Ch 1: Lucas De Santis

01:18 PM. The numbers on the clock burned my retinas like a countdown to an execution. Today was the day I stopped being a person and started being a peace treaty. 

I rolled out of my bed, a massive, silk-sheeted island that suddenly felt like a coffin. My head throbbed, a brutal reminder of the cheap liquor I’d used to try and drown out the sunrise. It hadn’t worked. It never worked. 

“Luca! Are you up?” Tatiana’s voice sliced through my skull. 

“Stop screaming, Tati,” I groaned, shielding my eyes. My sister pushed into the room, her eyes full of that suffocating pity I hated. 

“Father wants you sorted,” she whispered. 

“Like he cares,” I snapped, the bitterness sharp in my throat. “He’s just happy to finally sell off the unwanted son.”

I walked into the bathroom, catching my reflection. I looked like a ghost. This war with the North had turned us all into monsters or corpses. My father, Don De Santis, had ‘solved’ it with this marriage. A genius move for him; a life sentence for me. 

“Lucas. If you mess this up, you’ll wish you were never born.”

My father’s voice was a cold blade at my neck. He stood in the doorway, his shadow stretching across the room like a predator. 

I recoiled, my skin crawling as Tatiana scurried away. He didn’t look at me with love; he looked at me like a product he hoped wouldn’t break before the sale. 

Once he left, I retreated to the shower, turning the water hot enough to scald. I wanted to wash the ‘South’ off me, to burn away the horror of the day before it even began. 

When I stepped out, a beige suit waited on the bed. Beside it, a note from Tati and my “favorite” hidden in the vanity drawer: Xanax. I didn’t take one. I took two. I washed them down with a swig of wine, waiting for the chemical fog to settle the screaming in my nerves. 

Just as the numbness started to bleed in, my father burst back in. No knock. No respect. He grabbed me, turning me around roughly. He wasn’t checking my tie; he was checking for the wire he’d forced me to wear. 

“King of the North,” he hissed, checking the device. He already expected me to betray him. He’d hated me ever since my twin, Enzo, outed me in middle school. I could still feel the sting of his spit on my face from that day. 

“Come on, pretty son,” he smiled. “Let’s get you married.”

I put on my Ray-Bans. I wasn’t Luca anymore. I was a mask. I walked down the stairs with a fake swagger, hiding the pain in my chest with every dancey step. 

The drive to the church was a blur of black SUVs and cold dread. When the doors opened, the air left my lungs. Silas Vane stood at the altar in charcoal black. He was a statue of ice and power. At 6’5”, he towered over my 5’1” frame. 

He looked at me like a wolf watching a wounded deer. I looked at him and could swear he smirked.  

He smirked. My legs buckled; half from the drugs, half from the sheer, terrifying gravity of the man waiting to own me. 

The priest spoke, but I only heard the silence of the crowd. 

“If anyone has an objection…”

A cough echoed from the back. In a flash, Silas didn’t turn to look; he drew his gun at the altar and aimed it at the heart of the crowd.