Chapter 37
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Sophia
“Gio.” Slipping from the car, I hurried across the gravel and completely empty parking lot toward the only other person in sight. “Gio, where is Lily?” In the dark, I almost stumbled and almost went down, but at the last minute, I caught myself.
My brother’s shadowy form straightened from the car he was leaning against. He swung the passenger side open. “Get in the car.”
There was absolutely no emotion in his voice. If anything, he sounded bored.
I skidded to a stop. “Gio, I want to know where my daughter is.”
I couldn’t help it. My voice shook. I had already done everything he asked of me. I hadn’t even contacted anyone before running from the house and getting in the car.
And now here I was, an hour outside the city in the dark alone with my brother, and he didn’t even have my child.
Squinting, I tried to peer through the heavily tinted windows of the car behind him. There was nothing to see, but I didn’t think Lily was in there.
“Lily?” I called out loudly. “Lily, it’s Mommy—"
The back of Gio's hand cracked painfully across my jaw and sent me sprawling. I crumbled to the floor and lifted a hand to my stinging face.
Gio was my brother, I had known him literally my entire life, and not once in that time had he ever hit me.
“Get,” he enunciated each word, “in the fucking car, Sophia.”
Glaring at him, I climbed to my feet. My hand was still pressed to my face. The sting was fading, but it was quickly getting replaced by the sting of anger.
“You are so easy to manipulate, Sophia. You always have been.” He pointed to the car. “Now get in the car and…”
I set my feet apart. “And if I don’t?”
His eyes narrowed. “Then I’ll make you take this ride in the trunk. Don’t make me forget who you are to me.”
That was rich coming from him. “You seem to have forgotten already.” I snapped back. “I’m going to ask again. Where is my daughter?”
“Safe, and I am going to take you to her if you behave.” He took a threatening step toward me, but I didn’t step back. He was almost twice my size, but I wouldn’t back down from a bully. Even if that bully was my brother.
“But if you don’t behave, Sophia, then you are never going to see that snivelling bastard ever again.”
I reeled back at the utter hatred in his voice. “People will come after me.”
Throwing back his head, he laughed. “No, they won’t. Come on, Sophia. No one is coming because no one cares about you and the brat. Do you think that Nat…”
He burst into more peals of laughter. “She can’t help you…”
“Matteo—" The words left my lips before I could think to bite them back.
I expected my brother to fly into a rage or laugh or do anything but give me a cold, pointed look.
“I’d love to say I was counting on it because I would love to put a bullet between his eyes.
But that will just have to wait.” A cruel, cold smile spread across his face, making him look ghoulish.
“He will find you, of course, but…well, Sophia, that won’t really matter to you by then. ”
His hand closed around my elbow, crushing my flesh into my bones painfully. He dragged me toward the open door.
He was going to kill me. Kill us both. My own brother was going to kill us, and there was nothing I could do. I didn’t have a weapon, and not a single soul knew where I was because I had foolishly run out of the house without even a word to Nat.
“Matteo…he knows,” I mumbled.
“I know.” Gio shoved me into the car. “But he won’t get to you in time. Why did you have to do it, Sophia?” Why did you have to fall in love with him and ruin everything?”
The question was left unanswered as he slammed the door shut, narrowly missing my leg.
Desperately, I looked around the empty lot. I needed to believe that someone would come for me. That Matteo would, but he had been the one to walk away when he found out he was a father.
Could I really count on him?
Yes, a small voice whispered in my head. Yes, Matteo would come for us. I had to believe that. But how was he going to find us?
That’s when I saw it. The CCTV camera was half hidden high up on the warehouse wall. I couldn’t help it. I smiled. Cameras. That’s how he would find us. My brother wouldn’t know, but I did.
Almost every inch of the UK was covered by cameras.
I schooled my face into a worried expression as my brother got into the car and pulled away.
He glanced at me once, pulling onto a quiet road. “What? You have nothing else to say?”
“No,” I whispered. “No, I haven’t got anything else to say to you, Gio.”
And I didn’t. But I would be doing plenty to him soon. Because if he thought I was going to go out without a fight, he had another thing coming.
I wouldn’t let him hurt me or my daughter.
And I needed this time to be silent so I could make a plan, just in case Matteo let me down again.
The drive was much shorter than I expected. Barely five minutes. It was like my brother hadn’t thought about any of this at all.
“What is this place?” Leaning forward, I narrowed my eyes at the small white-washed cottage.
“Mom and Dad bought it as some kind of retirement place.”
My head snapped around. “Mom and Dad wanted to retire here? Wait, they were going to retire?”
“Get out of the car and stop asking stupid questions, little sister. You’re daughter is inside.”
