The Convent Orphan Donated My Arsenal, So I Came Back for Blood

In my last life, I single-handedly wiped out a rival gang, winning great honor for the Family. My mother handed me control of her private arsenal, worth hundreds of millions. Before I could even take inventory, the convent orphan my family had adopted quietly changed the codes, and handed the entire shipment to homeless men in slums controlled by our enemies. Staring down my gun, she crossed herself, her face full of pity. "God tells us to love the world, Alessia. Sitting on all those instruments of murder is a sin. I am only atoning for you." I scoffed, but one second before I pulled the trigger, my childhood friend, the Family's top killer, shot the gun from my hand and denounced me as bloodthirsty, cruel, and incapable of empathy. My older brother, the new Don, only sneered and stripped me of my inheritance on the spot. He threw me into the lowest end of the red-light district to wash dishes until the violence had been ground out of me. That same night, addicts from the rival gang cornered me at the end of an alley, stabbed me more than twenty times, then dumped me into the Thames. I opened my eyes, and I was back on the day the orphan girl walked toward the arsenal with my key in her hand. Chapter 1 "Alessia, God teaches us to be generous. The children in the slums are suffering, and you are sitting on enough weapons to end the world. It's obscene." Maria Rossi turned to look at me, her eyes brimming with pity, as if she were the only pure soul left in the world. "Only when I've given every last one of them to the people who need protecting will God forgive this Family for the blood it has spilled." Hearing that voice, my hand shook a little on the grip of my gun. "Ottaviani, put the gun down. You are beyond saving!" The man shielding Maria like a knight was Carlos Ricci, my childhood friend. Carlos looked at me with disappointment and disgust all over his face. "Alessia, enough with the reek of gunpowder you carry everywhere. Maria is trying to save your soul. Can't you see that? "Those weapons will only drag you down to hell. She's turning them into a staircase to heaven. You should be grateful." He turned to her, his voice softening instantly. "Don't be afraid, Maria. You did the right thing. God will look after you for your kindness, and so will I." In my last life, watching this idiot hand enough heavy weaponry to reshape London's underworld to an enemy informant, I nearly lost my mind. I drew my gun, wanting to take back control before the disaster happened. But in that same instant Carlos fired. The bullet grazed the web of my hand and knocked the gun loose. He roared at me, "Alessia! You are a devil?possessed maniac! "You were going to raise a hand to Maria over a pile of killing tools? Of course you were. A cold-blooded monster like you doesn't deserve to stand at my side!" I looked at him, feeling hollowed out. "These are my spoils. I paid for them with my life. What gives her the right to steal what's mine in God's name?" When Maria heard that, the tears came on their own, and she sank to her knees, shaking, and began to pray under her breath, "Lord, forgive her greed... Alessia, if these worldly things matter to you so much, I'll give you my most precious possession to make up for it." She pulled a badly worn wooden cross off her neck and held it out to me, her face full of devotion. "The Mother Superior gave me this herself when I was baptized at the convent. "It stands for eternal salvation. It's worth a million times more than those instruments of death. I'm trading it for your weapons. You should feel honored." I looked at the rotten piece of wood, worth two pounds at most. Then I thought of my arsenal, worth hundreds of millions. The absurdity almost made me laugh. When I didn't take it, Carlos finally snapped and shouted at me, "Alessia, don't be so greedy! "Maria just handed you the anchor of her soul and it still isn't enough for you? Take it right now and kneel to apologize to her!" I looked at the two of them coldly. There was a time Carlos was hurt on a job and I carried him ten miles out of a field of corpses. And now he thought a rotten piece of wood could cancel out everything I had given. I refused to let it end there, so I went to my older brother, Lorenzo Ottaviani, the current Don. Lorenzo sat in the Don's leather chair, neatly clipping the end of a cigar without lifting his eyes. "Alessia, you're too violent. The Family can't go legitimate while you behave like this. "Go wash dishes in the red-light district for three months. See how the poorest people live, and learn what mercy is. That's an order from the Don." I actually believed he was acting for my good and the good of the Family, so I obeyed. It turned out to be where I died. Remembering the pain of the blade going through my stomach in that life, I put the urge to kill away, and while Carlos was comforting Maria, I quietly called my mother, who was on holiday in Sicily. Chapter 2 But it was my father, Richard Ottaviani, who answered. I kept my voice low. "Father, Maria is about to hand the arsenal Mother left me to a Moretti informant, in God's name. Things are unstable right now. If the Moretti Family comes back at us..." On the other end, my father cut me off, his voice thick with displeasure, "Alessia, you always keep score. "Lorenzo told me about it. He brought Maria in to be the public face of the Family's transition. She's backed by a bishop who can help us go legitimate." My knuckles went white around the phone. My father went on lecturing me, "Interpol is watching us. The only way to protect the Family's assets is to clean up our public image. That's what it means to see the big picture. Do you even understand?" So even my father, who had already stepped down, had been talked into Maria's act. I gave a cold laugh and hung up on him. The phone rang again. This time it was