Chapter 36 #3
He nods, his jaw tightening as he responds. “My men saw a boat anchored at a nearby island, but nobody was there. After some searching, they found a dinghy hidden at the cove. Then I saw your text.”
A raw note of betrayal edges his voice as he confirms what I suspected from the moment he gave me the phone. He’s been monitoring it, and now he knows that I left to meet who I thought was Ares.
“Cristian—”
“Not now.” He glances down at Elias as he starts to stir. “I need to deal with him.”
Part of me hopes he’ll just put a bullet in him and end it right now, but of course, I should know better. He won’t kill him without interrogating him first.
Elias groans as he tries to mumble something, but whatever it is, he doesn’t get a chance to say it. Romeo plunges a syringe into his neck, and Cristian kneels to help secure him with zip ties.
There’s a knot swelling on the back of Elias’s head where Cristian hit him. And while I’m hoping there’s a chance he won’t be able to talk, so I can explain everything myself, it doesn’t seem likely.
When Cristian looks at me again, his initial concern has shifted into something cold and distant as he meets my gaze.
“Can you walk?”
I force a nod, and he does a quick visual scan of my body before concluding that I’m not injured.
“Stay beside me.”
The lack of warmth in his voice makes it difficult to determine whether he’s saying that out of concern or because he no longer trusts me.
Silence falls over us as the two men tow Elias back to the house while I walk beside them.
When we reach the same door I exited from, Cristian pauses to look at me.
“Go inside,” he tells me. “We’ll talk when I’m done.”
Before I can even gather the courage to say anything, Cristian nods at Romeo and continues on—dragging Elias away from us.
I stare after him as Romeo opens the door.
“Come on,” he grunts. “You don’t need to see that.”
I glance at him, and there’s no question he knows about my communication with Ares too. Wariness flickers in his dark gaze as he watches me, as if I might try to bolt any second.
I can recall a time when he vouched for my character to his brothers, but now, that trust has evaporated.
We enter the house, and he escorts me to Cristian’s wing. When we arrive, he lingers in the doorway and doesn’t follow me in.
“You’re locking me in, aren’t you?”
“It’s just to keep you safe until Cristian comes back.”
“I won’t try to leave,” I assure him.
“You’ll have your phone, so you can call if you need anything.”
I’m not worried about that right now. I just want to explain myself.
“Romeo, I swear it isn’t how it looks.” My voice fractures.
“You should discuss that with Cristian,” he answers gruffly. “Just try to relax for now.”
I swallow and nod, accepting that I have no choice but to wait.
Then Romeo closes the door, and the lock engages—sealing me to my fate.
The hours pass by slowly as I pace through Cristian’s wing, catastrophizing what will happen when he returns.
I’m certain that by the end of the night, he’ll know exactly who I am.
Elias seems willing enough to share information as long as it supports his delusions, and I doubt he’ll hold up under torture.
I know how Cristian feels about Ares, and there are only two natural conclusions he could draw from my connection to him. He’ll either assume I’m here to collect information, or even worse—that Ares sent me here to ruin him.
The thought that he might imagine I could do that to him makes me feel sick, but I only have myself to blame. I haven’t told him how I really feel, and now, I’m not sure he’ll even accept it.
At this point, it probably doesn’t matter. It won’t just be Cristian who decides how this is handled. The entire family will be involved, and Angelo doesn’t take it lightly when someone fucks with his blood.
If they think I’m a spy and a traitor, there are only a few ways this can end. I know what happens to liabilities in the Mafia, and while I don’t want to believe the Vitales could do that to me, I can’t dismiss it entirely.
I was raised in this world, and I’m not na?ve to how brutal it can be. I witnessed it firsthand when my father suspected my mother wanted to leave him. That alone was enough to condemn her to death.
Cristian isn’t my father, and I know he would never do that to me. But I also know what loyalty means to him. If he thinks he can’t trust me, there are only two other alternatives. He could eject me from the island, or stay with me out of obligation.
I’m not sure which would be worse, because I know the latter would be a life sentence to a cold, loveless marriage in which he would never forgive me.
The threat of such a bleak future devastates me.
I had just started to allow myself hope for a life with the man I love. Now, in a matter of hours, it could all be ripped away.
Exhausted from the emotional toll of the day, I collapse into bed, curling into myself as I cry.
This kind of agony was the exact thing I tried so hard to avoid. But the truth is, I’m not sure I would change it, even if I had the chance to do it over again.
Because for one beautiful moment in time, I felt what it was like to be truly happy.