Chapter 1 - The Neighbor

•MIA•

"UGHH!" I groaned while picking up the weights.

"Keep going, mi Hija." My father encouraged me. "You can do it."

I hadn’t been always fond of training. I didn’t hate it, but I did not like it. However, I had to do it. You see, when you are part of a mafia family, you had to take care of yourself and protect yourself when no one was around. You will have a lot of enemies no matter where you go.

Therefore, to my father, training was very important. At the age of 7, my father started teaching me self-defense. At the age of 12, I learned how to throw knives, and I am amazing at it might I add. My first kill was when I was 15, which was 2 years ago, and that was by accident.

Well...not exactly. I wanted to do it. Don't attack me, when you see your mother being sexually harassed and a man was about to do something, you will immediately act on it, so I did. I killed him with the special knife my grandfather gave me.

My father was furious because he wasn't there with us and he blamed himself for what happened to my mother and me. He didn't want me to be a killer that soon, but I felt fine. I was in shock the first couple of days, but then I accepted what I did and I don't regret it.

Anyways, the same year I killed that man, we moved to a small town Northwest of Illinois called Galena. My father wanted me to live a normal life away from all the enemies back in New York. We didn't move because I killed a man, but he and my mother were thinking about it a long time ago.

This town was very small and its people were friendly. I managed to get my awkward, introverted ass self two friends. Not that being an introvert is a bad thing, I loved it. But my father insisted I have normal friends who know nothing about it. Believe it or not, at first, I didn't care about them, I wanted them only for the sake of my father, but later, I couldn’t live without them.

"5 minutes more!" My father encouraged me again.

"Dad, I can't." I breathed heavily.

"You can." He replied sternly.

"What will I gain from this?" I rolled my eyes playfully.

"You get to shoot one bullet." He smirked knowing that I would not only stay 5 minutes more but 10 minutes if it meant I would use a gun.

I did everything mafia members do, but not use guns. My parents forbade me from holding a gun or even training with it. It was mostly my mother that didn’t allow it, but my father was a little bit lenient.

But I had always wanted to train with guns. I wanted to be like my father, badass.

"Fine," I smirked and continued lifting the weights harder. I would do anything to hold a gun and shoot, even if one bullet only.

I didn’t know where did I get the love of guns from since my parents are more into knives. Maybe from...

"Okay! Good job!" My father finally said. "Take the rest of the day off."

"When will you let me shoot that bullet?" I asked excitedly.

"Don't worry, a promise is a promise, and you know I always keep mine." He assured me. "I will take you to the warehouse tonight and you can shoot there." He grinned causing me to jump on him and give him a tight hug.

"Thank you, dad!" I giggled.

"Not a word to your mother." He said playfully.

"Don't worry." I winked and left the basement.

Walking towards my room, I passed by my brother's. Alexio was my young brother, who was a pain in the ass. He is 7 years old, but don't let his age fool you. He was the smartest, most selfish, arrogant, and genius kid out there. He always won arguments and made us feel so...so stupid.

Not that we aren't.

But despite that, I loved him so much. He was my brother after all.

"Hey, kid! do you want to come with me to the ice cream store?" I asked casually.

"What do you want?" He fired back.

"What? What 'what do I want?" I frowned.

"Spit. it. out, sister."

Fuck.

"Fine!," I gave in with a huff, "I need you to solve my math homework, like always." I rolled my eyes.

Did I forget to mention that I was terrible at math?

What? I hated it.

"No." He replied.

"No? Why? I am going to fail!" I yelled.

"Yeah...that's why I am not solving it." He smirked.

"You want to see me fail?" I gasped dramatically. "But, I am your sister!"

"Oh, now you are my sister?" He raised his brow. "Where were you yesterday when I asked you to take me to Kyle's house?"

Kyle was his friend from school.

"I was busy!"

"Busy with sitting on the bed and doing nothing?"

"UGH! Fine. Just so you know, I will NOT fail!" I yelled and closed my bedroom door with a thud.

What should I do now? I thought.

It was not like I could pay someone to solve it. My friends were as bad as me in math and I was not willing to take extra classes with the teacher just so I could understand math. I hated it, with all my heart.

What's the point of math? ha? 7 x 8 = ... wait what is 7 x 8?

Shit.

I grabbed my calculator and got the answer. 56. Yes, so what's the point of that?

God . . . I am going to fail.

I laid on the bed and video called my friends; Camilla and Cameron. It took them a while to answer, but eventually, they did.

"Hey!" "Hey girl!" they greeted me.

"I need your help," I whined.

"What happened?" Cameron asked worriedly.

"Math happened. Math happened, Cam." I frowned.

"What happened to, "My brother will do my home works?" Camilla mocked.

"Well, he changed his mind." I huffed.

"Anyways, what are you doing?" I asked casually.

"Getting ready to see Karen," Cameron smirked.

"I can't believe you left me to do the project with her." I narrowed my eyes.

"Sorry!" He chuckled.

"What about you Camilla?" I asked.

