Metanoia

“Why did we stop?” I asked, moving closer to the man hunched over the wheel. Looking around, I noticed that we had already left London, which meant the castle was a few kilometers away. There was only a road and a forest, and I was on my guard. This was the perfect opportunity to kill me.

“The tyre is damaged,” Dante said briefly, sighing deeply. He stood up and met my gaze, “I’ll change it in minutes,” he added, walking to the boot while I looked at the flat tyre. Exhaling deeply, I raised my head to the dark sky, then turned and took a few steps away from the Audi, walking along the road in my high heels.

“You look like a master of your craft,” I chuckled, crossing my arms over my chest and tilting my head to one side. Even on his back he felt my smile.

“This isn’t the first time I’ve changed a tyre, but still,” Dante replied, handling the jack, “I prefer a different kind of car.

“Did you set all this up on purpose to show off?” I squatted a few metres away from the man and narrowed my eyes. He had no idea how much information I knew about cars.

“You found out,” he said with a hoarse laugh.

“So my theory is correct,” I raised an eyebrow, not taking my eyes off Dante’s movements. He was working slowly but effectively with the tools and the new tyre was already in place of the previous one. I could see his muscles tense through the fabric of his shirt.

“What theory?” the man frowned, checked the strength of his work and, making sure everything was in order, picked up the tools and put them in the boot.

“About your conceit.”

The man who built a wall of ice around himself must have had a great past, especially if his life was never associated with crime – talking to Jensen, he showed no friendly warmth, continued to keep his distance not only physically but also psychologically, and combining these observations with his insolence at Luca’s house and his relaxed attitude today, I concluded that this indifference in his eyes was due to pride; Dante thought he was better than everyone else, so he did not get involved in the events going on around him.

“Really?” the man was surprised, scratching his cheeks and coming closer to me.

“Absolutely,” I nodded.

Coffee, cigarettes, insomnia, stress or the intoxicating scent of Dante’s perfume that I could inhale so deeply at close range had turned my head. His brown eyes, slightly squinted, wrinkled at the corners, studied my face intently as I breathed slowly, feeling my lips tighten and my heart beat frantically. The early morning in the forest, the dawn, the time when bright rays fell on the sturdy tree trunks, golden streams illuminating the bark – these were his eyes. I saw little moles, like they were drawn on with a pen. The silence between us didn’t go unnoticed and Dante looked down, coughing.

“Your eye,” the man said, not hiding his embarrassment, shifting quickly from foot to foot, pointing to my left eye, his movements jerky, as if he didn’t know where to go, “red,” he added. Absorbed in my thoughts, I didn’t notice the stinging pain and raised my hand to my face, stopping just in time to realise I was wearing make-up. It was probably a burst capillary. Dante leaned closer, one hand opening the car door behind me, “Sit down”.

Something flickered in his gaze. As Dante closed the door on my side, I followed his movements. Despite the fact that I used the same tactics with him as I did with other people, he remained cool and relaxed with me at the same time. But he was anything but Italian. I had lived in Italy long enough to understand that. Another contradiction.

We arrived at the castle ten minutes after changing the wheel, without saying a word. I could barely pay attention to the man, concentrating on my own feelings – my eye kept hurting, my heart kept beating fast, the blood pounding in my ears; all I could dream of now was a soft bed.

The man got out and slammed the door. I did the same, but immediately saw small holes in the stone walls of the castle. There were bullets all over the floor. De Rosso watched me cautiously, and when he decided to come anyway, I put my hand in front of him and pressed my finger to my lips. The man’s gaze turned sharply serious and we were both silent for a few seconds before I bent down and took off my high heels, using one of them as a weapon. I walked quietly up the front steps, feeling Dante quickly following behind me. When I opened the front door, I immediately noticed drops of blood on the stone floor. My first thought was of Jensen. I knew he could protect himself, but I didn’t understand how he would behave with his wife. The attackers could have been many times more than the local guards. I glanced to the side: several men were lying on the ground, and more were inside the house. A massacre had indeed taken place here, the results of which made my heart beat wildly. I couldn’t lose Jensen. My jaw clenched, I let out a choked breath and squeezed the heel in my hand harder. I took a step forward, trying not to step on the blood. It was dark all around, the red footsteps leading to the back door, so I crossed that distance quickly. Step by step I heard a soft female scream. I was about to leave the house when Dante stood in front of me and gestured for silence. He was the first to leave and, feeling the muscles tense throughout his body, he began to breathe heavily in an attempt to contain aggression and panic. There was a muffled scream in the street and I ran out into the yard to see the bloody body of my brother and his weeping wife. My eyes widened in horror and my breathing stopped. I couldn’t even move. The shoe fell from my hands. I didn’t care what Lynette was saying, what Dante was doing, my brother was lying on the cold ground, his back resting on the castle wall, his head pointing to the place where he had been married a few days before.

