27. CARLOS
CARLOS
T he cold marble floors chatter with every step they take. Two of my father’s guards carrying Simon’s limp, broken body across the room like he’s nothing. A discarded item.
I’m glued to the floor, unable to move, my brain not connecting with the rest of my body to function. I grind my teeth in frustration as I try to force myself to do something, say something, but my body refuses to obey.
Simon's head is lolled to the side, the angle unnatural.
His back is red, welted and raw, like fire had kissed his skin and refuses to let go.
One of the strikes has lacerated his skin from where blood runs down his back.
His hands hang like a dead weight, his face pale, hair covered in sweat. I just watch them leave the room.
“Wow, you really are pathetic. How did it feel, Carlos, watching me hurt your little fuck boy? How does it feel to have no say here?” Enrico goads, and Lucas has to hold me back as I move forward to strangle the bastard.
“Enough, Enrico. Carlos, I will be waiting for you in my office. Don’t keep me waiting and come alone,” my father commands before striding out of the room with a giggling Enrico following him.
My stomach turns as something inside of me fractures. The message is clear and well received of the lengths my father will go to.
This was supposed to be control. A message.
A warning. But all I can see is Simon—fierce, stubborn and impossible Simon completely broken and vulnerable.
The wounds and blood are not even the worst of it, it's the way he didn’t move or try to fight back.
He didn’t even notice any of us there after the second strike. I had to look away.
“Keep it together,” came Lucas’ voice from behind me—hard and low.
I don’t respond. Because all I want to do is shout and destroy everything around me. I want to kill and spill blood. But without back-up I’m a sitting duck. All I can do is watch and wait.
“We will end this, Carlos,” Lucas says, quieter and gentler.
Then I snap. I will end this.
“Find Mark and update him. Wait for me in my room.”
“Wait…are you sure this is a good idea, Carlos? I know you’re going to agree to come back. But are you sure?” Lucas asks worriedly.
“Get Mark and wait for me in my room.”
I turn and head toward the heart of the house—my father’s office—where he is waiting, always two steps ahead. The door opens before I can even knock. Of course it does. The king always knows when a prince is about to beg.
I follow him inside and the smell of cigars hits me in the face like a brick. The old fool takes his place behind his gross desk that's carved with gold. Disgustingly tacky. His wedding ring glitters in the light where he holds a crystal glass in his hand. His celebration.
“You’re to let him go,” I say, my voice hard. Every word is sharp as ice.
“Why? He’s alive isn’t he?” he says, barely blinking.
“I watched him bleed for your entertainment to make me bend to you.”
The room quiets, the atmosphere tense and taut like a blade between two hearts.
Finally, he leans back in his chair, ready to talk.
“You’re the one who bought him into this. You want him safe? Then take responsibility. Prove you're not a boy playing gangster. Take your place.”
I don’t hesitate.
“I’ll do it. I’ll come back. But Simon goes home, alive, or you lose me forever. Even if I have to put a bullet in my own skull.”
He narrows his eyes at me. Calculating the risk.
“You’d give up your freedom, even your life, for a man that will never look at you again?”
I swallow the guilt, knowing that to be true. “Yes.”
A long pause is then followed by a nod.
“Done,” he says.
I’ve made a deal with the devil, but I don’t care. Not at this time.
I say no more as I bolt out of the room, my mission to find Simon. I need to see him. My Simon. My little lion.
Simon who had trusted me.
Simon who may never forgive me.
Simon who I should never have dragged into this world and was now marked by it forever.
The anger blooms again, shining brighter this time. Not chaotic. Pure and purposeful.
My father may think he has won this round, but the war is just beginning. I will play the game. Make them believe I will wear their crown. Pretend to kneel.
But I will never forgive or forget what they’ve done to Simon.
And I will make them pay.
The corridors stretch out in a never-ending tunnel that's closing in on me with every step.
The chandeliers above, once a symbol of power and old worth, now flicker coldly as though they too mourned what had transpired here tonight.
I can still hear the whip, still hear his scream. The agony behind it. The fear.
I reach the end of the hall, stopping before the heavy double doors that lead to my father’s small private clinic. A room that is clinical and detached. Nothing could be sterile enough to cleanse away what was done to Simon.
