Deviant Prince [Romano Brotherhood, #2]

38 | Vivienne

A door behind us opens when we're halfway to the elevator, followed by quick footsteps.

"What happened in there, brother?" Santo, his concern clinging to him sharply. It's almost strange to see such expressive concern; I've become so used to Massimo's cool acceptance of everything, no matter how bloody or horrific. But out of all of them—and despite his surliness—Santo seems to be the one who's bridging the gap between the brothers.

Massimo glances at his watch. "We need to go. The jet—"

"I don't give a fuck. That shit that just happened—that's why you left us?"

"More or less," Massimo says, his hand shifting over my back.

Santo inhales sharply. "You're a stupid fuck for that." The vitriol of his words surprises me, especially with the depth of care present in the way he looks at his brother. "As if there's anything I haven't fucking stood by your side for. Why would this be any different? I would've killed him with you. For you."

He rakes a hand through his hair, a little of the anger deflating from him. "Keep trying to extract yourself from this family, from our brotherhood. It's not fucking possible. The more you pull away from us, fratello, the more creative I will fucking get. I'm done respecting your wishes."

"You can't understand how it's been, and I never asked you to. All I ever asked of you was to let me fulfill my duty to this family," Massimo manages. I don't think he realizes how tightly he's fisting the back of my shirt. "This was my fight. My duty to—"

"You're the only one who believes that," Santo interjects. "Your duty is to let me be your brother."

"I am not quite sure what that means, or what you could possibly be to me that would help with any of this," Massimo says, not harshly. A sharp pause follows, like he's never admitted this out loud before.

It's not necessarily a surprise to see, in this moment, how he views familial relationships. One-dimensional, sucked dry of things that make them so very messy and human. It's a flat, non-reciprocal sense of duty, unable to process the wild existence of love. It's not pride that makes him believe his brothers have nothing of substance to offer him—but what is it? Because, inevitably, whatever it is shapes the way he thinks of me, too.

Santo's eyes flit to me for half a second; there's more he wants to say without me present. "We'll figure it out," he promises instead, a little flatly. "When you get back, and all of this is over. While you're gone, I'll call doctors. I'll find the best—"

Massimo shakes his head. "I've been to doctors. Therapists, healers, all of it. This is the brain Antonio stuck me with." The obstinance in his set jaw says what he really means. This is the brother you're stuck with.

"I'll find better ones. I don't give a fuck what they told you in the past, they were wrong. I'll find better fucking doctors—"

"When Antonio had his final break, you were too young but I remember." Massimo's level tone extinguishes his younger brother's burning determination, turning it to smoke. "I remember the day he ceased being our father. There are ways to manage it, you see, but eventually you just stop caring to pretend. For him, it was a psychosis he never came out of. It will happen to me too, one day soon, and it cannot be stopped. I feel it happening, Santo," he emphasizes, speaking over his brothers attempts to interrupt. "It started months before I left. Perhaps if I had left earlier, things would have been different."

Santo's bearded jaw clenches, and I feel my own chest hollow out. Especially as Massimo's arm falls from me, physical and mental distance widening between us. He didn't want me to know that, to see that he believes everything is so doomed. That we're doomed.