my mother. "My darling. Have they been mistreating you?" My mother, Vittoria Ottaviani, was the Family's true iron empress, the woman every mafia family in Europe feared. "I've already sent the plane back for you. That arsenal was my coronation gift to you. Anyone who touches it, I'll send to meet their god." Her words lifted a weight from my chest. I shot Carlos a cold look as he wiped Maria's tears, then turned and drove to the airport. I had barely arrived when Lorenzo called, sounding thoroughly out of patience. "Alessia, where have you run off to? I hear you made Maria cry again today? "Can't you grow up? The Family's White Dove initiative is at a critical stage. We need Maria's saintly image to keep the politicians calm. "Enough. Maria says she's going to the red-light district to do relief work, so you'll go in her place. Wash some of that sin off yourself and stop acting so self-righteous!" Even though I hadn't blown up in front of them this time, the story was repeating itself anyway. "Lorenzo," I laughed softly into the phone, and my voice came out pure ice, "Mom has arranged a different baptism for me. I'll leave the red-light district to your holy Maria." "Alessia! Are you defying the Don? Maria said the East End tempers a person better than anywhere, and she only offered to go there to atone for you. You should be grateful!" At the words “red?light district”, I let out a cold laugh. There it was. The mask was off. In my last life they sent me there, and the Moretti Family came for me that same night. I only learned, as I lay dying, why Lorenzo and Carlos were so fanatically devoted to Maria. Lorenzo was an orphan my mother took in. He had taken the Don's chair, but his claim to it had never been legitimate. Maria had promised to use the Church's influence on his behalf, so that under the cover of going legitimate he could swallow that legal empire worth billions whole, bring my mother and me down, and become the real king of the underworld. And Carlos, the Family's killer, had come to hate living in the shadows. Maria fed him the lie that once she was the Family's heir, she would give Carlos every secret arms route under my control, along with the private force my mother had left me. To feed their petty, grasping ambitions, both men willingly did whatever Maria told them. This time, I left early. I wanted to see how they would deal with the fallout. Before leaving the family estate, I had installed hidden cameras in every corner. Now I sat in an airport lounge, swirling champagne, watching the feed on my tablet. On the screen, my arrogant brother Lorenzo was tenderly cradling Maria's face in both hands. "Don't worry. I've driven that sinner Alessia out. This Family's future belongs to a soul like yours." Maria leaned into him, her smile perfectly pure. "God says everyone deserves a chance to change. I'm willing to carry the Family's burden for her, for now." "Of course. I'm going to announce that you are the Family's true heir." In another room, Maria leaned against Carlos's shoulder, looking heartbreakingly beautiful through her tears. "Carlos, I'm so stupid. I lost Alessia's things and she's going to hate me forever... Lord, punish me." Carlos kissed the tears off her face, his whole expression soft with pity. "Don't be afraid. A witch with that much blood on her hands doesn't deserve any of it. I'll go to the Family council myself and propose that you take over everything she owns. Consider it God's reward." Watching all this, I felt a wave of nausea rise in my stomach. Chapter 3 I switched off the feed, watched my mother's private jet touch down beyond the window, and felt myself grow calm. Carlos called and called. I didn't pick up once. Then came Lorenzo's texts, one after another. "Alessia, sign this transfer of assets immediately and let Maria take over your docks! This is to wash the sin off you!" "How dare you ignore me? This is the will of the Don, not a negotiation!" "Alessia, I order you to answer me right now! Otherwise, you'll answer for this under Family rules!" A mocking smile tugged at my lips as I read the messages. Then I blocked the number. The old wound in my shoulder began to ache. I ignored the sting and traced the scar with my fingertips. That scar came from Moscow three years earlier, when Lorenzo was pinned down by a rival gang. I had taken a bullet clean through the shoulder to get him out. He held me while I bled all over him, his eyes red, and swore to me, "Alessia, as long as I am Don, half the glory of this Family is yours." And now, for one orphan girl, he had stripped me of my inheritance and wanted to send me into the red-light district to be trampled by anyone who felt like it. And Carlos. At sixteen, Carlos was sent to Siberia for training and molded into one of the Family's expendable men. The day he left, I pulled off my own body armor and forced it onto him. I told him, "Carlos, stay alive. Become the sharpest blade in my hand." He knelt in the snow and kissed the back of my hand like a believer. And now that knife had turned around and pointed at my heart, all because Maria said my existence was the Family's sin. Right then, a private email from Maria popped up on the tablet. The attachment was a video. In it, Maria was standing in my bedroom. She was directing the servants to gather up the spoils I had kept for years, the medals that embodied the Family's honor and the rare, discontinued guns I had assembled myself, and throw all of it into the incinerator in the garden. She spoke to the camera, her eyes full of mercy. "Alessia, things this full of violence will poison your soul. "I've burned them all and sent them up to God as smoke. It's a purification ritual I’ve performed for you. No need to thank me." At the end of the video, she dug the only thing my grandmother left me out of my jewelry box. The sapphire ring that stood for the Family's bloodline. On camera, she dropped