Chapter 13
Chapter Thirteen
Ciarán
I frown as I feel my phone buzzing in my pocket. When I see Emilia’s name, I yell for everyone and show them the text.
“Fuck! Why didn’t we think of tracing her phone earlier?” Salvatore snaps as he starts a trace on her phone.
“I didn’t think she had it on her. Whoever this Paul is? He’s an idiot for not taking it from her,” Sebastiano adds, sounding exasperated but relieved..
“Celestino, take Keegan, Carmelo and Lorenzo. Go to John’s house and bring him back here. Now,” Zio Giacomo says.
“Sì, Papá.” Celestino nods as they all leave.
“Tell me what I can do. I can’t just sit here and watch you guys do all the work.” I frown at everyone.
“You can help me search for Paul and whatever information we can find on him,” Sebastiano says.
He shows me how to use specific words to search for information. Between Sebastiano, Francesco, Salvatore and me, we finally find some information on John and Paul. They are identical twins born to Roland and Kathleen Mulberry. They divorced when the boys were a year old. Roland’s brother is a judge and he ruled that one boy would live with Kathleen and the other would live with Roland. That there would be no visitation between the two. How they got away with that is beyond me. The records show that when Paul was two, his mother took him to the ER for a broken arm. She said he fell off the swings at the park. They were assigned a social worker and that social worker made a few home visits. She deemed Kathleen a fit mother and closed the case. There are no other records of Paul going to the doctor—or to school. He seems to have slipped into the abyss of neglect.
I want to feel sorry for Paul, but can’t let myself, because he has Emilia. And even though she was able to text me, I don’t know if she’s really okay. She asked me not to text her back and it’s taking every ounce of will power I have not to.
“I found her. Her phone is pinging off this cell tower. I’m working on getting an exact location,” Salvatore tells us.
“Did you know about his brother?” I ask Kali.
She shakes her head no. “John must have heard wrong about being adopted. Cause you’re saying Roland is his biological father, right?”
“Yes. Maybe Roland was talking about Paul? It doesn’t look like he ever tried to contact Kathleen or Paul.”
“That’s really sad. Who walks away from their child? And on top of that, who splits up identical twins?” I blurt out.
“It looks like Kathleen was diagnosed with schizophrenia about ten years ago. Paul would’ve been fifteen at the time. I still can’t find anything on Paul. It’s like she hid him away.”
“We’re fucking morons. Does Kathleen own or rent a house?” Enea asks.
Sebastiano looks at his papá, then turns back to his computer again, muttering something about why didn’t he think of that.
The others come back with John. His hands are tied and he has a bloody nose. Celestino has a bruise forming on his cheek.
“Dumbass thought he could take Celestino.” Lorenzo laughs. “You can see how well that worked out for him.”
“Fuck you. Now tell me why you broke into my house and assaulted me.”
“No one assaulted you, shithead. You swung at me before I could even tell you why we were there.”
“Sit the fuck down and shut up,” Enea snaps at John.
John’s eyes get bigger as he finally takes a good look at everyone around him. Each of them have at least three inches and fifty pounds on him. He’s stupid to think he can take any of them. He finally sits down and shuts up.
Salvatore stands up in front of him. “Do you know someone named Paul? Or Kathleen?”
“No, who are they?” He finally looks and sees Kali. “What’s going on? Why are you here with these thugs?”
I watch John’s facial expressions as he sits there. I don’t get the feeling that he’s lying.
Kali laughs. “They’re protecting me. They’re not thugs.”
“Of course they are. Look at what that one did to me!” he says while pointing his tied-up hands at Celestino.
Celestino rolls his eyes.
“Are you sure you don’t know who they are?” Salvatore asks again.
“For fuck’s sake. I said no.”
Salvatore tells John what we found out.
“You’re fucking delusional. My mom is Sheila Mulberry.”
“Do you have baby pictures with her? Real baby pictures, from before you were two years old.”
John stops and thinks. “There’s no fucking way. My parents would never do that. You’re saying that my dad walked away from my identical twin brother?”
“We think he’s taken Emilia. Unless it’s you that’s been texting and threatening her,” I snap at him.
“I haven’t done anything. Why would I threaten her?”
“Because you’re a cheating asshole. So we thought it was you that was sending her the texts. And tonight? Someone attacked Frank and kidnapped Emilia,” Kali tells him.
“Baby, I had nothing to do with any of that.”
“I’m not your baby. So stop calling me that.”
“I don’t know anything. Can you at least take the zip ties off? I wouldn’t hurt Emilia.”
“You already did.” I frown.
“And I apologized for all of that. I never meant to hurt Kali or Emilia. If I could take it back I would. Now tell me how I can help find her.”
“You can’t, you don’t know Paul. So you can’t help us find him.”
“Has he hurt Emilia?”
“We don’t know.”
“I found an address. It’s about a twenty-minute drive from here,” Francesco says.
“What are we waiting for? Let’s fucking go! I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to yell but please. We need to go now.”
“We need a plan. We can’t just storm over there without one,” Zio Giacomo says to me.
Salvatore was able to confirm that it’s the house that Kathleen bought when she and Roland divorced. We spend the next half hour forming a plan. The plan is to go in from the front door, the hard part is we’re basing it on a picture of the house from the outside. An hour later, we’re all standing outside of the house. Carmelo and Keegan quietly do a quick walk around the house to look for any other doors. They find one in the back yard. Half of us will go in the front door and the other half through the back door.
Emilia
I pray that Ciarán got my message. I didn’t want him to text me back in case Paul came back. Now I wish I hadn’t told him that.
I hear some noise coming from above me. Voices yelling. Then there’s a few loud popping noises and more yelling. I hear someone yelling my name, it sounds like my Ciarán.
“I’m down here!” I scream.
The next person I see is Ciarán. Relief washes over me and I start sobbing. He found me. Ciarán rushes over to me and unties my legs.
“Are you okay? What did he do to you?” Ciarán asks as he holds me.
“Nothing. I think he drugged me. It wasn’t John.”
“I know, baby. We got Paul, he’s upstairs. He won’t be hurting you ever again.”
“I knew you’d find me.” I sob harder.
“We need to get you to the hospital.”
“Frank. Please tell me he’s okay.”
“Frank is doing okay. He’s got a concussion, but otherwise he’s okay.”
The relief I feel overwhelms me and I pass out. When I wake up, I’m in a hospital bed and Ciarán’s holding my hand as his head rests next to me.
“I love you,” I whisper to him.
“I love you too,” He says groggily.
I smile and run my hand through his hair. There’s a knock at my door and Ciarán sits up fast.
“I have someone here who won’t stop grumbling until he sees for himself that you’re okay,” Zio Giacomo says as he wheels Frank into my room.
“Frank! I’m so glad you’re okay.”
I can see him looking at the bruises on my face and he has tears in his eyes.
“I’m sorry I didn’t protect you from him. I should’ve done more,” he says to me as he takes my hand.
“There’s nothing you could’ve done. I’m sorry you got hurt, but I’m so happy you’re okay. When I woke up, all I could remember was seeing John hit you from behind. But it wasn’t John.”
“What do you mean it wasn’t John?”
“It’s a long story. I’ll tell you everything once we’re out of here. I promise.”
Frank gives me a hug.
“I love you, Emilia. You’re the family I always wanted.”
“I love you too, Frank. You’ll always be a part of my family.”