CHAPTER 16 #2
“Erm…not really. I mean, definitely Terza’s cooking, but nothing specific. If I’m honest, my diet was so basic for all of that time, I stopped thinking about food I missed or wanted. Eating just became another part of surviving,” I told them. May be it was too honest, but I wasn’t going to lie.
“Basic? What does that mean? What did you eat?” Dante asked, back to his grumpy self as he stared me down, awaiting his answer.
“Different things at different times. At first my Mum worked some, and she’d bring home diner food – usually cold burgers or grilled cheese.
That was okay. It was miles from what I was used to, but it was filling, and if I kept some, I’d have food for during the day while she was at work too,” I explained.
“Whenever she found a boyfriend, that was usually tougher. Her boyfriends weren’t exactly savoury types, and they hardly ever had food in the kitchen.
Mum didn’t like me to leave the bedroom anyway.
She said I got in the way, or pissed off the guys she was with, but I usually found a way to get something – cereal, or leftovers they didn’t eat when they came home with takeout.
Mum did have two boyfriends who would make sure I ate.
One – Rick – was really nice, and he tried to look out for me some, but Mum ended that when she discovered he wasn’t going to buy her drugs.
The other, well he fed me for his own motives and I learnt that fast.” I shuddered as I remembered Tim – the first, but definitely not the last, creep who took liberties with me during those years.
“Cara. Jesus,” Callan said, and I looked up at him, hating the look on his face. He looked angry and concerned all at once, and it felt wrong. I needed his smile back.
“It got better as I got older,” I shrugged. “I started finding ways to earn money and I could buy some basics. Occasionally, when things got dire, I’d turn to shop lifting, but never anything expensive and never more than we needed to survive,” I stressed, not wanting them to think badly of me.
“You lived on the streets?” Dante pushed.
“Sometimes, but not for the last couple of years. Not since I quit school and got a full time job.”
“And your Mum was okay with all of this? With you starving and living with abusers?” Cal snapped.
“My Mum didn’t love me from the second she gave birth to me.
Once she found herself stuck with me, she kept me around because I think she was terrified of what would happen if Rafe came for me, and she didn’t have me.
None of that meant she felt the need to care for me though.
She was an alcoholic and a drug user. It’s a miracle she survived at all,” I told them bluntly.
“Thank fuck yer home now, wee one. We willna let anything like that hurt ye now,” Arran told me, placing his hand over mine on the counter and squeezing it a little.
“I survived,” I shrugged, feeling too awkward to reply to what Arran said. “I wasn’t telling you so you’d feel sorry for me. You asked, and I…well I try to be honest where I can. I’m a crappy liar anyway.”
“Why would you lie?” Dante asked with confusion.
“My story is pretty depressing, and I don’t want you all feeling like you need to feel sorry for me. It’s the past and I don’t want or need any sympathy.”
“I don’t feel sorry for you,” Dante told me flatly, making me smile. I loved his directness. At least there was no guessing what he was thinking.
“Dante!” Arran groaned.
“What? I don’t feel sorry for her. Why would I, when she fought so hard to overcome it all?
Why would I feel sorry for someone who was tough enough to survive what Cara has?
” Dante turned to me and locked me in with that stare.
“I hate what you went through, and I wish we could have found you sooner to put an end to it all, but I will never pity you, Cara. What you went through made you who you are today, and from what I’ve seen, you’re strong, and resilient as hell.
Be proud of that. Feeling sorry for you won’t change anything that happened, so I’d rather be amazed and proud of the person all of that shit made you into. ”
“I try to be,” I agreed, emotionally. My eyes were glassy, Dante’s kind words overwhelming me.
“Good,” he nodded as he sat back. “Hand her another cheese sandwich, Arran. She liked that one better.”
“Thanks, big guy,” I laughed tearfully. He nodded to me again, then picked up his own food and continued eating it as if none of that had even happened. I already adored him.
***
I had slept through dinner. The exhaustion of my adrenaline crash, and my stomach feeling full had knocked me out and I’d collapsed onto my nest of blankets in the closet for a nap. I hadn’t woken until six hours later, having actually slept peacefully and feeling better for it.
When I walked out of the closet and into my room, I had found three bags filled with clothes I had bought earlier that day.
I could smell they had all been laundered and dried too.
I was relieved, since Cal and I hadn’t gotten around to buying anything online that afternoon.
