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MIA

Most cities keep their ugliest monsters hidden in the shadows. Indigo Hills parades them in daylight; a city of wolves in every sense of the word, unashamed of its own evil. Almost as if to prove it, the downtown skyline gleams like polished armor in the morning light.

I stand barefoot in my kitchen and admire the view from my penthouse apartment window. It doesn’t matter how many times I see it; I’ll always love staring at this glittering city. Straight ahead, glass towers catch the sunlight and throw it back defiantly. To the left, brick row houses sit shoulder to shoulder like they’ve made a pact to endure together. In the center, a thin river cuts through downtown in a slow, deliberate curve, its surface reflecting gold like even Mother Nature is draped in luxury. In the distance, hazy mountains loom like a wall around the fortress.

Indigo Hills is a beautiful city.

And a brutal, dangerous, deadly one.

But it’s mine.

By the time I remember it, the coffee in my hands has gone lukewarm, but I don’t move to reheat it. I like these first few minutes of stillness. The quiet hum of traffic below. The distant wail of a siren. The way sunlight pools across my floors and climbs the walls, catching in the gilded frames of the almost-neon abstract canvases I hung to make this place feel alive.

My friends think my place is too colorful. The first time Dutch saw it, he asked, “Where’s the brooding dungeon aesthetic from your dad’s place? And why does it look like a clown threw up in here?”

I’d rolled my eyes and handed him a beer.

I grew up in a house that feels more like a mausoleum. Dark wood. Closed curtains. Chandeliers that drip crystal tears like they were mourning something long before there was anything to mourn. And then long after there was more than enough to cry about.

My mother used to throw the windows open in defiance. My father used to close them again after she fell asleep, especially in the winter when snow would blow across the sill. Funny, the small things you remember when the big moments are too painful to forget. But a rabbit hole of reminiscing will lead to more feelings than I have time to deal with today. So, I yank my thoughts back from that precipice before I can fall over its edge.

Instead, I force myself to think about safer topics. Like the fact that, two weeks ago, this city nearly tore itself apart in the biggest war ever waged in these streets.

Even war is safer to think about than my mother.

Now, Vincenzo is dead. Franco’s legacy lies in a pile of ash. And finally—the mafia pack stands under new leadership that actually gives a damn about protecting its own.

For the first time in my entire life, Indigo Hills feels like it might have a future that isn’t carved from cruelty. My heart swells at the thought.

I love this city.

Not the mansions in the suburbs or the penthouses perched like crowns. Not the men who mistake dominance for strength. I love the corner bodega that stays open late. The teachers who stretch budgets that should have broken them years ago. The girls who walk home in pairs because they’ve learned not to trust even the busiest of streets.

I fight for them.

For the innocents.

For the version of this city that exists underneath the luxury-draped rot.

Which is why sunny, peaceful mornings like this are dangerous. Because when everything looks this calm, this untouched, it’s easy to pretend the cost wasn’t real.

It was.

Anytime I’m tempted to forget that, I think of Claire. A girl I rescued from a man who thought he had a right to her body simply because he wanted it.

Her scars are visible.

Mine are not.

Loss doesn’t leave scars the way battle does. But the invisible scars are just as painful. Except this pain lingers in empty chairs at the table and rooms so quiet, they echo with it.

It turns strong men into ghosts of themselves. Men like my father.

Sometimes I worry that no amount of peace in the future can make up for the past. But I have to try.

The knock at my door pulls me from my thoughts.