A Sinner’s Saint (De Bellis Crime Family #4)

Chapter 5

Chapter Five

M y eyes flicker open and land on her. Cammi. I watch as her chest rises and falls with each breath she takes. I wasn’t planning on falling asleep. I don’t sleep next to people. I had every intention of sliding out of the bed and leaving the room. The last thing I want is to wake up screaming while someone else is in my bed.

Especially her. That’s a part of me she doesn’t need to see. I couldn’t bring myself to leave her, though. Her naked body curled up around mine. There’s something grounding about her touch. Something that calms my demons. It’s different from getting high. Somehow, this girl’s touch both numbs and sets something alive within me. Something I’ve never felt before.

I don’t usually like when someone touches me. When I’ve slept with chicks in the past, I make a game of tying them down so they can’t touch me. I didn’t do that with Cammi. I wanted her to touch me, which made the experience all that much better. We didn’t fuck last night. I wouldn’t call it making love either, but it was something between the two.

When she fell asleep in my arms, so vulnerable, so trusting, I wanted to wrap her up and protect her from the evils of this world. Including the biggest risk to her right now. Me. I didn’t do that, though. I’m not ready to let this go. Whatever this is.

She’s good for me. For the first time in a long time, I didn’t wake up with the need to light up. The nightmares didn’t come. I shake the thoughts from my head. I don’t even want to think about those demons while she’s lying in my arms.

“You look like you have the weight of the world on your shoulders,” Cammi says, her voice raspy and full of sleep.

“Anyone ever tell you you’re beautiful when you’re sleeping?” I roll over, my face close to hers.

“Only my parents,” she says. “How long were you watching me?” Cammi asks while a small smile spreads across her lips.

“Not nearly long enough.” I lean in closer. “Ask me.”

She knows what I want—no, what I need her to ask me. I made her ask me all night. And when I finally got to sink into her, she didn’t just ask, she begged me.

“Vin?”

“Yeah, babe?”

“Shut up and kiss me,” she says.

Like a well-trained soldier, I follow her order. I kiss her. I consume her. If my soul weren’t so fucking tainted, I’d meld ours together, so we’d be one. But I could never drag this girl into my darkness.

“Mmm, I could kiss you all day and not get bored,” I tell her.

“I would let you,” she replies, and then her stomach makes the most god-awful noise.

“What the hell was that?” I laugh, lifting the sheet and looking down at her naked body. Big mistake. My cock was already hard. Now it’s just aching to get inside her.

“Sorry.” Cammi covers her face with her hands, her cheeks pinkening as her stomach rumbles again.

“I think I need to feed you,” I tell her.

“I can go. You don’t have to feed me,” she spits out quickly.

“You want to leave?” I roll over and begin to push off the bed.

Cammi’s hands reach out for me, her arms hooking around my neck and pulling me back to her. “No,” she says. “I don’t want to leave. I can leave, though. I don’t want to be a bother or overstay my welcome.”

I cup her face with one hand and my thumb strokes up and down her cheek. “You would never be a bother to me. Ever,” I tell her, kissing her forehead. “Let’s shower, get dressed, and then I’ll take you to get food. I doubt there’s anything in the kitchen.”

“Do you live here?” Cammi asks.

“No, I used to. For a little while, after our house burnt down. But then my brother bought a big-ass place in the ?burbs. That’s where I live now.”

“Oh, nice.”

“It’s a house.” I shrug, leaving out the part about how it’s becoming more and more a home since El’s moved in.

“Yo, Vin, where’d you disappear to last night?” Dash walks through my bedroom door.

Pressing the pause button on the console remote, I turn my attention to him. “Who the fuck let you up here?” I ask, knowing full well none of the soldiers would allow anyone upstairs.

“Gio.” He smirks. “Your brother likes me.” Dash plops down on the sofa and swipes up the second controller.

“My brother likes one person, and you are not her,” I grunt while pressing the pause button.

“Come on, man, you’re not gonna restart and play doubles?” Dash complains.

“Nope.” I continue tapping on the controller, all my focus on the imaginary enemies attacking me on the screen, until I finally meet my virtual demise and toss the damn thing aside. “What are you doing here?”

“Checking on your ass. Where’d you go after the party?”

“Did you grow a vagina overnight? What’s it to you where I went?” I scowl in Dash’s direction before pulling my tin from the pocket of my jeans.

“Well, I can see you’re in one piece and in a fine-ass mood. I’ll leave you to it.” He stands and walks out the door.