Blinking quickly, I realised I had to act quickly, I ran over to Jensen and felt his pulse, “He’s alive”.

His body was covered in blood. I couldn’t see his blue eyes because they were closed and the eyelids twitched slightly. There were drops of blood on his blond hair and all over his body. His clothes were drenched in red. I didn’t recognise this man as my brother. There was a wound in his shoulder. I immediately tore off my white shirt and wrapped the piece of cloth around his shoulder, causing my brother to exhale heavily. The colour immediately turned to dark blood. The bullet had hit a vein.

“They’re coming back,” Lynette cried as Dante tried to figure out what had happened, “I don’t know who they are. Lots of guns, people came here and died.” She was definitely hysterical. I had not recognised most of her speech.

“We have to go,” De Rosso said, getting Lynette up and then coming to me. I nodded and put my brother around my waist. He began to regain consciousness.

“Explain to me who these people were,” she said as Dante and I carried my brother to the car, “why would anyone want Jensen dead?”

I just frowned and shook my head. We had no time. Lynette quickly opened the passenger door and De Rosso put my brother in the back seat, the girl did the same. I turned to Dante who was standing thoughtfully by the closed door, his hands on his hips. I understood that if my brother’s life was threatened, I would have to tell a stranger details about my life, but there was no other choice. My heart was beating fast and his lips were covered in blood. My brother’s life was hanging by a thread, I couldn’t lose him.

“I can’t take him to the hospital,” I breathed quickly, “the accessible part of the restaurant has all the necessary first aid and enough security.

“If they came here, they know about the casino. They may already be there.”

I looked away in panic, quickly thinking of another solution. But Dante did know about the casino. The light from the headlights of several cars suddenly appeared in the distance, the man next to me also noticed, “I’ll drive,” I said abruptly and ran to the driver’s door. Dante was already sitting on my left, checking the condition of my brother who was breathing heavily.

I started the engine, backed up abruptly, pulled the handbrake and turned the Audi around. As soon as several cars entered the castle grounds, I drove onto the road and turned towards the city.

“Be careful, Alana,” Jensen clears his throat from the back seat. In the rear view mirror I noticed the blood on his face from the movements. Lynette was there, but she seemed so frightened by the situation that she didn’t notice anything around her.

“I’m not going to let you die,” I said, noticing the two black SUVs approaching.

“You’ll kill us faster,” the brother coughed again, trying to laugh, and didn’t say another word. Lynette held the bandage around his shoulder, still bleeding. I didn’t know what Jensen meant, the fast car I was driving, or the people who shot him. I understood that the one who set fire to the casino was behind it all. Anger built up inside me by the second and I began to lose control, gripping the steering wheel with incredible force until Dante’s husky voice echoed in my subconscious:

“Brake and turn here,” he said, pointing to the left-hand bend that led into the unknown. I did as he said and only one car missed us, the driver of the second car managed to swerve in time. The speed increased and so did the risk of losing control. Ahead I saw a road repair sign, behind it a special asphalt paving machine.

“Lynette, close your eyes,” I said loudly, knowing she wouldn’t survive another death. As I picked up speed, I noticed Dante’s grip on the door handle tightening. I took a deep breath and steered the car straight for the sign, knowing that the size of the Audi meant the car behind wouldn’t notice it. I quickly turned the wheel to the right and was pulling out onto the open road when the car behind me crashed into a car on the tarmac. Sparks appeared in the rear-view mirror, indicating that the driver had not survived.

