Of Blood and Bone (The Minaldi Legacy #1)(58)
Author: Courtney Cole

“You’ve always thought you were better than me,” he snaps.  “And you never were.  It was all in your head.   And the funny thing is, Mr. So Fucking Holier Than Thou, is that everything else in your head, I put there. I put there.  So where’s your f**king arrogance now?”

My eyes open.

“What do you mean you put things in my head?”

Adrian eyes me.  “Exactly what I said.  I put everything in your head that is there right now.  You’ve been tormented for years… by thoughts that I’ve planted there. By things that I’ve told you that you’ve done.  By things that I’ve made it appear that you’ve done.  But it was always me, Luca.  Always. Me.”

He sees the confusion on my face and laughs.

“You always thought you were so smart,” he snickers.  “You thought you had to tutor poor dumb Adrian so that he didn’t fail Algebra.  Yet poor dumb Adrian was making you think you were a monster, that you were trying to kill innocent things, that you were cursed… and you never were.  You never were, Luca!  Who’s dumb now?”

His words stun me but his maniacal laughter shocks me even more.  Adrian has lost it.

“That can’t be true,” I argue.  “My entire family is cursed.  My father, my grandfather…”

Adrian looks at me patronizingly.  “And who has always worked for your family?  My father?  My grandfather?” He laughs again.  “I have poisoned you and lied to you, Luca.  Just as my father and grandfather before me. And theirs before them.  It was the poison that made you violent. It was the poison that took your memory.  It was me who fed you lies.  Poor, dumb Luca.”

Shock slams into my chest and fury turns my vision red.

“You did this to me?  YOU??”  I roar like an animal but it only causes Adrian to laugh harder.

“Yes, me,” he laughs. “Always me.  And your mother… your poor demented mother?  That was me, as well.  The tea that she just had to have shipped in from Italy like the spoiled bitch that she was?  I drugged it. Your mother would have been right as rain if it weren’t for me.  And the funny thing is that she thought it was you.  She told me once, in a lucid moment, that she thought you were poisoning her.  But it was me all along.”

“Why?” I rasp, still unable to wrap my head around it.  “Why would you do this to me…to my family?”

He looks at me like I’m a fool.

“Because we hate you,” he says simply.  “We f**king hate you.  You ruined us so long ago and your family has used us as servants ever since.  Why the f**k wouldn’t we hate you, Luca?  We’re not f**king servants.  We’re men.  And I’m so much more of a man than you are,” he snaps.  “Do you think you had the balls to kill those girls? Do you really think that?  You’re too much of a pu**y.  You had all the balls in the world to f**k them, to rape them, but you left it like that… you left them alive.  They would have gone straight to the police and reported you and then everything would be over.  You would have been put in prison, away from my reach.  Life in prison would have made your life easier and I couldn’t have that.”

He all but spits the words as he spins on his heel.

“So, I did what you couldn’t because you’re too weak.  And now that you know, I’m sorry, but your battle has come to an end.  Your family will be told that you couldn’t bear to live with your curse any longer.  They’ll believe that, you know.  You’re such a pathetic excuse for a human being.  So f**king weak.   The public will be told that you drowned.  All will be well.”

“Except for me,” I answer bitterly. “And for those girls.  You killed them.  It was you…all along.”

He smiles down at me.

“It wasn’t only me.  You were there, Luca.  I may have killed them, but you raped them.  And then, of course, I raped them, too.  It would have been wasteful not to, don’t you think?”

I feel nauseous at his words.  “I can’t believe this,” I mutter.  “I raped them because you drugged me.  I trusted you.  You were supposed to be my closest friend.”

Adrian smiles sardonically in a way that I’ve never seen him smile before.  It is in this moment that I realize that I never really knew him at all. He’s insane.

“Oh, you can trust me when I say this:  I will put you out of your misery, friend.”

Adrian starts to walk up the steps when I hear something loud.

Chopper blades.

Adrian freezes.

Lights are flashing all around us and then I hear a loud-speaker.

“Luca Minaldi, if you are on board, come out where we can see you.”

I’ve never been more relieved in my life.

That is, until Adrian returns with a large knife in his hand.  He cuts my ropes and yanks me to my feet, sticking the knife against my spine.

“Go,” he says.  “Don’t try anything or this knife gets buried in your back.  Don’t doubt it.”

“I don’t,” I say calmly, walking slowly up the steps.

We step on deck and there are helicopters circling low and boats surrounding us.

“Luca Minaldi?  Are you alright?” the loud speaker calls out.

I shake my head no.

“Adrian Leopoldo!  Step away from Mr. Minaldi.  Be advised that there are rifles trained on you at this moment.”

“Fucking son of a bitch,” Adrian mutters. “You’re a f**king son of a bitch, Minaldi.  You always think you will come out ahead.  But not this time.”

Before I can think, breathe or move, he has yanked me overboard with him.  On the way over, his knife sinks into my shoulder but I don’t even feel it.

The water is choppy because of an impending storm and I fight to get back to the surface.  I choke in water as the waves roll over my head and I am washed under again, slammed into the side of the boat.  I grapple with a line that I feel there, and pull myself to the surface, clinging to the boat.  When I push my head above water, I don’t see Adrian anywhere.

I hold fast to the side of the boat with one arm, the uninjured one, until help arrives.  I’m hauled back on board and friendly faces surround me, wrapping a blanket around my shoulders while a medic examines my shoulder.