The proper thing to do would be to stop him. Hang out with my friend. I don’t do that, though. I’m really not in the mood for company. I woke up in the best mood. Spent the whole morning with Cammi before I dropped her off at home.

Then I came back here, and the ghosts started to invade my mind again. Every time I blinked, I saw them. It’s as if they’re making up for the brief reprieve I had last night.

I slide a sheet out of the packet and pinch the green herbs between my fingers, lining it up along the centre of the paper before rolling it up and licking down the edge to seal it shut. Then I lean forward, grab the lighter from the table, and walk over to the balcony. I don’t smoke in my room. This shit stinks, and the last thing I need is my big brother storming in and lecturing me.

I drop onto my ass, lean against the balcony wall, and light up, enjoying that first hit as my lungs fill with smoke. After finishing and stubbing out one joint, I immediately roll up another one and light it. I need to numb my brain. I need to smoke them all out. It’s the only way I’ll get any peace tonight.

When I’m done, I shut the balcony doors and collapse onto my bed, closing my eyes. This time, I don’t see them. I only see her. Cammi. Big, beautiful green eyes. Brown hair that never seems to end, and pale skin. Tiny freckles that spread across her nose and pouty lips that are as soft as pillows when you kiss them.

Fucking beautiful.

“ Why me? I’m your son ,” I ask my father. He’s brought me here again. I almost thought that maybe this month he wouldn’t. That he’d stop.

He laughs at me, and then his hand snaps out, hitting me across my face. “Why you? Because everything is your fault, boy. You think you’re my son?” He laughs again and then spits at me. “You’re nothing to me, Vincenzo. Nothing.”

He shakes his head and walks out of the room before the hard metal door slams shut. Leaving me alone in this living, breathing nightmare. But I know it won’t be that way for long. They’ll come for me. They’ll do whatever they want with me, and I can’t do a single thing to stop them.

I thought about telling Gio. My big brother would help me. At least, I think he would. Unless he already knows? What if he’s in on it? He works so closely with our father. I mean, how could he not know about this place?

Sitting down on the filthy mattress that’s the only thing left in the cement-walled room, I bring my knees up to my chest. I won’t cry. No matter how much I may want to.

Men don’t cry, my father’s voice echoes in my head.

I don’t understand why these particular men do this, though… I do know that when I’m older, when I’m bigger, I’m going to find them and kill them all. That day will come. I might not know who they are now, but I’ll figure out a way to find them. And one by one, I will come for them.

If they don’t kill me in this shithole first…

The handle on the door turns and my heart starts beating faster, as not one but two masked men walk in.

“On your feet, boy,” the first guy says while the second one slams and locks the door. The noise makes me jump. “Look at that. We got a frightened little one.”

“Good. I like ?em jumpy,” the second guy says before stepping forward. “You deaf or just dumb, boy? On your fucking feet. Now.”

I scramble off the mattress. I don’t want to. But I also know if I don’t, whatever they’re planning to do to me will be much worse. I spent two weeks in a makeshift hospital bed last month. My brothers asked how my trip was when I was finally allowed to return home. They thought I went with a friend’s family on holiday. I didn’t correct them. I should have. I should have told them. Maybe if I had, I wouldn’t be in the situation I’m in right now.

“You look familiar. Have I seen you before?” the first guy asks. He closes the distance before crouching down to meet me at eye level. I can feel his glare searing through the mask as he continues to study me.

I shake my head. I have no idea who these men are. I don’t recognise their voices. When the second guy reaches out and places a hand on my shoulder, bile rises in my throat. I push it back down.

I am not here. This isn’t happening to me. I want to remove myself from my body. I want a pill. I don’t want to be here.

“Open your mouth,” he grunts.

I do as he says, because not doing it is always worse. He drops a little white pill on my tongue.

“Swallow,” he tells me, and I listen. I know this pill will make me forget.

“Now, on your knees,” the first guy says.

My eyes widen. What? No, that’s not how the pills work. They usually wait. I’m still lucid. I’m still me. When I don’t move, his friend shoves me down. I fall to the concrete, my knees hitting the ground hard. Then they both undo their belts.

No! I don’t want to be here.

I jolt up in bed. Covered in sweat with a silent scream trapped in my throat. Looking around my room, I take a mental note of everything. I’m okay. I’m alone. I’m not back there.

“Fuck.” I run a frustrated hand through my hair.