A House Full Of Monsters

CHIARA

“Per favore, Chiara. Non puoi andare lì, tuo padre si arrabbierebbe!”

I ignored the house help’s pleas after reaching the base of the staircase and turned straight right, heading towards my father’s home office. On a normal day, I would have been sensible and waited until he came down for dinner to voice out my grievances, but this couldn’t wait.

Not when I was about to be sold to an arranged marriage.

So, I marched straight to the door and pushed it open without a second thought. Several eyes turned to me instantly at the sudden realization, rooting me in place. That’s when I regretted not listening to the house help’s warning.

A soft gasp escaped my lips when I saw a man kneeling on the floor with a bloodied face.

“Oh my God…”

My father, who was sitting behind his desk, raised his head to glare at me.

Okay, that was the wrong thing to say. But how else was I supposed to react to this scene? I had never witnessed such a thing in my entire life, and the only dead bodies I ever saw came from horror movies I watched in the middle of the night when everyone was asleep.

But still…it was not an appropriate thing to say in a place like this.

I was a daughter of the powerful De Santis family after all.

My father was the second son of Don Raffadele De Santis, the reigning Don of the De Santis family in Rhode Island. He was appointed as the Boss who ran the family’s operations in Boston, Massachusetts. My family’s power stretched across Rhode Island to Massachusetts, and even some parts of Connecticut, and we had our hands dipped in every illegal business that one could think of.

I wasn’t supposed to know these things, but I liked to read. And snoop around things that were absolutely not my business.

That’s why I knew I was currently in a shitload of trouble right now. The tension in the room was heavy and suffocating as everyone turned to my father, silently waiting to see how he would react.

After some long minutes, my father leaned across the polished desk while pinching his nose. “Uscite tutti.” He said softly.

His men exchanged confused looks but didn’t move at all. They were all vaguely concerned with his calm demeanor after being interrupted in the middle of such an intense meeting. But none of them knew him as I did. It was the calm before the storm.

Before I could take my next breath, he slammed his fist down on the table. The sudden action caused the men to flinch as he flung his phone at them.

“Are you all deaf?” he roared. “I said you all should leave!”

I watched them file out of the room with low murmurs of complaints, dragging the injured man along with them. Hearing the door close gently behind me sent a shiver through my body as I pulled my eyes away from the smudged trail of blood on the floor to watch my father rise from his seat.

Fuck.

I was so screwed.

“How many times have I warned you about coming in here without my permission?” he asked, stuffing his hand into his pockets as he approached me.

Instinctively, I kept retreating from him until my back hit the closed door. The first thing that came to mind was my older sister’s words whenever she caught me crying in my room after such an incident.

Fight back, Chiara. You can’t keep playing the ‘victim card’ forever.

Yeah…that was easier said than done. I learned from an early age that it was easier to submit than resist my father’s beating whenever he was angry. I had witnessed all the horrible things he had done to break my mother and sister’s rebellious spirits when they were still around in the past.

Now, it was just the two of us.

I took a deep breath before murmuring an apology. “I’m sorry. I only came here because I have something important to discuss with you.”

My father stopped right in front of me, his large build hidden in a suit, towering over my small frame. I could tell he was itching to hit me, but he seemed strangely pleased by the fact that I kept my eyes on the floor instead of meeting his eyes.

“Something important to discuss?” he repeated, rolling each word out of his lips with distaste. “What could be more important than the headache those Irish gangs on the streets are giving me? Or the fact that my father thinks I’m colluding with them to steal from him?”

I suppressed the urge to wring my hands after hearing him, wanting to maintain some dignity. “I…I heard you agreed to an arranged marriage for me.”

My father hummed in confirmation. “So?”

The unconcerned tone in his voice sent a wave of annoyance through me, but I tried hard not to show it. He was already pissed as it is. There was no need to agitate him any further.

“But I don’t want to get married,” I said, forcing each word with as much courage as I could muster. “You promised me that I would be allowed to raise my daughter in peace-”

My words were cut short as his hand suddenly shot out to slap me across the cheek without warning. Tears blurred my vision momentarily as I tried to breathe through the pain thrumming under my skin. My ears were ringing, and my heart was racing like a horse galloping across the fields as I tried to put some distance between us.

But my father wasn’t having it.

He grabbed my arm and yanked me back hard, causing me to stumble. I collided with his chest before his other hand shot out to grab my jaw to face him.

“You have no daughter, remember?” he said, his voice low and controlled. “You might not be a virgin, but you have never had a child. And that is the story you are going to stick with until you enter your future husband’s house.”

I struggled to speak. “That man….is twenty years older than me.”

“You are already twenty years old, Chiara,” my father replied. “Besides, your grandfather was the one who arranged the marriage between you and Don Salvatore Romano. He ordered me to engage my firstborn daughter to his friend’s son as a way to repay a life debt.”

A small frown graced my lips after hearing his explanation. I didn’t care about an old favor between two old men, and even if that was true, I wasn’t the firstborn daughter-”

My eyes suddenly widened as I stared at my father in shock.

“Oh my God,” I gasped. “My grandfather doesn’t know Isabella is dead, does he?”

A small, displeased grunt escaped my father’s lips. “No, he doesn’t. And it will remain that way until he dies.”

Anger slowly built up in my chest as time ticked away until I could no longer contain it.

“How could you hide this away from them?” I cried, not caring about the way my voice kept trembling. “They are family. They deserve to know the truth!”

“They will kill us if they ever find out what happened to Isabella, stupida troia!” he yelled back at me. “Besides, Don Salvatore is the most ruthless mafia don in the entire country, so I hope you can honor this agreement if you want you and your daughter to survive.”

I slowly nodded after his words sank in. My father suddenly released me once he got the agreement he wanted, not caring how I dropped to the cold, marbled floor, gasping for air. As much as I hated him, he was right about one thing.

My family was full of monsters.