He thought the returning memories would get better after being with Adalyn, but they hadn’t. She helped soothe them, but they always somehow managed to come back, taking him in the middle of the night.

Staring at the demon behind the desk, it was time Angel moved on. And I’ve come to do exactly that.

“I know he’s alive.”

Lucca’s blue-green eyes glowed. “Who?”

“You know precisely who,” he said, wanting him to cut the shit. “If I know the boogieman, which I think I do, then I know you’ve kept him breathing.”

“What is it you want, Angel?” Lucca asked, not denying anything.

An evil smile appeared on his lips. “I want you to take me to see him.”

* * *

The blindfold was taken off his face after he had been led into an old, damp building at an unknown location. He looked around, seeing a huge, metal sliding door in front of him. He walked up to it and placed his hand on the cold metal. He could feel what he wanted behind the door.

Before he could open it, Lucca warned, “If you so much as think about fucking killing him, everything I did to him … I’ll do to you.”

I don’t doubt it.

Gripping the handle, he slid the heavy door open, and with every inch it moved, light poured into the dark room until it reached the back wall, highlighting the frail body that was curled up in the corner.

Angel stepped into the room, moving toward it, when the bright fluorescent lights were turned on, lighting the space with intensity before the door was slammed shut behind him.

The frail man covered his eyes, protecting them from the bright lights, while he quickly rose up the dingy wall behind him. It looked like he was cowering away from the intruder, but then his eyes finally adjusted, and he blinked several times before he realized who it was, and a maniac laugh escaped his throat.

“Matthias, is that you?”

Looking down at him, Angel noticed every mark that marred his father’s naked, filthy body. Every single one of them hadn’t existed on his pristine pale skin prior to his current situation. If he didn’t know any better, he would have thought twenty years had passed since he had last seen him. That was how much he appeared to have aged.

His eyes travelled from his scarred head down his mangled body, and then to the chain that shackled his ankle to a pipe in the corner.

Angel took another step toward the man who had made twenty-three years of his life a living hell. “Hello, Father.”

Lucifer sat back when he saw Angel move more into the light, his hopeful expression gone. “Oh, it’s you.”

“I’ve always known how to disappoint you, haven’t I?”

“Without fail,” Lucifer hissed.

Walking over, Angel sat down on the filthy ground beside his father, placing his own back against the wall. He got the full view his father would enjoy for the rest of his days.

“Why did you come here? To gloat?”

“Before coming here, I thought you actually might have begged me to release you.” Turning his head, he stared into evil, black eyes. “But I realize now that was stupid.”

“I’m a Luciano. We don’t beg,” Lucifer practically spat.

No, we don’t, Angel agreed.

Sitting in the cold silence, he finally asked the question he couldn’t before. “What is it that makes you hate me so much?”

“All my sons brought something to the table, except you.” Lucifer’s brows came together, trying to find the word. “You’re neutral.”

Confused, he asked, “Neutral?”

“My sons either wanted to be me … or feared me.” Lucifer was proud to say that his lips twisted up with a smile, but then they quickly turned down. “You didn’t have either in you. Therefore, you were worthless to me.”

He knew his father had lied about how a Luciano shouldn’t fear a single thing when all he wanted was to instill fear in not only his men but his own children. The fear Lucifer had craved most was fear of him.

“Matthias, though …” Crazed laughter bounced off the walls. “I remember when I broke him. He snapped so easily. Even like this, I bet I could scare him into releasing me.”

Having heard enough shit spew from Satan’s mouth, Angel got up, the temptation to kill him too strong.

“He needs me! My children need me! The family name will not continue without me because the family’s nothing without me!” The chain around his ankle rattled as he tried to stop Angel from leaving, grabbing the bottom of Angel’s leg to get the metal object he knew he kept there.

Angel stopped him, placing his shoe on his father’s hand.

“You’re wrong, Lucifer.” Using all his weight, he pressed harder, hearing bones begin to snap. “We’re stronger without you, and I’ll do everything in my power to make sure you fucking live long enough to see it.” Releasing his hand, he began to walk away as Lucifer’s fanatic laughter sounded again, echoing repeatedly.

“I did you a disservice, keeping you in that closet for all that time. It made you lazy and complacent. That closet was the only space you deserved, and it’s all you’ll ever deserve.”

Angel reached out, flipping the switch to kill the lights. Darkness enveloped him, his father, and the very room they were in. The only noise to be heard was the softest, quietest rattle of the chains around Lucifer’s chest as it rose and fell.

Closing his eyes, Angel could almost taste the cherry flavoring of the candy he had come to love.

As he listened carefully, the rattling softly grew louder as Lucifer’s breathing picked up speed, rising and falling at a different pace.

“A Luciano fears nothing,” Angel whispered. “Not a train, not a bullet, not a man, not even …”

The rattling grew.

“… the darkness.”

Opening his eyes, he slid open the door, letting light pour into the room for only a few more seconds. Then Angel walked away from what he hoped would be the last time he would ever see that face, a face that scarily resembled his, reminding him every time he looked in the mirror that a monster had created him. A face and body he and his twin brother marred with tattoos, desperate to cover up that very fact. Each tattoo they had inked into their pale skin had made it easier and easier for them to look in the mirror, until they could finally face their reflections without destroying a mirror. It could drive even the strongest man insane when every time you looked at yourself, you didn’t see you but someone else, someone who had abused and tortured you your entire existence.

And out of the two of them … one had.

Angel placed his hand on the door, getting one last good look, with one final thing to say.

“It’s ironic to think you trained me for the exact place you are in now. I would outlast you in there, you know. I lasted twenty-three years in my hell and didn’t break once. That’s why you hate me so fucking much. You just can’t admit it.” Smiling, Angel started to slide the door closed, letting the darkness have him. “Just know, it’s a hell of a lot bigger than the closet you kept me in. Tell me, Lucifer; how long are you going last?”

Slamming the door shut felt therapeutic, freeing, like he had finally closed a book on his life and was ready to start a new one.

“How was it?” Lucca’s haunting voice sounded from behind him.

Angel thought for a moment. “Better than I thought it ever could be.”

“Good.”

Angel turned around, his gray depths staring into the demon’s eyes. “I’m going to need something else from you.”

Lucca stared him down with evil eyes, waiting.

“You don’t get to kill him … till every one of my brothers get to have him.”