You Are The Reason

CHAPTER 11: All My Fault

Ruslan's POV:

"Harden your heart, Ruslan." Mom told me. "You can't be a Mafia leader with such a weak heart."

I looked down to the pistol in my hand, my hands shaking.

"Mom. I can't do this." I whispered.

"Bullshit! You have to!"

Tears welled up in my eyes. "Mom, please. I don't wanna do this."

She gripped my shoulder tightly. "Can't you do this for your father? He sacrificed his life trying to save you."

A tear rolled down my eye. "But...mom..."

She paced around the huge training hall shaking her head in disappointment. "God. I can't believe training a sixteen year old would be so difficult." She mumbled to herself.

More tears fell down my eyes and a sob escaped my mouth. Her head snapped to me. "Stop crying! You are not supposed to cry. Mafia leaders don't cry!"

I immediately wiped away my tears with the back of my palm.

She grabbed both my shoulders and gently shook me. "Get a grip, Ruslan! You have to do this. You are the future of Searlus Mafia. You were born to lead. To rule. To kill."

"Why do we always have to kill people, mom? Why can't we be good? This is wrong." A lump formed in my throat.

"This is what we do for living. There's nothing wrong or right in this." She explained.

"But there's a lot other things we could do for a living. Like business...we could start our own company--"

"Get your head out of business!" She snapped, silencing me and I flinched.

One of the men that worked for us, came inside the hall and whispered something to mom and she nodded before dismissing him.

"Well..." She said to me. "We found the man responsible for stealing money from us."

"And?" I asked in confusion.

"So, for your first task. You need to shoot this man." She stated nonchalantly.

I gasped loudly. "No! He just stole some money. We don't need to kill him for that!"

Her jaw clenched and she grabbed my arm. "You will do as I say. This will harden your heart. Teach you. Just do it."

I shook my head frantically in fear and shock and disgust. "I can't. Mom, please."

"Yes. You will!" And she started dragging me away from the hall and across the living room to a corridor.

Stopping infront of a door, she opened it revealing a set of stairs going down.

She again dragged me down the stairs and opened a door that lead to the cold, dark dungeon.

There were a number of cells there and she dragged me to a cell in the corner. This time I couldn't control my tears and started sobbing. "Mom, no! Please."

"Shut up, Ruslan!" She scolded and stopped in front of the cell.

Inside was a man, maybe in his mid thirties, he had chocolatey blonde hair and a fair complexion.
He was sitting on the floor, his legs drawn close to him, his chin rested on top of his knees.

My heart broke.

I still had that gun in my hand and mom opened the cell door and pushed me inside. "Just do it, Ruslan."