I was out of the car and running before he had even killed the engine. It didn’t matter if this was a trap, and a hail of bullets were going to rain down on me. All that mattered was my daughter.
Flinging open the door, I screamed her name. “Lily?”
“Mommy?” A small, timid voice spoke out from the back of the tiny house. “Mommy, is that you?”
Her voice was so tiny, so scared.
I barreled into the kitchen, or what used to be a kitchen, anyway. There were no cabinets. It was nothing but an empty shell. And in the far corner, her hands tied cruelly in front of her, was my child.
My sweet, brave child.
Skidding to my knees, I gathered her into my arms, rocking her as she cried and I cried as well
“Pathetic.” Gio entered the room but didn’t close the door. Instead, he went and leaned against the wall facing it. I glanced between them.
“Get her to shut up, Sophia,” he said after ten minutes. “I can’t hear myself think.”
“She’s tired and afraid,” I snapped back, continuously rocking my child. “You left her alone in the dark. What kind of person does that?”
He ignored my question completely and asked one of his own. “Aren’t you afraid of me?”
Blinking rapidly, I shook my head. “No, Gio, I am not afraid of you. Should I be?”
“Yes.” One simple word, and it was like a knife had been twisted in my gut. I loved my brother, and although I’d had my doubts about him and what he was capable of, I hadn’t truly believed it deep down.
Or maybe I hadn’t wanted to believe it.
I had always been the kind of girl who was blinded by love.
“I don’t believe that, Gio. You love me. I’m your sister.”
His laughter floated up. “It won’t be the first time I have killed someone I love. And…” He turned to me slowly. And his eyes speared me to the spot.
There was so much hatred in his eyes that I instinctively shielded my daughter's face from him. She didn’t need to see that kind of hate, and she sure as hell didn’t need to hear it from her uncle, who was supposed to love her.
“I loved them a lot more than I do you.” His eyes narrowed. “I’ve never loved the brat.” He sneered. “If you hadn’t been knocked up by that asshole, none of this would have happened.”
I couldn’t help it, I shuddered . My eyes roved around. I needed to find a weapon. Or anything that could be used as one.
My brother was going to kill us. There was no way around that fact now, and I had to defend us. Only there wasn’t anything. This was a kitchen, but it was just a shell.
Nothing but…my eyes locked on a stack of wood in the corner.
“Don’t even think about it.” Following my gaze, Gio stepped between me and the only thing I could use to defend myself.
“Gio.” Sliding Lily onto the floor, I pushed her into the corner. I forced her to look at me. “Sweet girl?”
“Mommy, I'm scared.” Her tiny voice shook, but not as much as her body did. “Why is Uncle Gio doing this?”
“Because he is a bad man.” I smoothed her hair back from her face and pressed my lips against her forehead.
“I’m going to need you to close your eyes now, okay?
Be brave and keep them closed, no matter what you hear.
Mommy won’t let anything bad happen to you.
” Slowly, I stood and turned to face my brother.
He shook his head. His hand was already reaching for the gun I presumed was in the back of his waistband. “You shouldn’t make promises you can’t keep, little sister.” His voice was a little uncertain, but when he levelled the gun at me, his hand was perfectly steady.
“She might not be able to keep them,” a voice boomed out, but not from the direction of the front door. It came from the back.
Gio had been so busy concentrating on the front of the house that he hadn’t thought to check the back.
There was a squeak of hinges as the door was pushed open, and a little broken glass fell from the already shattered window.
Gio hissed in shock as Matteo stepped through, crunching glass under his feet.
The gun swung away from me to aim shakily at him.
“How did?”
“How did I find you so quickly?” Matteo asked. His lips thinned, and I could tell by the way he held himself that he wanted to look at me, but he didn’t move his eyes away from Gio.
Best friend
Brother
Traitor.
“You were never very good at planning, Gio. I searched for records of property your family owned, and this is the only address. You wouldn’t have the guts to take them anywhere else.” Gio shook his head. “Let them go.”
“No.”
“Let them go. You have me here now. You don’t need them. Let Sophia and Lily leave. You never have to see them again. I never have to see them again. You win without any blood being spilled.”
“It’s too late for that.” My brother’s voice cracked, but the gun didn’t waiver.
“I guess it is, and I’m sorry about that.”
Gio’s eyes widened. “What do you mean by that?”
“Sophia might not be able to keep her promise to Lily, but I can.”
Finally, his eyes darted to me. A look passed between us that I didn’t really understand, but I think it meant he loved me.
There seemed to be a sorry in there somewhere as well.
“Be brave, Lily. Daddy isn’t going to let anything happen to you. He’s not going to let the bad man hurt you or your mommy. I promise.”