Shattered Throne: A Dark Mafia Romance: War of Roses Universe (Mice and Men Book 3), Lana Sky [summer reading list txt] 📗

over and over, gripping the page so tightly a rip appears in the middle. Safiya never witnessed this tension, so brutally spelled out. Wracking my memory, I can’t recall a single fight between them.

For the first time, I’m wary of what else I might discover. The past feels as fragile as a house of cards—and as much as I loathe Donatello, I don’t want everything from those days tainted. Still, I grapple for the next letter…

And a shadow falls over me. At the same time, my nostrils flare with a scent that has become engrained on my subconscious—a potent, lethal musk, fresher than the traces embedded in these pages.

I finally look up, already resigned to what I’ll find—Donatello Vanici himself standing in the doorway. He could be a figment of my imagination if he weren’t so drastically different from the man I remember, the same passionate figure forever immortalized in his own letters.

This man has aged decades in seven years, his hair unkempt, his eyes narrowed to slits. Behind him, the door sways, and I wonder if he threw it open, letting it slam.

If so, I’d been too engrossed in the past to notice. The ink beneath my fingertips seems to prove what I felt in the car—I wasn’t wrong. He wasn’t always like this. An irrational impulse to preserve the evidence has me shoving the box behind me.

But it’s too late. He’s already spotted the haphazard stack of read letters on my lap, and recognition flits across his face. I hate shock on him. It’s brief but jarring, undercutting his rage with a dangerous glimpse of what lurks beneath—pain. Unimaginable in quality, comparable only to a stab wound.

Straight through the heart.

A grunt rips from his chest, and he staggers, his hand grasping for the doorknob. The color drains from his expression, humanizing him for a heartbeat.

Before rage swiftly sets in.

I tense, expecting him to lunge. Instead, his eyes flit up to mine, ice-cold. “Where the hell did you—”

“No!” A tiny voice pierces the thin wall, loud enough to drown out his growl.

“What the hell?” Donatello stiffens, bouncing on the balls of his feet as if torn between lurching at me or investigating the sound.

Then several more shrieks pierce the air. “No! No!”

Alarm washes over me as I recognize that high-pitched cry. Kisa.

“Fuck.” Donatello turns, racing into the hall. I’m already on my feet, following him despite every instinct warning me not to.

As we advance down the hall, a masculine voice rings out. “I have to, honey. Just let me—”

“No! I said no!”

The door to Vin’s old room is already ajar, and inside, Luciano stands over a crying Kisa.

“She took her bandage off,” he explains.

Sure enough, she’s clutching her injured arm to her chest, sitting amid a pile of bloodstained bandages. The fact that she’s still wearing her bloody clothes adds a ghoulish quality to her vacant expression. She’s a broken doll, her dark curls astray, those big blue eyes utterly lifeless.

“I’m trying to help her redo it,” Luciano explains. “But she won’t let me—”

“No!” Kisa screams, coming to life to bat away his attempts, her arms flailing. “You can’t cover it.”

“We need to,” Luciano insists, crouching to her level. He grabs a nearby metal box that has First Aid written across it. “Let me fix it. You might open the stitches—”

“No! No, you can’t! If you cover it up, I’ll get sick and die like Mama! You can’t.”

I take a step toward her—and the color drains from her face. As a gust of warm air grazes the back of my neck, I realize why.

“You’re making a lot of noise for someone who is in danger of getting sick and dying,” a man declares from behind me.

As he stalks forward, I do a double take. The strange dichotomy of the two Donatellos is on display once again. The only change? His voice. Underlying warmth softens the guttural baritone just enough to differentiate from the customary growl he uses with me.

Regardless, Kisa whimpers. My heart flinches at the sight of him towering over her like the monster from a fairy tale. She’s so tiny. Helpless.

I don’t think. I just react, reaching for the hand he extends toward her. His eyes cut to mine, and I freeze. I can’t name what passes between us. Understanding? After days of torment and animosity, the fleeting hint of clarity strikes me to my core. He won’t hurt her.

Do I truly believe that? I don’t have the chance to decide; he’s already crouching down on one knee, much like Luciano had.

“Let me see it.” He extends his hand out to her.

“No.” Her tone wavers, but far softer than the one she took with Luciano. “I’ll die. I’ll get sick and die.”

“You ever been shot?”

Kisa blinks while Luciano curses under his breath. “She’s just a kid—”

“Have you?” Donatello presses, but a softer inflection betrays he isn’t trying to scare her. Yet. “Because I have.”

He tugs aside the collar of his shirt, revealing a wealth of scars marring the tanned flesh. My breathing feathers with recognition. Less than twenty-four hours ago, I felt each one up close, sensing the varying textures beneath my fingertips. Every scrape. Every scratch. Every scar.

Kisa’s eyes widen at the sight of one wound in particular—a silvery circle along his right shoulder.

“You know what saved my life?” Donatello asks, readjusting his collar. Then he reaches for the first aid kit. “Bandages.”

“No,” Kisa whines as he fishes out a clean length of gauze. “Mama hurt her arms, and then she wore bandages, and then she went away!”

My brain takes that statement, translating it from the childish phrasing to a darker reality. Mama hurt her arms. Then she went away. Could she really be alluding to the worst-case scenario?

Luciano winces, his expression pained. “Kisa—”

“I knew someone who hurt her arms too,” Donatello says while arranging various utensils on the floor before him. “She didn’t die because of the bandages. I think your mama had the same sickness, and I can tell you for a fact that