“You can open it,” I breathed. Dante relaxed visibly in his chair, but his eyebrows knitted quickly as he looked at the road.

“Straight for a few kilometers, then uphill,” he replied, panting.

“Where are we going?” I asked, noticing in the distance the rise De Rosso was talking about.

“To my house.”

There was no information on his property. Without another word, I quickly followed the man’s route. As I approached a small two-storey house, I slammed on the brakes, which could have seriously damaged the car, but my brain could only see my brother’s blood. My blood. Dante grabbed Jensen’s good arm and dragged him into the house, and Lynette quickly followed. Running into the house, I immediately noticed a small dining table, from which I immediately threw everything away, and De Rosso placed my brother there. The man took off his jacket, unbuttoned several buttons and rolled up his sleeves. I took the opportunity to remove the homemade bandage from Jensen’s shoulder, carefully pulling it away from his skin. An unpleasant smell of meat, to which I had long become accustomed, immediately hit my nose, but once I had finished with the cloth, I began to look around for what I needed. Lynette was sitting on the floor with her back to the table so as not to see anything. I didn’t pay any attention to her.

Dante took a first aid kit from the kitchen cabinet and quickly placed it on the table. When I opened it, I immediately saw a small bottle of hydrogen peroxide; while the man was washing his hands in the sink, I decontaminated the tools that De Rosso was going to take out the bullet, after which I treated Jensen’s wound. My brother began to quickly move his injured arm and shoulders, to which I abruptly took a step back.

“Damn,” I hissed, setting the bottle down and holding my brother’s body. Dante began to work professionally on the wound, not a single muscle in his face shaking. He disinfected the tweezers again and leaned closer to the hole, starting to pull at the edges, looking for the bullet itself, after a few moments the man nodded, pressing his thumb to the spot where the metal was obviously located. I didn’t look away as Dante removed the bullet. From time to time I rubbed a cloth over Jensen’s skin so that the blood didn’t completely flood the wound and Dante didn’t lose a bullet. I had done the same for my father on more than one occasion. Finished quickly and successfully, De Rosso tossed the bullet onto the table and began disinfecting the needle, ready to stitch it up.

Forgotten Feeling

Sickening, sticky blood dripped down my cold hands and onto the wooden table. There was a musty smell of metal and moisture in the air, pressing heavily on my stomach and making me gag. Jensen fell silent, his movements no longer so abrupt, but his labored breathing echoed in my ears, squeezing my head; his whole body was covered in blood, and where Dante had searched for the bullet there were scalpel cuts where red flesh remained beneath the layer of skin. I refused to give my brother alcohol as a painkiller, despite the pity I felt every time I looked at his tortured face – by reducing his body’s response to pain in this way, we risked damaging the wound and bones even more, and not even knowing it. De Rosso looked focused on the painstaking work of the tweezers – trying to minimise my brother’s suffering by carefully withdrawing the needle and thread; focused on his work, he could barely breathe, concentrating on the stitching, and then there was the sharp sound of metal.

“It’s done,” Dante said as he finished bandaging the wound. My brother was breathing heavily, most likely he had already lost consciousness and would be tormented by a fever for the next few hours, “there is a bedroom on the first floor, you need to take him there and wash out the remaining blood.” The man looked at the shaking Lynette and I shook my head.

“I’ll do it,” I gasped, grabbing Jensen’s waist as De Rosso grabbed the other shoulder. Together we carried him to the bed and laid him down neatly. Now his life was only threatened by the risk of the wound festering. Lynette followed us.

She looked no better than Jensen at the moment – tired, tortured, covered in blood. Her eyes were like two large green orbs, staring terrified at everything around her. The girl’s hands were shaking so badly that she couldn’t hold anything in them.

I found a small bowl in the bathroom off the bedroom, emptied it of unnecessary supplies and poured water into it; after wetting a towel, I returned to my brother and began gently running the cloth over his skin, feeling him flinch at each touch. There were drops of sweat on his forehead, his forehead furrowed and his eyelids twitching, his chest heaving heavily as if an animal were sitting on it. The water had quickly turned red and the towel was tattered, but there was less blood on Jensen’s face and body, which probably eased his condition.

