A Deal With The Devil

CHAPTER SIX: THE KITCHEN

ELENA'S POV

By the time I made it back to my room, my stomach had stopped growling and started aching, a hollow, insistent pain that no amount of pacing could distract from. I sat on the edge of the bed and counted the hours since I'd last eaten. Almost twenty. I had been so consumed by fear on the drive here, and then so consumed by the sheer strangeness of everything since, that food hadn't even registered as a need until my body forced the issue.

No one had brought me a tray. No one had knocked to ask if I wanted one. I was beginning to understand that in this house, comfort was not offered. It had to be found, or fought for, or gone without.

I am not going to sit here and starve out of politeness.

The decision settled something in me, a small flicker of my old self pushing through the fog. I stood, smoothed down my shirt like it mattered, and let myself back out into the hallway.

I had no idea where the kitchen was. I only knew it existed somewhere in this maze of marble and money, and that the twins from yesterday, Nina and Catalina, had come from somewhere near it. I followed my nose more than any actual logic, trailing faint smells of garlic and butter through corridor after corridor until I finally pushed open a swinging door and found myself standing in a warm, chaotic, blessedly ordinary kitchen.

Catalina looked up first, wooden spoon frozen mid-stir. "Well, look who finally escaped the tower."

"I wasn't sure I was allowed in here," I admitted, hovering awkwardly in the doorway.

"Allowed," Nina repeated, like the word offended her personally. She was chopping something with more violence than the vegetable strictly required. "Are you hungry or are you just here to admire our knife skills?"

"Hungry," I said. "Starving, actually."

"Sit," Catalina ordered, already pulling a stool out from the counter. "Zia Pina isn't here to tell us not to feed strays, so we're feeding this one."

I sat. It felt like the first fully voluntary thing I'd done in two days.

Catalina set a plate in front of me before I'd even finished getting comfortable, some kind of pasta dish that smelled like heaven and looked like it belonged in a restaurant rather than a home kitchen. I ate faster than was polite. Neither of them commented on it.

"So," Nina said, sliding onto the stool across from me, chin propped on her hand. "You're the new one everyone's whispering about."

My fork stopped halfway to my mouth. "People are whispering about me?"

"Sweetheart, you got pulled out of the servants' quarters after one night and put back in the main house. Of course people are whispering." Catalina said it cheerfully, like this was simply how the world worked. "Usually that only happens for family. Or trouble."

"I'm not family," I said carefully.

"Then you're trouble." Nina grinned, and it wasn't unkind, just curious. "Good trouble or bad trouble, we haven't decided yet."

I didn't know how to answer that, so I focused on my plate instead. The silence didn't last long. Nothing seemed to, around these two.

"Don't mind her," Catalina said, elbowing her sister. "Nina interrogates everyone. She did it to the new gardener last month too. Poor man looked ready to quit on the spot."

"He handled it fine," Nina said. "Better than you did, swooning over the guard before he'd even learned everyone's names."

Catalina's cheeks went instantly pink. "I do not swoon."

"You absolutely swoon. It's disgusting. It's also very entertaining, so please continue to shamelessly indulge yourself."

I found myself smiling before I'd decided to, a real one, small but unmistakable. It felt strange on my face, like a muscle I'd forgotten I had.

"There it is again," Nina said, pointing her chopping knife at me with theatrical triumph. "She's smiling. We're wearing her down."

"Give her time," Catalina said, refilling my water glass without being asked. "She's had a rough couple of days."

I looked between them, these two strangers who had no reason to be kind to me and were anyway, and felt something loosen slightly in my chest. It wasn't safety. I didn't think I'd feel safe here for a long time, if ever. But it was something adjacent to it. A place where I could sit and eat and be teased and not have to brace for the next blow.

"Thank you," I said quietly. "For this. For not treating me like I'm contagious."

Catalina's expression softened, the teasing dropping away for just a moment. "You're not contagious, Elena. You're just new. Everyone here was new once."

Nina didn't say anything, but she pushed the bread basket closer to me without a word, which somehow felt like the loudest kindness of the two.

I stayed in that kitchen far longer than I meant to, long enough that the light outside shifted from morning to early afternoon, long enough that my plate was cleared twice and refilled twice more. For the first time since signing that contract, I let myself forget, just for an hour, exactly whose house I was sitting in.

Loud footsteps suddenly echoed down the hallway. A shadow rushed past the entrance to the kitchen but I could already tell who it was by the scent—unmistakeable mix of sweet wood and fresh, crisp apple flooding the air.

Luca De Santis charged out of the house, the loud thud of his footsteps startling everyone in the kitchen. He swiftly tucked a gun in the waistband of his pants, his jacket concealing the weapon. My fingers instinctively tightened on the fork. The footsteps faded and I let out a breath I didn’t know I was holding.

“Yikes! Looks like Don is pissed today,” Nina said with a grimace. “We better leave the kitchen before he gets back even though he would probably only return after midnight.”

“But it’s only seven-thirty,” I couldn’t help but say.

“We know. But better safe than sorry. We do not want to get on his bad side.” Catalina said, squeezing her face like she just tasted a lemon.

“Fine. Then I’ll help you clean up while you tell me about the Don. I need to know who’s roof I’m living under now.” I proposed, desperate to know even the tiniest bit of information about this enigma of a man.

Nina and Catalina shared a look like this was a question they’d rather not answer.

“What?” I asked.

Catalina sighed, picking up the empty plates. “Where do we even begin?”

“The beginning would be nice.”

Nina laughed under her breath. “You really don’t know anything about him, do you?”

“I do but not much. All I know is that he runs the place.”

“That might actually be a good thing. The lesser you know, the better.”

“Nina,” her sister said in a chastising tone.

“What? It’s true.”

