Chapter 20: I Love You

I let Damian know about Hannah's message and we met up outside her studio.

William insisted on coming, and wouldn't take no for an answer. So, when the boys saw him, they naturally pulled out their guns to shoot him.

He held up his hands, while I tried to convince them (and myself) that William was going to help me help them, and that he was a valuable asset to the cause.

"How do we know we can trust him?" Damian asked. I could see he was agonizing about why Hannah could possibly want us all there, but his grip was steady on his gun as it pointed to a point right between my brother's eyes.

"I just want things to finally be set right, and that justice would come for those that deserve it," William said. "I've been quiet for too long."

"You've been a coward for too long, Prince Charming," Danté said with a scoff. He closed the distance between him and William and pressed the nozzle of his gun under his chin.

"You let things happen. You could have stopped your father--" Danté pressed the gun deeper into his skin-- "but you stood by, watching him burn those innocent girls."

I couldn't believe what I was hearing. Father burned innocent girls? What story was Danté spinning this time?

But it wasn't a story.

Danté's eyes bore the purest fury and pain that I have ever seen in him. They didn't have that playful spark in them. He wasn't smiling cunningly. He wasn't making jokes.

And the look of utter agonizing guilt William had was the nail in my coffin.

It was true. My father might be a completely different person than I thought I knew.

"I know. And I have no excuse." Will's held Danté's with an intense sincerity. "Let me help you, and you can have my life."

"William--!" I cried.

"Fine, then," Danté sneered. "you can help your sister."

Danté released him, and the other two put their guns away as well.

"We should head in now, guys. Hannah might be in trouble," Nick said.

I nodded and led the way inside.

The door was open, as always.

But Hannah wasn't standing in front of her painting of Damian, which I realize now, isn't Damian but his brother, Luke.

She was tied to a chair near a bunch of empty canvases and unopened art supplies, her face red and wet, and sneered with mascara.

Her eyes jolted to me as soon as I stepped inside, hand on the hilt of my gun. They widened in horror.

"No, Venus, don't come in! It's a trap--!"

"Well, well, well. What do we have here?" Jace came out from behind the life-sized blank canvases.

My ears rung. My mind was as blank as those canvases.

Danté, Nick and Damian drew their guns.

"Jace?" William emphasized his name in a way that made it clear that he was as flabbergasted as I was. "What are you doing?"

Jace was dressed casually, wearing a red hoody, jeans, and red Converse. His Converse made dull boom sounds as he dug his heals into the wooden floors, and screeched when he turned to put a gun against Hannah's head.

She whimpered when the cold metal made contact with her skull.

"I have you all now," Jace's freckles were covered by a cruel smirk. "And I have a whole team ready outside, so don't even think about escaping."

"Is that a challenge?" Danté shot back.

Damian stepped towards Hannah, making Jace press the gun so hard into the side of Hannah's head, she had to bend her neck. "Ah-ah-aah~ One wrong move and I put a bullet through her head."

Damian froze.

I couldn't believe the person I was seeing in front of me. He was my brother. He was always joking around, always making me smile. We were closer than I was with Will.

But I didn't know the person standing in front of me. This was a completely different person. A person that was prepared to kill his little sister's best friend to get what he wanted.

It wasn't Hannah who was using Jace. He was the one that used Hannah to get what he wanted - to lure out The Inferno. And to see if I worked as a double agent for them. And now Will also looked like he was betraying the police.

"How long have you been planning this?" I finally croaked.

"Everything just seemed so suspicious when you were abducted by The Inferno. The way William described you - wearing an oversized leather jacket... And Hannah--" he jerked her head with his gun-- "She seemed too relaxed to be worrying about you, when I told her what happened.

And that painting--" Jace pointed at the painting of nude Luke-- "I saw it as soon as I walked in. The tattoo."

In the painting, Luke had a tattoo of a burning butterfly under his left ear.

"I did some research about it and it all became clear.

You never wanted to be a cop, Vee. And you were angry at Father - furious - for taking your life away," Jace said, like he was talking about a character in a book rather than his own little sister.

"No," I breathed.

"And you decided that you'll do the one thing that will piss him off the most. Work for the enemy. And that explains why you were so obsessed with the mafia." Jace shook his head, and laughed to himself.

"There's more to this than you know, brother. And you are gravely mistaken," William said with his palms facing Jace's shoes.

"Now, you are a surprise," Jace said to William. "I didn't think you were f*cking the enemy. You were always the golden boy, the favorite. You're the apple of Dad's eye."

William's jaw tensed.

"But it seems that looks can be deceiving. Like how Hannah looked like the perfect best friend to my sister, but were childhood friends with the mafia all along."

Danté rolled his eyes, like this situation was one big drag to him.

It wasn't a drag to me. My whole world was shattering, and the pieces were slipping through my fingers and cutting my skin.