I put the bowl on the bedside table and sat down on the edge of the bed, my legs spread wide and my elbows on my hips. Tired, I lowered my head onto my palms and clutched the roots of my hair, trying to adjust my psyche to the situation – I had grown up in a murderous family and such encounters with my father were not uncommon, but to see my brother struggling with life was too much for me: weakness and hopelessness overwhelmed me, there was nothing I could do to take away his misery. A rustling sound was heard in the corner of the room and an amorphous silhouette dissolved into the shadows of the room, sobbing.

“Alana,” Lynette whispered in a choked voice. Emerging from the darkness, I noticed the glare in her malachite glass eyes; the tip of her nose was trembling, as were her lips and fingers. She shuffled from foot to foot, turning her head across the room to avoid looking at the bed where Jensen lay. Her hair, clinging to her damp face, prevented Lynette from speaking or breathing, “what just… what is…” her tears almost made her gasp, “going on?”

Sighing heavily, I lifted my head and pressed my fingers to my face. I really didn’t want to talk to the girl right now, to calm her down, let alone explain what had just happened. Lifting my heavy eyelids to the frightened girl, I stared at her for a long moment in silence; she gave in to the pressure of my gaze and stepped back, sitting on a chair against the wall and pressing her thighs together with her fingers, waiting for my answer. Dante stood silently by the door, leaning his shoulder against the wall and crossing his arms over his chest.

“I don’t know,” I admitted honestly, nodding slowly. There was silence – Lynette was waiting for me to continue, and I was keeping the secrets of the illegal business as much as I could in this situation; she was unlikely to believe that the castle had been shot by accident.

“Jensen,” she sobbed, wiping her nose with the edge of her sleeve, “he said that… he works with,” the girl exhaled loudly, gripping her fingers tighter, “with bad people, but I didn’t think it was that serious.”

My restaurant was set on fire twice, and then, by a happy coincidence, the building where my brother and his wife were staying was shelled. Jensen could hardly have been the target, he was a tool to influence me, but who was in the shadows and in charge of the process remained a mystery. A cough in my chest brought me back to reality, where Lynette, shaking like an aspen leaf, was rocking from side to side in her chair, while Dante watched silently, without interfering.

“Jensen said he was laundering money for some illegal associates in his bar. We met there,” the girl whispered, pausing. I pulled down the corners of my lips and tucked my hair behind my ears.

“He does a lot more than you want to know,” I replied groggily, clearing my throat.

“I don’t understand,” Lynette got up from her chair, arms raised to her head, “Jensen almost got killed today,” the fear in her eyes turned to panic and her drooping voice to a falsetto.

“He should have told me about our family sooner. I’m sorry you found out this way.”

“But how?” she exclaimed, getting up from her chair, “How could Jensen be involved with weapons?”

I exhaled loudly, beginning to lose patience with Lynette’s tantrum. Slowly rising from the bed, I straightened my back and took a few steps in her direction, frowning. Even though anger coursed through my veins like lead, I was too exhausted to pay any attention to the girl.

“He is my brother, Lynette,” I reminded her in a deep, raspy voice, “and therefore bound to me. My enemies are his enemies too,” I looked stubbornly into Carbyn’s green eyes, I could see her awareness of the situation changing, the reason for the attack on her husband right in front of her, “you will see Jensen in blood many more times, my dear, until he is dead. That’s the price of being called Wollstonecraft.”

“Jensen almost died today because of your damned business,” Lynette tried to push me, but I quickly caught her hand and pulled her close to me, causing the girl to frown from a strain in her shoulder.

“Don’t blame me for what you don’t know,” I hissed through clenched teeth, gripping her wrist so tightly that my fingers turned white; animal rage rose in me. Footsteps were heard and Dante’s fingers fell on my hand, forcing me to release the terrified Lynette.

“You’re safe in this house, you can take a shower and try to calm down,” De Rosso said, “we’ll talk about it tomorrow.”

I exhaled heavily, trying to get rid of my anger, and left the room, giving my brother one last worried look. Lynette didn’t like me, but she would look after her husband. I felt like I was about to lose my mind.

