Chapter 49
“You're not my Little Mouse anymore. You're nothing but a memory. And one I'm coming to regret."
Tears fall down my cheeks, but I don't bother wiping them away. What have I done?
Ignacio’s words are on a loop inside my head. Not only the ones he said today, but everything he's ever said to me, good and bad.
The confusion and terror that came when he first kidnapped me, the first steps of our beginning, meeting my parents, Jax and everything we lived through, the one hundred percent fun and personal proposal, and Il Padrone’s offer of an out…
Everything crashes over me at once, and I curl in on myself, a keening sound coming from my throat as I shake.
What have I become?
Pain. So much pain courses through me as I struggle to catch my breath, to stop my swirling thoughts.
“You’re fucking mine. And no matter what, you will always belong to me. You’re my Little Mouse.”
I was his… What happened to that?
“Such a sweet Baby Mouse, and all for me.”
Tennant… The love of my life. My soulmate.
The very air I breathe. I thought I knew what love was before him.
I thought Ignacio was my one and only, the person who made this life worth living…
But I went and fell in love with someone else, someone dangerous to my heart, who can never give me what I ultimately want.
Do I regret it?
“I’m going to mark you—permanently. Show the whole world you’re mine. Ti ho preso, Tesorino. Sei mia. In questa vita e nella prossima. Sei il mio mondo.”
How can I ever regret someone who makes me feel so alive? Even when trying to kill me… No, I don’t regret falling for Tennant. But the consequences of my actions are something I’ve been avoiding for a long time. Tennant, Ignacio, Lio, even Roman. So many people have been hurt because of me.
A scream ravages my throat and my eyes sting, but there aren’t any more tears to cry. Not that I deserve to feel sorry for myself.
What have I done?
“I’ll take as little or as much as you’re willing to give me. You’re still part of my heart, no matter what.”
Fuck!
Ignacio was right… I fucked up. He extended an olive branch, showed he was still there for me, even after I broke his heart, and I…I was selfish. I used him for my own comfort, but never gave anything in return.
“Who is really the villain?”
My thoughts spiral further and it becomes harder and harder to breathe.
Until strong, familiar arms wrap around me.
“No!” I protest, trying to wiggle out of the firm grip, only to cry out in pain as my wound aches, but I welcome that. It’s the least I deserve for what I’ve done…
“Shh. I’ve got you, Topolino.”
I shake my head violently. “No…no, no. Y—you shouldn’t.”
“Hush.” Tennant holds me tightly and I tremble in his arms, unable to fight against him.
That’s what started all of this, isn’t it?
From the very first moment we locked eyes, in that first meeting between our Families, I’ve been his…
Maybe even before that. I knew who Tennant was the first time our Families came together, at that Christmas party that feels so long ago now.
He caught my interest from the start, but…things were good then. Or at least I was better at pretending they were. How easily I crumbled when given the opportunity.
“You are what I live and breathe for, and I thought I was the same for you.”
I clutch at Tennant, so afraid he’ll leave me too… I’m barely hanging on by a thread. If I were to lose him… What would be the point of living?
“Come here, Baby Boy.” Tennant’s words are distant, and they don’t register until someone is sliding onto the bed behind me, wrapping their arms around me.
I startle, but relax once I realize who it is. Lio… My best friend. The person I’ve disappointed more times than not. Another person I should have been there for.
“I promised you forever, and you promised me it as well! Am I no longer important enough?”
Fuck. How does he not hate me?
I ruin everything I touch.
All my actions crash over me as reality sets in, and I realize how royally I fucked myself. I have no one to blame but myself. Not when Tennant, Hollis, and Lio all tried to tell me. They tried to help, to show me how it could work.
I finally realize what Tennant means when he says you can love more than one person at a time. My love for Lio and Ignacio makes me ache because of all I lost.
How simple and easy was my life before all of this? Before I let finding my forever love ruin it all. I threw Ignacio away, and I'll have to live with that for the rest of my life… I thought our chapter had ended, but I'm the one who stopped the words halfway through.
Emilio…he was my soulmate, my forever, and I let him down. I wasn’t there when he needed me. I put someone else before him time and time again. And what does he do? He’s here, holding me, offering me comfort, because unlike me, there’s not a selfish bone in his body.
Fuck, I fucked up.
Tennant mutters something, but the words sound like static to my ears. It’s not until I feel the sting and pinch of a needle that I realize what’s happening, but I don’t even have the strength to be upset. I welcome the encroaching darkness, wondering if they’ll notice if I don’t wake up.
It’s the least I deserve after everything I’ve put them through.
I feel myself being moved, and a body wraps itself around mine. I have enough strength left to open my eyes and meet Lio’s. “S—sorry,” I mutter before my eyes close again and I’m lost to the darkness.