I open the door slowly, bracing myself for what's on the other side.
The room is painfully white, but the low lighting makes it more bearable.
The doctor attending to Simon is familiar, but I don't care to remember.
He is standing over Simon, wrapping gauze around his back.
His gloved hands move methodically, avoiding the angry red gashes that mar Simon's skin.
Lash marks. Still weeping blood at the edges.
Simon lay motionless on his front on the medical bed, his bare back a map of cruelty.
The doctor looks up as I enter, nodding stiffly, and without a word, packs his things and leaves the room. I wait until the doors click shut behind me before I move. I swallow the knot in my throat, my voice nearly lost to it.
“Simon…”
No response. Just the sound of his shallow breathing. I look at his fingers, nails chewed down, clenched tightly on the edge of the bed as if grounding himself to this hell. His dark hair hangs over his brow, clinging to his face, wet with sweat.
I step closer, and I wince as I get a closer look at his back. I’m for a moment grateful Enrico was not strong enough to have continued. They wanted Simon broken. Broken enough that he would never come near me or this family ever again.
“I’m so sorry, Simon. I never imagined they would take it this far,” I whisper, kneeling down beside him. “I’m so sorry I couldn't stop it. That I couldn't protect you.”
Silence. The kind that weighs on your chest like concrete.
“I warned him not to do it. If I could’ve killed him I would have, but it's just me and Lucas. We would have all been killed, never got out of here. I had to be smart,” I say, and my voice slightly cracks. His lack of words is more heartbreaking than a tirade of abuse.
“If I could have taken your place, I would’ve, Simon. I would do anything for you.”
With trembling fingers, I reach out to brush his arms, but he flinches. The movement is small, but it shatters something inside of me.
“Don’t do this. Don’t shut me out. I need you. We can fix this. Together. But not if you go cold on me. Please look at me, Simon,” I beg.
Minutes pass like it's a lifetime.
Finally, Simon turns to face me. His eyes hollow, bloodshot from crying. Empty. But a single tear tracks down his cheek, followed by another. I go to wipe them away, but Simon manages to slap my hand away, not with strength, but with a revulsion that hurts me more than any punch.
“I trusted you,” he rasps. His voice low and raw, like he hasn’t spoken in days. “You let them do this to me.”
My heart cracks wide open. “What was I supposed to do? I couldn’t do anything. Do you think I enjoyed it? I wanted to rip out their hearts for what they did.”
“You let them,” he says, voice rising, not loud, but sharp. “You stood by and watched. You watched me disappear and did nothing.”
“I didn’t have the power?—”
“Don’t lie to me.”
The room pulses with grief.
Simon is now fully focused on me and the pain in his eyes is hard to take.
“You promised me that you wouldn’t let anything happen to me. That you wouldn’t allow it. That you would burn this whole fucking place down if they touched me.”
The only sound in the room is the hum of the lights. I can’t breathe. I can’t speak.
“But you didn’t protect me. The man I trusted the most here became another ghost in my life, standing on the edge, doing nothing.”
“Simon, please, you need to understand—” I say, reaching for him again, but this time, with a hiss of pain from his back, he shuffles away.
“I will never forgive you.”
The words pierce through me like a dagger.
“I don’t care what you do now, Carlos. Who you kill, who you betray. You don’t get to fix this. You don’t get absolution.”
My body shuts down at his words. I want to punch something, scream at him to listen. But I don’t. I let the hate and anger build a wall around me. Detach myself from the most painful moment in my life.
“You let them break me and something died in me tonight. Something I’ll never get back. I just want to go home and forget that you and this godforsaken family ever existed in my life.”
His stare is resolute. Hurt that has morphed into hate. All I can see is disgust and disdain at my presence. Wow. It feels like shit.
There is nothing more to say.
I stand and move away from the bed, from the man I’m pretty sure I’ve fallen for. But I will let him go. For now.
As I walk out of the room, the silence following me isn’t quiet, it screams.
Revenge.
When I have buried all that is here around me, I will get Simon back, whether he likes it or not, he still belongs to me.
In life or death.
I won’t let him go.