Dark Redeemer by Raven Scott

4

Massimo

The next morning, when Roberto doesn’t join us for breakfast, I head out to the beach to check on him. I find him sitting on a towel in the sand next to shore. An empty bottle of wine lies next to him. He’s bawling his eyes out as he watches the sunrise. It’s a bit shocking, seeing the brother I love cry like a baby. All I want to do is reach out to him and hug him, but I hold back. I want to give him his space.

So instead I sit beside him on the sand. His head tilts toward me for a second before he returns his gaze to the sunrise.

I don’t say anything, just sit beside him, let him know I’m there.

Finally he says: “I was always a weepy drunk. I suppose now is the moment where I confess my feelings of inadequacy.”

I rest a hand on his shoulder and squeeze. I know he’s not drunk anymore. He would have finished that bottle the night before. Hung over, maybe, but not drunk.

“Do you think there’s a heaven?” Roberto asks me.

“I don’t know,” I tell him.

“Do you think momma and papa are there?” Roberto presses.

I sigh. “I don’t know. It’s possible.”

“What about the guy I killed?” Roberto asks.

I don’t answer him.

“Well, if there’s a heaven, that means there’s also a hell,” Roberto finishes. “Reserved for men like me.”

“Yeah, well, I guess you’ll never want for company,” I tell him. “Because I won’t let you go alone.”

He looks at me and then chuckles softly. He wipes another tear from his cheek. “I appreciate that.”

“What are brothers for?” I tell him.

“I always wondered what it must have felt like for you to kill a man,” Roberto says. “I never thought it would be so… well, it’s just, the guilt is so super overwhelming.”

“It was different for me,” I admit. “I felt no guilt. It was either kill, or be killed.”

He nods slowly. “Well, I guess we all deal with it our own way.”

“I suppose so,” I agree. “Now come on, get up. Stop wallowing in self-pity. Get back to your routine. Do you best to forget about what happened.”

“I’ll try, bro,” he says.

I squeeze his shoulder again. “Good. That’s all I can ask for. Let’s get some breakfast.” When he doesn’t move, I shove him. “Breakfast, bro.”

“Breakfast,” he agrees, forcing himself to stand.

* * *

I shove the barbell upward,feeling the burn in my pecs. It’s weighted with three forty-five pound plates per side. Concentrating on my set, I ignore the admiring eyes of the gym bunny beside me. When I finish and rack the bar, I sit up.

“Hello,” the gym bunny says. She extends a hand. “I’m Alessandra. I see you here all the time but I’ve never had the courage to introduce myself.”

“Except today,” I tell her with a wink.

“Yeah!” she says. “Isn’t that strange? I’m usually so shy.”

I shake her still extended hand. “Massimo.”

“Ooo, I like that name,” she says. “I’m visiting for the summer from Messina.”

I see one of my clients behind her. He beckons subtly. I ignore him. Let him wait a bit so he learns his place. I’m not at his beck and call.

I chat a bit more with Alessandra and get her number. Then I walk over to the client.

“Ever the ladies man,” Riccardo says when I reach him.

I shrug, saying nothing as I escort him to the men’s locker room. I give him the bottles he’s looking for, and he shoves a wad of cash into my hands.

“Thanks, Massimo,” he says.

I nod absently, not bothering to count the cash. Clients know not to fuck with me. “No worries.”

When he walks away, I can’t help but think of Matteo. I feel no guilt over pushing pills at the gym—if a client gets addicted, that’s their choice. And it’s all in the name of a better body anyway. But Matteo, my brother, doing hard drugs? That’s something else entirely. I don’t know what I’m going to do about him. And Roberto, too. I’m going to have to keep a close watch on the two of them over the next few days. Maybe it was a mistake to expand our operation outside of performance enhancing drugs. It only made the harder drugs all the more accessible, and too tempting in times of crisis.

I pause to examine myself in the mirror. My workout shirt looks like it’s barely containing my upper body. My biceps are bursting from the sleeves, and the tattoos I got in prison cover my arms. The distinct cut of my pecs is clearly visible in the front; my shoulders bulge next to my traps, and my back tapers to a V. Short-cropped blonde hair, steely blue eyes.

As for my facial features, girls would probably call me handsome, but there’s definitely a hard edge to me—mostly because of those eyes. I look… dangerous. That’s the best description I can come up with. Which suits me, in my work.

Still, I’m sometimes troubled when I peer into those eyes of mine, feeling like it’s not me that’s looking back, but rather someone I don’t know anymore. I used to have what some would say was an easy smile, but the streets took that away. I rarely smile these days, and when I do I don’t think it ever touches my eyes.

I finish the rest of my workout. I bump into Alessandra again, and she asks me to confirm that I entered my number correctly in my phone, as if she’s worried I won’t be able to text her. She doesn’t understand that I’ll probably ghost her anyway. This is the third number I’ve gotten this week, and none of the girls really spark too much interest in me. Maybe I’ll text one of them for a booty call at some point, but that’ll be the extent of any relationship with them.

I pass a group of teenage girls waiting at a bus stop. I ignore them. Like Alessandra, I don’t have an eye for any of them. The only girl I want is the one I can’t have.

Angela Amato.

She will be mine someday. I swear it.

One of the teenage girls unexpectedly rushes up to me and shoves a flyer into my hands. Her face reddens when I meet her gaze and she bashfully runs away.

