To Play The Devil’s Game

Luciana Fifteen years ago. Angry voices filtered into her darkened room. She didn't know why they were fighting again but she was scared. She tried to blur out the voice with her hands against her ears but it was not good enough. The anger still filtered in. Her mother was screaming and her father was screaming back. She wished for a time when they both agreed and loved themselves and loved her. But even then, even as a child, she could notice the changes in the air. Tension was latent in the atmosphere of the Andreas mansion. Everyday felt like she was walking on a thin wire and soon, the wire would decimate into nothingness. She flinched as she heard the doors bang. No matter how strongly she wanted to pretend, she knew that things may never go back to the way they used to be. She knew that her family was fractured and nothing, absolutely nothing could fix it. She wanted to go out of her room. But she wondered if she would be punished because she was meant to be sleeping. She wondered which parent was waiting for her at the other side of the door. She closed her eyes and tightly begged for sleep to whisk her away. Into a land of peace, of gentleness. While other girls longed for unicorns and rainbows, she wished that her home was not a heated battle between her family and the enemy. Families were not supposed to fight with each other. Families were supposed to fight the enemy together and if a family began to fight, an enemy was the cause of it. She had heard father say those words over again and she wondered what enemy caused her parents to fight. The door to her room gently swung open and the light from the corridor poured in like waves; its glow urged her lids to open but she fought it. Footsteps echoed in and curiosity gnawed at her inside but she fought it. She pretended to be asleep because she thought if she pretended hard enough, she could pretend the tension was gone. A weight pressed on the side of her bed and a rough, huge palm caressed her face as the fingers tucked wisps of obsidian black hair behind her ears. “I know you are not sleeping, Mija,” her father's voice was soft whenever he spoke to her but tonight, there was a heaviness in it and she felt it. She opened her eyes and her father's lips curved into a smile. But even in the somewhat dark room, she could see the lines of worry, of pain and heartache. She could see that her father was hurting and that he was also trying to mask it. She could see his emotions filter into the lines of his eyes. She wondered what enemy was powerful enough to do something like that. She wanted to make them pay. “Family is not supposed to fight family, papa,” her voice was tender, innocent. “Family is only supposed to fight the enemy.” Her father cupped the side of her face. To everyone else, he was Diablo - brutal, cruel and unforgiving- but to her he was her angel, her light, her guardian. “An enemy has entered into our family, Mija,” his words carried a weight; an invisible weight that demanded to be carried. “But all would be well, do not worry.” She wished she believed him. She knew something was broken in him. Something she did not know or recognise but felt. It was evident in the way his eyes dulled. In the way his voice fought to falter. “Where is mama?” she asked. She tried to not do so but she could not fight the curiosity that gnawed at her, a longing to know that clawed her from the inside out. Her father pulled her into his chest as he breathed deeply. Part of her wondered if he was trying to make her not see his tears but the sound of his heart revealed what he tried to hide. Her mother was gone and her family, her home, her haven was not fractured. It was broken. Present Luciana walked into a club - a club she owned or to put more succinctly, acquired. The music blasted from the speakers and into her eardrums. She meandered her way through the sweaty and colliding bodies that swayed to the rhythm of the music. She made her way to the bar and ordered tequila. She winced as she downed the liquid in one go, acknowledging the burning sensation at the back of her throat but it did not stop her from ordering another one to which she drank in swoop again. A hazel eyed man walked up to her and gained her attention by ordering another drink on her behalf to which she did not decline. “I'm Derek, what's your name again?” “I never told you.” She replied flatly. Derek looked stunned at her bluntness before he masked it quickly. She was popular in these parts and that meant that everyone knew to stare clear from her radar but this man - this Derek was an obvious new blood in town. “Let's do this again. I'm Derek, you are?” “Diabla,” Luciana said as she drank the harsh liquid this time, unable to ignore the burn. Diabla was the name everyone called her. It was a fitting name. No one has ever tested her patience and lived to tell about it. She was no longer a sweet innocent girl. She was the daughter of the mafia boss but now; now she had become the mafia boss. Luciana Andreas. El Diabla. Derek smiled. She knew he was already terrified by her. She had been with enough men to know when her presence intimidated them. But she wanted them to cower at her presence especially whenever she embarked on these ‘one night stands’ she never showed a fraction of weakness. Each time she introduces herself as 'Diabla' she sets the tone. She immediately asserts her dominance. No man would ever make her feel small. Not after she had proved herself meant the time came to lead the mafia. She knew the things she had to do, the fire she had to do. The stains on her soul she had to bear. She would never show weakness to men. Never. “So what brings-” “Look, I know you want to f**k me and I want to f**k you too so let's just cut to chase and get a room, shall we? ” She spat bluntly. He smiled at her boldness and she rolled her eyes at his stupidity. They both made their way out of the club. She took him in her car and drove to a hotel. She never trusted her hookups enough to show them her home. She had many enemies and she had to be careful and beside no sensible person would bring a hookup to their home. Luciana and Derek made their way to the room assigned to them and the moment they entered and shut the door, she ripped his shirt and undoes his trousers. He was hard as a rock. She took all of him in her mouth. He groaned softly as he tried to touch her head but she smacked his hand away. She pushed him to the bed and seductively took off her gown. “If you are not good I will walk out that door with your clothes and there is nothing you can do to stop me. You don't touch me unless I want you to. You are not the dominant one here, I am.” He nodded to her terms. She undressed him completely and allowed him to plant himself in her, fulfilling her most dirtiest of desires. Luciana left the hotel before morning's light. The hook up was good but she had other pressing matters to deal with. Like finally confronting the man that had been selling information to the Fontanas. She hated that name. She hated them. To her they were the enemy that tore her family apart. They stole her mother, made her abandon her and her father. Her father was never the same after that. The man she had always looked up to turned into a shadow before her very eyes and she was too powerless to stop it. And now someone was selling information to them. The things she would do to him. She would make him regret his life choices and then she would put a bullet in his head. The Fontanas were a sin. An unforgivable sin and its punishment was death and nothing would come in the way of the punishment that awaited that man. She didn't know he was yet but she knew his name and he was in her dungeon. A part of her wanted to go to him the moment she got home but for what she had planned, she needed every bit of her strength. And by the time she was finished every member would know if they so much as thought of betraying her with the Fontanas then they were automatically willing to pay the price.