"Just sitting in my room." She pouted.

Camilla and I had the same personality and the same life, well...excluding my mafia life, but we do think alike and do the same things. We sucked at math, we both hated sports, we liked the same ice-cream flavor; Mango, and we hated shopping.

Wait, what do we love? I thought as I narrowed my eyes at nothing in particular.

"I gotta go!" Cameron said and hung up.

"Are you okay?" I asked Camilla.

"Fine, I guess."

Camilla was having a hard time with her boyfriend; Allen. They were always fighting and breaking up. I would always tell her to break up with him because he was not good neither for her nor for her mental health, but she always said and I quote, "but I love him." He was a jackass and one of the popular kids at school.

"Do you want me to come over?" I asked.

"No, it's okay M. I think I am going to sleep," she replied and I nodded.

We said our goodbyes and hunger up.

I huffed and got up and walked towards my window. We lived in a two-story house that looked normal on the outside, so no one could sense anything. Back in New York, we used to live in a huge mansion that I used to hate. I hated big houses. When we moved to Galena, I became much happier in our home, especially also after meeting Camilla and Cameron, and I thank my dad for pushing me to socialize with people.

I opened my curtains and looked ahead. My eyes landed on the window on the second floor of the house in front of us. I saw River, who I guess just came out of the shower with a towel wrapped around his torso.

He's beautiful. So beautiful. I always said that, but I had never talked to him.

Suddenly, his eyes landed on mine and I quickly closed the curtains with wide eyes.

Fuck!

I hated when that happened!

No, I never check people's windows or anything, I was not a creep, but I always put myself in awkward and embarrassing situations, and I didn't know why.

I walked to my bed with my heart beating so fast because of how embarrassed I was.

That's ladies and gentlemen, River Martin. He was the school's nerd and was not ashamed to show it. Why would he? He was smart and hard-working, and that's what I liked about him. He was original.

According to the American Dictionary, a nerd is, "a person who lacks social skills, esp. someone interested in technical things."

I couldn’t say that River was a true nerd because he was a little bit different, but to the school, he was.

I didn’t like him.

Don't get me wrong, not because he was a 'nerd', but because he was rude and didn’t give a fuck about anyone. He didn’t talk to anyone and didn’t have friends. He only had one and that's David. David was one of the popular kids, but he was a good one. I had spoken to him a couple of times in class before.

I had never personally spoken to River, but Camilla had and he was so rude to her, so I didn't take my chances.

I didn't want to.

Night came and I made my way to the living room to check up on everyone. I still didn't forget about the warehouse and the bullet. I was more eager to shoot it.

"Where have you been? I missed you." My mother pouted, making her way to me.

"I have missed you too." I hugged her.

"So, dad, ready to go?" I suddenly said.

"Go? where?" My mother frowned.

"Uhh, yes, yes. Let's go." He replied, obviously forgetting that we had a deal.

"To the warehouse." I simply said.

"At this time? why?" She gasped.

"I want to introduce her to new members. They are going to be responsible for her protection." My father lied smoothly.

I felt bad because we didn’t like to lie to her, but sometimes we had to, so she doesn't get worried.

"Oh, okay. Take care!" She told us before leaving.

* * *

On our way to the warehouse, my father kept talking about how he lied to my mother and felt bad.

"Dad, it's fine, stop thinking about it." I rolled my eyes playfully.

"Well, I am the one who is lying to the love of his life and not you." He said.

"Ouch." I gasped.

"We have to tell her." He said.

"No! then she will never even let me train."

"But you hate training." He frowned.

"Dad, you know what I mean. The mafia stuff in general." I rolled my eyes.

"Fine." He gave up.

We parked the car and made our way inside. We were greeted by a bunch of members. We made our way to the basement of the warehouse which was huge.

"Look whose here!" My father's best friend, Danny, greeted me.

"Hey, uncle Danny!" I hugged him. I called him uncle because I loved him so much and he was more like a father to me.

"Hey kiddo, how are ya?"

"I am fine. I will be better when I hold a gun." I smirked.

"Oh, you rebel!" He chuckled.

They kept talking and I walked around the basement to be stopped by Troy.

Troy was the most annoying person I had ever met, even more than my brother. He asked me out a couple of times and every time, I said no. He didn't understand that. He was an ass.

"Hey, baby." He smirked, taking me by my waist.

"Take your hands off or I will kill you," I warned.

"What are you going to do? Punch me?" He laughed. I fake laughed with him, surprising him.

I quickly took out his gun from his holster and shot his leg.

That was a worthy one fucking bullet.

My father ran to me with wide eyes and question marks appeared on his face.

"Why did you do that?" He asked furiously.

"What? You said I get to have one shot! I did." I reasoned, making uncle Danny die in laughter.

"I didn't mean to shoot at someone!" He said.

"He touched me, dad," I said and his eyes turned dark.

I knew he was about to do something I would have killed him if it came to my best friend too well, but I stopped him.

"Dad! I shot him and he got punished. That's enough!" I said loudly.