"Jace, it doesn't have to be this way." I said through a swollen throat. "If you just give us a chance to explain--"

"You are under arrest for the violation of the law, for colluding with the mafia and conspiring against the Chief of Police," Jace exclaimed, his free hand going for his cellphone in the back pocket of his jeans. He was going to summon the backup he brought.

"Jace, please," I begged.

"This won't make Father more proud of you!" William cried.

"You have the right to remain silent. Everything can and will be used--"

Before he could finish what he was saying I was suddenly grabbed from behind and put in a choke hold with cold hard steel against my head.

I blinked.

Nick's eyes were saucers, "Damian, no!"

Danté's pierced eyebrow twitched.

William was gaping.

"Let go of Hannah or I blow your sister's brains out," Damian's voice said from above my head.

Jace's eyebrows lifted slightly.

He dropped his phone, and it clattered on the polished wooden floor, and I could feel the vibrations through my feet.

He pulled out another, smaller gun from his hoody's front pocket, and pointed it towards me and Damian.

"You think I'd care if you shot her?" Jace said with a laugh.

It felt like Jace had just shot me in the chest.

Nick's gun was wavering between Jace and Damian.

"Jace, how could you say that? She grew up in front of us... We changed her diapers for Christ's sake," William stepped closer to Jace. "She used to draw you pictures of comic book characters, and sing you songs."

Jace's eyes grew red.

"She skipped her most important piano recital to watch your basketball game," Will's voice broke.

I could feel tears pour down my cheeks, as I saw all those memories play before me.

"When you fell off your motorcycle in high school, who cried more about you being hurt than Vee?" Will kept bringing up memories that I didn't realize he even witnessed.

"Shut UP!" Jace yelled. Hannah flinched, and I gripped Damian's arm around my neck tighter.

I couldn't speak besides the weak attempt I made at saying Jace's name.

"You know as well as I do that she isn't one of us. She never was," Jace said through gritted teeth.

"Don't you dare--" William yelled.

"And she never will be," Jace clicked the gun that pointed towards me. "And Dad won't miss her if she's gone."

He never loved me. My brother never loved me. When he smiled at me, laughed with me... He was lying. All this time he pretended to care.

Jace looked me dead in the eye, and pulled the trigger with a bang that scared me out of my skin.

But the bullet never hit me.

In front of me was the back of my eldest brother, William.

"Will!" I screamed.

Damian was stunned, and let me go when I struggled out if his grasp.

William fell to his knees, and before he fell to the ground, I caught him.

Jace stared at his brother and sister, sitting on the floor in a pool of blood - horrified that he shot the wrong sibling.

Hannah was screaming and wailing and struggling in her bindings. Her chair rocked so much it nearly toppled over.

"Will! Stay with me--" I looked at Nick who stood frozen, his gun long abandoned as the hand gripping it hung by his side "--Get help! Please call an ambulance!"

He looked mortified, but didn't reach for his phone.

A warm,wet hand gripped mine, and I glanced down at my brother. "It's no use," he gasped. "I won't...survive this."

"No, you will survive, William. Will, please you can't leave me," I sobbed and placed his bloodied hand on my cheek, leaning into it. "You're all I have."

William coughed up blood and my chest tightened. "You'll be fine, little sis. You're stonger than you know. You're going to set things right."

"Haah, Will... Please, someone get a doctor," I muttered though tears and snot and pain worse than anything I've ever known. I could barely breathe.

"Princess, I'm sorry, but he's not gonna make it," I heard Danté say in a tone that didn't suit him. A warm, soft tone. I couldn't look at him because I couldn't look away from my dying brother.

My uniform was soaked in his blood.

I could see the life draining from his hazel eyes, and I realized that I would never see them sparkle again.

I would never see him laugh at cheesy comedy shows. I would never see him through the window of Father's manor, throwing a Frisbee at our mother's pomeranian. I would never hear heavy metal music blaring through his bedroom door.

I would never hear him lecture me, or tell me that it's okay not to do what father wanted me to.

I would never be woken up from my nightmares with a brotherly hug, telling me everything was going to be okay.

"Vee, I have to...tell you something," William coughed again, a serious expression covered his face with the last bit of strength he could muster, "You can't trust Father."

"Oh, Will, don't talk you'll only--"

"He's not the man you think he is. He--" Will coughed and wheezed-- "He wants power. He wants to control the city. He doesn't care who he hurts or kills in the process. Even famil...."

William was losing strength. And I was gripping onto him as if I could give him the life running through my veins.

"Will, please don't leave me," I whispered.

"....trust no one....." William managed through the blood.

".....except...those....that...." Will gurgled.

"William!"

"....put you....first...."

He gave me a final weak smile before he slumped in my arms.

He's gone.

I held him in my arms and rocked back and forth, sobbing silently into his hair.

"I love you," I whispered.