Catalina shot her a warning look before turning back to me. “Luca De Santis is the head of this house. Everyone here answers to him in one way or another.”

“The head of the house?” Nina asked with a raised eyebrow.

“The Don,” Catalina corrected herself.

I nodded slowly. “I know what a Don is.”

“Do you?”

I frowned. “I’m not stupid.”

“I didn’t say you were.” She grinned. “I’m just saying there’s a difference between knowing what a Don is and understanding what it means to live under one.”

I didn’t have an answer for that.

Catalina rinsed one of the plates and handed it to me.

“Start with something useful,” I said. “Like… is he always like that?”

“Like what?”

“Angry? Grumpy? Never smiling?”

Both sisters laughed.

“He wasn’t angry,” Catalina said.

“Could’ve fooled me,” I shrugged.

“He always looks like that.”

I stared at her. “Seriously? No twitch on his face? Not even a tiny muscle twitch?”

“Seriously. Nothing at all.”

Nina leaned closer, lowering her voice as though she were about to tell me a state secret.

“That’s just his face. He probably doesn’t want to get wrinkles.”

A laugh escaped me before I could stop it. I covered my mouth.

Nina pointed at me triumphantly. “There. Again.”

“Stop counting my smiles!” I said in a loud voice but there was no bite to it.

“I’ll stop when you stop making them so rare.”

Catalina shook her head, but she was smiling too.

“What happens if someone makes him angry?”

The kitchen went quiet.

That was the first time since I’d met them that either sister seemed unsure of what to say.

Nina placed her knife on the cutting board. “It… depends.”

“On what?”

“Who made him angry.”

“And what they did,” Catalina added.

I swallowed.

“Has anyone ever…”

I hesitated.

“Has anyone ever crossed him?”

Nina’s expression changed. “You don’t want to ask questions like that.”

“Why?”

“Because once you know the answers, you can’t unknow them.” The words settled heavily between us.

I looked down at the sink.

For the first time since entering the kitchen, the warmth around me seemed to dissipate slightly.

“What exactly does he do?”

Catalina glanced toward the doorway before answering. “He runs everything.”

“Everything means?”

“Well not literally everything,” Nina said. “But close enough. I don’t know how to explain it.”

She lowered her voice.

“There are different people beneath him. Men who handle different parts of the business. Some deal with money. Some handle territory. Some oversee the soldiers.”

“Soldiers?”

“You know what I mean.”

Unfortunately, I did.

My fingers tightened around the plate.

“So there are a lot of people working for him?”

“A lot.”

“How many?”

Nina smiled faintly. “Enough that you shouldn’t worry about counting them.”

That wasn’t particularly reassuring. “And everyone answers to Luca?”

“Yes. But not directly,” Catalina said. “That’s not how it works.”

She dried her hands and leaned against the counter.

“There are people between him and everyone else. Men he trusts to carry out his orders.”

“Like the man who was with him yesterday?”

“Vittorio?” She asked and I nodded skeptically. I wasn’t sure that was his name but I wasn’t planning on delaying new information because I was confused. I’ll probably think about it in the shower later.

“He’s different,” Catalina said.

“How?” I countered curiously.

“Vittorio is the consigliere,” Nina said. The word sounded foreign on my tongue.

“What’s that?”

“He’s Luca’s right hand.”

“So second-in-command?”

“Not exactly.”

Catalina shook her head. “It’s more complicated than that.”

“Everything about this place is complicated,” I could already feel the headache blooming in the back of my head.

“Now you’re learning.”

I leaned against the counter. “And the man who brought me here?”

“Marco?”

“Yes. I think that’s the one.”

“He’s one of Luca’s men.”

“I hope that you realize that tells me absolutely nothing.”

Nina laughed. “You’re going to be trouble.”

“I’ve been told that already.”

“Good. At least you’re learning quickly.”

I smiled despite myself. Then I remembered something.

“Wait.”

They both looked at me.

“If Luca is the Don… does that mean this entire house belongs to him?”

Catalina nodded.

“Yes.”

My stomach tightened. I mean I already guessed it but I didn’t expect to be this uncertain and uncomfortable by the confirmation.

I looked toward the hallway where he’d disappeared only minutes ago.

“That’s terrifying,” I whispered.

Nina gave me a sympathetic look. “It should be.”

“But you’ll get used to it!” Catalina chimed in.

I turned to her. “So you’re not afraid of him?”

She considered the question.

“I am.” Catalina nodded. “Everyone is.”

“Then why are you so casual?”

Nina shrugged. “Because being terrified of someone doesn’t mean you have to be miserable every second you’re around them.”

I stared at her. That was perhaps the strangest thing anyone had said to me since I arrived.

Catalina nudged me gently with her elbow. “You’ll figure it out.”

“Figure what out?”

“How to live here.”

I wasn’t sure I believed her.

“Oh and do not worry. Don will not hurt you if you’re not a threat. We’re all a family here.”

“Family? Where did that come from? Was it inspired by lines from some cheesy soap opera?”

“No,” Catalina laughed a little. “The House of De Santis was founded in the seventeenth century. It’s one of the biggest mafias in Europe. It runs on one core believe: family is determined by loyalty rather than by blood alone. Why does it feel like a history class now?” She joked and everyone laughed. Just then, footsteps echoed in the hallway again, approaching the kitchen.

Zia Pina entered the kitchen, face stoic and grim. Her face went to us—particularly me—and her eye twitched so subtly that I almost missed it.

“You,” she said, pointing at me and I straightened my posture instinctively. “Have you eaten?”

I nodded.

“Your room. Now!”

I walked—more like speed walked—out of the kitchen.

Her voice echoed faintly and I heard her warning the twins, not subtly—stay away from her. She is trouble.