As soon as I had eaten, I had been exhausted, and Cal had walked me to my room so I could rest, promising to order me a cell phone so Rafe would at least feel a little better.
Now, rested, and wide awake, I had changed into a comfortable pair of cotton pyjamas, and pulled on the snug, fluffy robe I had chosen at the store earlier that day.
The robe was black with red hearts all over it, and even though it was totally cliché, I had loved the way it felt, so soft and warm.
It was long enough to come almost to my feet, and paired with my black fur lined slipper boots, I felt cosy.
I tried not to look around the cavernous and silent bedroom as I sat on the edge of the bed with a notepad, which I had found on the desk in my room, and a pencil.
I still felt uneasy in that huge space alone and I didn’t plan to stick around in it for long.
It was just too open and silent. It made too much space for me to think and for my mind to conjure up images from the past, which I didn’t want to face.
As quickly as I could. I drew out the star tattoo I had seen on the man who…
who attacked me in the parking lot at Jewel’s.
I hated the ‘R’ word, and he hadn’t gotten that far anyway, Had he?
Did what he did to me even count as…as that?
All I knew was that using that word made it all feel too real and brought me close to breaking, and I refused to do that again.
I had roughly drawn the circle with the star inside of it, and done some odd types of characters around it that I was sure resembled some of what I saw.
It wasn’t an accurate depiction, but it was close, and I hoped it would help Dio find the men who were trying to capture me and who had hurt me that night.
Knowing it made me a coward I all but fled from my new bedroom, crashing the door closed behind me. I actually had to stop and try to catch my breath once I was out of there, and I knew it was irrational to feel that way about a beautiful bedroom in a luxury home, but I couldn’t help it.
“Cara?” I looked up and found Gia poking her head out of her room. “Are you alright?”
“Fine,” I answered too quickly. “I’m good. Just heading down to find Dio.”
“I can’t believe you still call him that,” she laughed.
“Dio? It’s what I always used to call him,” I countered, unsure why it was so funny. Was it childlike of me to still call him that?
“You’re not a kid anymore, and nor is he. Maybe you should check with him before you call him something so juvenile and weird. You know what that means, right? Dio?”
“Yeah. I just…I’ve always called him that. I couldn’t say Dario when I was little, apparently,” I shrugged, suddenly feeling very self-conscious.
“Well, you’re both adults now. I’m not sure Dario will like it as much anymore.”
“Okay. I…I’ll ask him. Er…thanks,” I floundered as I stood there a little taken aback. Juvenile? Is that how Dio…Dario felt about it? I hadn’t even thought about it. He had always been Dio to me.
The fact that the word meant ‘God’ in Italian hadn’t ever really been a thing, since we were all pretty British, having been born there.
Yes, we all spoke some Italian, but we didn’t think in it.
To me Dio, was just Dio. And God was God.
Not that I thought much about God anymore.
Not since he seemed to have long ago forgotten about me.
“No problem. Look, I wanted to apologise for this morning. I know I was being a royal bitch. I shouldn’t have spoken about you or to you the way I did. I was just upset,” she told me.
“I think it’s Rafe who needs an apology more than I do.”
“I’m not apologising to Rafe. He’s being a total arsehole! I’m almost seventeen, but he keeps me here like some prisoner. Do you know he told me I can’t leave the house for the rest of the week?!”
“I’m aware, and I have to say I agree with him, Gia. I was shot at this morning. It’s not safe outside this house right now, for either of us.”
“I knew you’d take his side!” she pouted dramatically.
“I’m on the side of keeping you safe and protected, and if that’s Rafe’s side too, then so be it. We love you. Gia. We don’t want anything to happen to you.”
“You don’t even know me, Cara, and if you really did love me, you could have come back for me, but you didn’t, did you?
You abandoned me and took my Mum with you!
” With that Gia disappeared from sight, slamming her door closed so hard that it rattled the walls around me.
I stood frozen for a moment, not sure what to do, but I had to try and speak to her.
I wanted her to understand I had never wanted to leave her behind.
I needed her to believe that I loved her and I always had.
“Gia?” I called with a gentle knock on her door.
“Just go away, Cara. I don’t want you here! Everything is so much worse since you came back!” she screamed angrily. Every word tore at me, but I didn’t say anything in return. What could I say to that?