the ring into a drain as if it disgusted her, then folded her hands in prayer for the camera. "Vanity is a sin too. It's time you purified yourself and atoned." The camera swung around. Carlos and Lorenzo stood beside her, gazing at her with indulgent smiles, as if what she had thrown away were a piece of trash. My fingers tightened around the champagne glass until they blanched. Did it hurt? Of course it did. I had bled for this Family, but in their eyes, none of it mattered. A few hollow prayers from Maria outweighed every drop. They had enjoyed every victory I won for them without a shred of guilt, yet they despised the gunpowder that would never wash off my skin. "Alessia." My mother had just come off the plane, and her eyes were locked on me. "You're hurting?" I took a deep breath and drank the champagne down in one swallow. The cold liquid slid down my throat and tamped down the violence churning inside me. "No, Mother." I lifted my head. "I was only wondering which to do first tonight: break Lorenzo's legs or cut out Maria's lying tongue." My mother sat across from me, a satisfied smile tugging at her lips. "There's my daughter. The Family creed has no place for forgiveness, only settling accounts." Before we got into the car, Carlos's last message came through. "Alessia, this is your last chance. "Come to the Family hall, kneel before Maria and confess your sins. Beg her forgiveness for your arrogance. Maybe I can still keep you alive. Otherwise, by morning, Alessia will no longer exist in London." I laughed at it, powered the phone off, and dropped it in an airport bin. A bodyguard raised a black umbrella over me. In my heels, I walked step by step toward the armored Rolls-Royce waiting at the curb. Did they really think they could shove me into the abyss and enjoy themselves in peace? They had forgotten that I was a devil who had crawled out of that abyss. The car pulled away and headed for the Family hall. There, I would personally take back everything that belonged to me. And while I was at it, I would crush every traitor's spine, inch by inch. Chapter 4 Night pressed against the car windows. I leaned back against the Rolls-Royce's leather seat and ran a fingertip across the tablet screen. On the screen, Lorenzo and Carlos were rushing to convene a meeting of the Family's senior men. Watching Lorenzo hold forth, I felt a mocking smile tug at my lips. On the feed, Lorenzo stood on the raised platform. He looked out over the old men who held the arteries of underground Europe in their hands. "Gentlemen, Interpol's witch hunt has already cost those of us in this room more than three billion euros. "If we keep running Alessia's model of meeting force with force, one of us will be standing in an international court next week." The hall went dead quiet. The faces of the Family's senior men darkened. I raised an eyebrow and gave the driver an order, my voice cold, "Drive faster. How can this grand charade of putting the Family above blood end without its star?" Lorenzo turned and gestured toward Maria, his voice rising. "But Maria is different. Her background can open special offshore channels for the Family. Once Alessia's assets are transferred into the foundation Maria and I control, our business can disappear into the shadows. "That makes our holdings safer, and every man in this room will see his annual distributions rise by at least twenty percent once the security premium is factored in!" The eyes of those old foxes lit up at once, and they started talking among themselves. Beside him, Maria lowered her gaze right on cue, her voice soft and lethally inviting. "Please trust me. I'll do everything in my power to help you." Then Carlos came up to add to it, "You all know what Alessia is like. She's too uncompromising. Her methods are suicide in today's financial wars. For the absolute safety of the Family, I propose sending her to the red-light district. "It isn't only about grinding the violence out of her. It sends the outside world a signal. We have completely abandoned violence and embraced the new order." What Carlos said settled it for the last few senior men who were still hesitating. Watching the feed from the car, I found the whole thing absurd and faintly amusing. "I agree." The senior man in the front row was the first to nod. "For the Family's future, I support sending Alessia to the red-light district." "I agree as well." One by one, the old men on the screen turned against me. I sat back in the car and gave a short, contemptuous laugh. Just as Lorenzo pulled out the agreement and prepared to sign it, my car stopped at the entrance. My bodyguards shoved the doors of the meeting hall open and took over security in seconds. My mother patted my hand, signaling that it was time. I stepped out, linked arms with my mother, and entered the Family hall, my heels striking the floor one measured step at a time. The noise in the hall died instantly. The gang leaders who had been about to applaud saw Vittoria's face and stood up one by one in terror, barely daring to breathe. Her razor-sharp gaze swept the room and stopped on Lorenzo. Her voice was ice. "Lorenzo. Who gave you the nerve to move against the heir I chose? "My own daughter. Since when does an upstart who only just seized his seat get to lecture her? "And you, Carlos. I raised you to be Alessia's knife, not to turn that knife on her. "Don't forget: I made you, and I can cripple you just as easily!" She stopped there and let out a slow ring of smoke. Through the thin haze, her eyes found a new target. Maria was cowering in a corner. The last trace of warmth vanished from Vittoria's gaze, leaving only the disgust she might have shown a piece of garbage. "As for you..." Vittoria walked straight up to Maria and tilted her hypocritical face upward with one finger, a cruel smile curving her lips. "Since you love your god so much, I'll send you to see him. All right?"