pushed down her own suffocating emotions and the welling
tears. She leaned her head to her father’s shoulder, and wrapped her arm around
his to hold tight.

“It’ll be all
right, Dad,” she told him.

Peter shook his
head. “No, it won’t. It really won’t.”

She knew her
father was telling the truth.

As much as she
knew that her own lover had been the cause of her mother’s death, she couldn’t
imagine standing at his grave to bury him. Tommas was every good and bad part
of Abriella’s heart—something she desperately needed and wanted, but could
rarely have. The one thing she had chosen to love entirely, the man who owned
her soul and her very breath.

Tommas was her
shadows in the daylight, and her color in the darkness. He knew her secrets and
her stories, he loved her defiance and her spirit. He let her be true to who
she was, loved her fearlessly, and tried to give her what he thought she
deserved in the only way he knew how.

She couldn’t do
what her father had to do today.

Abriella just
couldn’t
.

“I’m sorry, Dad,”
Abriella mumbled.

“Me, too, Ella.
Me, too.”

A short while
later, Abriella helped her father into his waiting car. Once she was sure he
was settled in the back seat, she gave the enforcer waiting behind the wheel a
nod to say he could take a somber Peter home. Closing the door, she stepped
back from the car and waited as the black vehicle pulled away.

Heavy in her
heart, Abriella looked for the car that should have been waiting to take her
home as well. Joel had opted to have Darryl drive him home when he was ready,
and allowed Abriella to have a separate car and driver waiting for her.

It was something
else her brother managed to get right.

For once.

She quickly found
the waiting car at the end of the winding road. The enforcer who must have been
her driver was sitting on the passenger side of the hood with what looked to be
a cigarette dangling from his fingers as he chatted on the phone, completely
unaware.

Something—or
rather, someone—caught Abriella’s eye on the other end of the road, far away
from her waiting car. A familiar Jaguar was parked with a man leaning against
the passenger door.

Tommas.

His head was bent
down too low for her to see his eyes. She knew he was watching her.

Inside, every
single inch of Abriella screamed out for Tommas. She clung tight to her
control.  

She needed to keep
it for just a little while longer. Abriella wasn’t sure that when she gave up
the control she had managed to keep since finding out about her mother’s death,
if she would be able to come out of it unscathed.

Her heart wasn’t
ready.

Abriella held tighter
to the clutch in her hand. Inside rested the cell phone Tommas had given her.
His text message that morning had been the same message as it was all week:

I love you.

I’m sorry, Ella.

I’m here when you’re ready.

Tommy.

Simple.

Honest.

And exactly what
she needed.

The phone was
running low on minutes, and it needed a new card. She hadn’t had time to pick
one up when she wasn’t being followed or watched by Darryl. Hopefully, she
would be able to get one soon, but until then, she planned on saving the last
few minutes she had on the phone card for when she couldn’t take it anymore.

When she finally
broke.

When she really
needed him.

Tommas would
understand.

Raising her hand
slightly, Abriella waved to her lover.

Tommas tilted his
head up a little, just enough for her to see the camber of his frown and the
tightness in his jaw. He lifted his hand in return, and that was enough.

It was enough for
her to keep it together for a little while longer.

Abriella shifted
the messenger bag over her shoulder, hoping to ease the weight of the contents
a bit. Walking around the hallway corner, she met up with her waiting enforcer.
Like always, Darryl sat on the bench looking bored and annoyed at the same
time.