I glance at the flyer. An invitation to a private party of some kind. At an apartment close to the University of Palermo. I crumple the flyer up and shove it into my pocket. I have better things to do than attend some stupid campus party. At least that’s what I tell myself. Maybe it would be good for me. And not just me… the more I think about it, the more I believe that’s precisely what Matteo and Roberto need. A party where they can fuck the brains out of a few university girls and forget about all their problems.

I retrieve the crumpled paper as I get into my car and carefully unfold it.

Why yes, we might just have to go.

* * *

Matteo isin the living room with my other brothers Enrico, Stefano, and Luciano, watching some Italian drama. Rosa, my sister, is also here, sitting next to Luciano. I’d called Roberto earlier and he told me he’d be home after he finished some errands. I also talked to Luciano, who told me that Matteo was doing better than yesterday. I’m not sure I believe him.

I wave at Matteo, tell him I want to talk to him.

He doesn’t come.

My other brothers notice and I nod at them. They vacate the room. Rosa, the last one to leave, turns off the television.

Matteo growls some curse and retrieves the remote to turn it back on. He flops back down, as if getting up took great effort.

I take a seat beside Matteo. “How are you feeling?”

“Good,” Matteo says quickly, without looking at me.

“Have you used again, since yesterday?” I press.

“Why do you care?” he asks.

“Because I’m your brother,” I tell him.

He sighs. “No. I haven’t.”

When he finally looks at me, his pupils seem normal, if haunted. He’s not constantly licking his lips, either.

“Good,” I tell Matteo. “I knew you were stronger than that.”

Matteo arches an eyebrow. “Am I?” He shakes his head and looks away, turning off the television with the remote. “I thought killing a man would be easy. And sure, it was. It’s the aftermath that’s the hard part. I don’t know how you dealt with it… but for me, realizing that the kid—and that’s what he was, a kid, we can lie to ourselves all we want and call him a man, but we know that’s not true—the kid will never get to see another day. I took everything away from him. Just because I was trying to scare him a bit. So he could lose a stupid race for us.

“I wonder if he ever kissed a girl. Ever had sex. Ever traveled. He has parents. Brothers, sisters, who’ll never see him again.” Matteo presses his lips together. “When I close my eyes, I can still see him falling. Still see the shock in his gaze when we let him go. The fear. But most of all, it’s the accusation beneath it all that gets to me. Those accusing eyes, boring into me, reminding me that I’m the one who did this to him. Me, and Roberto.”

I’m at a loss for words. I don’t really know how to comfort him. As I said, I felt no guilt over the man I killed. Maybe there’s something wrong with me. Then again, that man deserved to die, while Santo was an accident.

I have to try, so I say: “It gets easier.”

He looks at me and forces a smile. “I appreciate what you’re trying to do, but I don’t need your sympathy.”

Growing angry, I gaze into his eyes. “It’s not sympathy. You’ve lost your footing, and I’m trying to hold you up so you don’t fall over the cliff. I’m partly to blame, no matter what you believe. If it wasn’t for me, none of this would have happened. I’m the one who chose that jockey and his horse. We could have picked any other, but I chose him. I wanted him to lose. There was no rhyme or reason to it. Just a whim. I wanted to feel powerful, knowing I could choose whoever I wanted.”

Matteo considers my words. Finally he says: “It was my idea to dangle him from a rooftop.”

“And I agreed,” I retort.

He merely stares at me a moment before finally looking away.

“Listen,” I tell Matteo. “There’s this party tonight on the University campus. There will be a ton of girls there. It’s just the pick-me-up you and Roberto need.”

Matteo perks up. “Is Michela going to be there?” he asks hopefully.

“Yes,” I lie. I make a mental note to give Luigi’s daughter a call at some point later. Even if she doesn’t come, with his looks, Matteo will easily find another girl to fuck.

“Sweet!” Matteo says. “I’m in.”

I hope he’s more excited about Michela than whatever drugs might be present at the party.

While he’s getting ready, I call Michela and invite her. She says yes, surprisingly. I call Roberto next and tell him to meet us at the party, as he’s already in Palermo.

“I don’t know,” Roberto says. “I’m kind of tired.”

“Kind of tired,” I mimic in a deeper voice. “Come on, think of all the pussy you’re going to get tonight. We haven’t attended a college fuckfest in a long time. Too long.”

Finally Roberto agrees and I give him the address.

I consider inviting my other brothers, or even Rosa, but I want to concentrate my attention on Matteo and Roberto and make sure they’re having fun.

Matteo joins me downstairs and we head to our private dock in back. The ferry doesn’t operate at this hour, so we’ll have to take our own speedboat. The water isn’t too choppy tonight, so it only takes twenty minutes to traverse the forty-one miles across the sea to Palermo.

I’d already used my favorite app to book a car rental, so after securing the boat in Palermo we walk to the nearby neighborhood where the vehicle awaits. I don’t use the local Uber equivalent, as I don’t intend to get fucked up tonight. Lead by example, is always my motto. And tonight, I’ll be leading by eating a lot of pussy.

I turn up the radio full blast as I tear onto the streets.

* * *

I wakeup in a hospital bed. A heart rate monitor beeps periodically beside me. The cloying scent of antiseptic fills my nostrils. Tubes are taped to my right wrist.

What the fuck?