Once up on the second floor, I began a quick search of the rooms, looking for another guest bedroom, it was very close to the stairs. I quickly made my way to the bathroom, not bothering to close all the doors. I mindlessly tore off my wet and dirty clothes and kicked them into the corner of the room, trying to get rid of the smell of sweat and blood around me. I turned on the water and stood under the hot jets, forcing myself to breathe slowly and deeply. The drops burned the skin on my back and my hair immediately stuck to my body; pale red streaks ran down my legs, carrying Jensen’s blood to the drain in the floor. The clear glass that separated me from the rest of the bathroom fogged up in an instant, causing me to close my eyes.

The thought of death hadn’t bothered me for a long time, hadn’t frightened me. I had become so resigned to my death that I no longer attached any sadness or negative emotions to it. Death was inevitable, and there was no longer any value in allowing it to happen – no matter what I did, I was going to die anyway, especially if I worked with people who disliked me and threatened to use their new weapons in practice. The meaningless dragging of my existence condemned me to a silent wandering in search of my end. I no longer knew happiness and joy, moments of smiling came when I forgot that I was searching for non-existent answers. I lived with the feeling of a cast-iron cauldron on my chest, as if my own thoughts were weighing it down and adding the necessary ingredients for poison.

Tonight brought back long-forgotten feelings – fear for my own brother overshadowing my worries. It was unbearable to see him on the brink of death, exhausted, wounded, in a pool of his own blood. Now that the fear for his life had receded into the background, an unbearable rage rose in my throat. The stench of rotting flesh and decay reappeared around me and hit my head with a new attack of migraine. The anger was replaced by tears, which came out and hid under the drops of hot water. Resting my hands on the glass wall of the shower cubicle, I began to breathe heavily, feeling a burning sensation on the skin of my back from the high temperature. On top of the threat to Jensen’s life, there was the fight with Lynette: there was always a fear inside me that one day I would not be able to control myself and would hurt someone close to me because of my own aggression. I almost hurt her today.

“Did you run away because you were afraid of public condemnation?” Dante’s deep, tired voice echoed through the bathroom, fading into the sound of running water. Reluctantly, I opened my eyes and swept my palm across the fogged glass to see the man in front of me.

“I was afraid I’d hurt her,” I replied quietly.

“But you held back.”

“I don’t know if I would have resisted if you hadn’t been there,” I admitted. Dante was silent for a moment, pondering my words. I must have frightened him with my capriciousness, which was for the best – if De Rosso was frightened of me, it would speed up the process of his release.

“I’ve brought a towel,” he said.

“How do you know about the casino?” I said, ignoring his words. The sound of the water faded into the background.

“I’ve worked with people like you, Alana, you all walk among yourselves, I heard about you before I met your brother and the accounts in his business confirmed all my suspicions,” Dante said slowly, “and millions don’t pass through a little known bar in London.”

I really should have been wary of De Rosso, his intelligence and charm could kill my business. Over the years I had learned to think strategically and control my impulses, but this man made me feel the same way I felt about my husband.

“You need a rest, Alana. Your things are on the bed,” Dante said huskily, then turned and left the bathroom. Yes, I definitely needed a rest.

It was past one in the morning when my back hit the headboard. I couldn’t remember how long I’d been standing under the scalding jets of water that had sliced through my skin since Dante had left. I ran my fingers through my wet hair, letting black strands fall out, and pulled the heavy blanket and soft plaid over me tighter, feeling a shiver run down my shoulders and shoulder blades. Despite what I’d been through today, and the terrible pain in my eyes, I didn’t want to sleep; I just twitched my leg nervously, but sleep wouldn’t come. I wrapped my arms around myself, feeling the rough skin on my forearm with my fingertips, and pulled the blanket down to look at the scar. I’d told Dante a few days ago that it was from a car accident. I caught my lower lip between my teeth and nibbled at it in a throbbing motion, pressing my fingers harder against the bump.

The crackle of the fire and the sound of the embers spreading through the walls of the small house in the distance of London. My knees pressed to my chest, I sat on the soft sofa, wrapped in my own jumper, until the man handed me a plaid.