PURE HATE

When I was younger, I always saw my older brothers coming home late at night with cuts and bruises across their faces. Of course, newly adopted 10 year old me was unaware of my new adoptive family's relation to the Russian mafia but now I know firsthand that organised fights are a common stress reliever in the underground world.

I remember wanting to be just like them, I mean a split lip and a black eye are kinda badass, no?

I would beg them to teach me to fight, wanting to be tough like my older brothers, and they were more than willing. This resulted in long nights in our training rooms, learning to throw punches and kicks, which lets be real just ended up being them tackling and roughhousing me.

My brothers were very enthusiastic to teach me though, it's something we came to bond and connect over, as well as ultimately the correct way to be bringing me up properly in a mafia household.

Though they taught me to fight from an early age, they always reassured me no one would ever lay a hand on their little sisterwhilst they were still alive.

Never would I have thought my first black eye would be by the hands of my boyfriend.

"You never fucking listen Carlotta!" Emiliano yelled, towering over my shaking form. The impact from his fist to the side of my head made his figure look slightly blurred, a slight ringing sound piercing through my ears.

This fucker did not just hit me.

Pushing myself back to my feet I did my best attempt to look down on him, despite our obvious height difference. "Did you seriously just backhand me?" I chuckled, wiping a thumb across my bloody lip.

"You need to learn your place, Carlotta. You belong with me, to me, I don't want you anywhere near him! You know how he feels about you!" Emiliano retorted, slowly backing me up towards the wall behind me.

"He's my lab partner, Emiliano! We were working on our project, do you seriously think I'm capable of cheating?" I asked, slightly hurt by his implication.

"You were at his house." He seethed leaning down to my face, effectively caging me into the wall with both his hands resting by my head.

"Do you not trust me? I'm your girlfriend, Emiliano. After all the fights I got into with my brothers about dating you, you now question my loyalty?" I respond incredulously, staring into his golden eyes that are swimming with rage.

Rage? Pfft, more like raging toxic masculinity.

He leaned impossibly closer, our noses barely touching, "How am I supposed to trust you when you're whoring around with other boys, hm?"

The shock must've been clear on my face as a glimmer of guilt washed over Emiliano's features, but was just as quickly replaced with his regular glare. Shaking my head slightly, I let out a humorous laugh. This was so unlike Emiliano, he's only ever been loving and caring towards me.

Yes, the boy I was partnered with for our biology project was a notorious flirt, but I would never be unfaithful to my boyfriend, it's possibly one of the worst things you could do.

Emiliano and I met when I was 16 and he was 18 in his last year of high school. My brothers and I were at a race competing against some usual competitors, though Emiliano was a new rival on the racing scene. As my third oldest brother Maxim and I crossed the finish line winning the race, Emiliano's car pulled up next to us, securing his second place victory.

My fourth oldest brother, Levi, ran over to our car screaming his head off and sputtering about all the "fucking sick drifts you did bro!" Such a dork.

As Maxim and Levi did the bro hug-handshake thing that all guys seem to universally know, I looked over to assess the not-so competition Maxim had just beat.

The door to the midnight blue Lamborghini Huracan swung open, and out stepped Emiliano. A 6 foot 3 wall of pure muscle and tattoos. His light brown hair was disheveled and hanging over his forehead and distinctly amber-golden eyes. He wore simple grey sweatpants and black hoodie, looking god-like in the informal attire. The sleeves to his hoodie were pushed up to his elbows, revealing the simple tattoos scattered up both his forearms.

I was openly, and unashamedly, checking him out. That was until he caught my eye looking me up and down and smirking in my direction, turning my cheeks a slight shade pinker. I looked away quickly and back towards my brothers who were thankfully still engrossed in their conversation about the race.

What am I doing? I never blush.

Mentally hyping myself back up again, I confidently turned back to Emiliano and returned his smirk, making his expression falter for a second with what looked like shock at my return of confidence, before he grinned back at me.

Emiliano showed up to the next couple of races, his eyes always seeking mine, until one night he came to talk to me and my brothers. From then on, we saw a lot more of each other in the underground world. There was always a flirtatious relationship between us, one that didn't go unnoticed by my brothers or father resulting in several late night yelling matches about my rights to a relationship.

Being the alpha male mafia bosses they are, they were all "No way in hell are you ever dating anyone" "I'm not letting my princess date some guy!" "You're not getting a boyfriend or girlfriend til you're 90!"

Classic mafia family.

After months of secretly seeing one another, Emiliano and I decided to bite the bullet and tell my brothers and father we were in a relationship. To say it didn't go well was an understatement.

It took 2 months before they'd 'made peace with the idea', which in their books meant not throttle him on sight every time they saw him. Don't get me wrong, to this day they are not okay with us being in a relationship, but fuck that I'm a grown ass woman. If I want to be in a relationship, I'm gonna be in a fucking relationship.

Fuck, my brothers are gonna actually kill Emiliano once they see what he's done to me tonight...

Eh, I'll help 'em hide the body.