Chapter 202: This Felt Like Goodbye
Chapter 202: This Felt Like Goodbye
Camilla
"No, we don't believe that." Gregorio said but there was a kind of numbness to his words that felt like the knife being twisted.
"There is only one other way to ensure your father gets out of this alive and I promise you I will make sure it happens tomorrow."
What does that even mean? I wiped furiously at my cheeks when more tears flowed and it took my arms physically wrapping around my body to keep from moving closer to them.
"Please, Camilla." He cries with guilt and I wish I could say that made me feel better but it didn't. Not in the least.
"Please let us make this right, tell us what you need and we will make it happen. But please, just don't leave."
His last beg came out as a desperate plea and it was my undoing. I broke as I fell to the ground, sitting against the desk leg with my hands over my face and my knees pressed to my chest. I didn't move away when I felt Gregorio and Domenico come to my side but their toughness against my skin didn't feel the same. What they didn't understand was that they had already given me everything I ever could have needed just by being them.
No actions could speak back what was already too fat gone. Even if they don't plan to kill my father now, they did when I was in love with them. I was foolish enough to believe my happily ever after had finally found me.
"I am sorry," Domenico whispered in my ear but I was barely listening when Gregorio gently pulled my hands away from my face, his gaze focused on my shaking body where our fingers were now connected.
"There is no place in this world where people won't be able to find us. But tomorrow, I am going to kill Raphael and flee to a safe house in England until the dust settles." Gregorio said, surprising me with my eyes shooting to Adriano.
Adriano hadn't left the door since I first flinched away from him but a lot had changed since I last looked. The only thing I could see through his hardened expression was disgust, not for me but for himself. His arms were crossed and his eyes were entirely on me but if he was bothered by Gregorio's words, he didn't show it.
"We are going to convince you to come with us and I am going to tell you everything once we get there to ensure both of our safeties together. I know there is no amount of apologies we can give you to make up for the lies we told but I promise you I will fix it." Gregorio said and I didn't stop him as his hands lifted to cup my face but my vision was too blurry to even make out more than the shape of his hair I had been playing with only minutes ago.
His words should have reassured me so why am I only feeling so much worse? I didn't want Gregorio to have that burden because I know he has a little right compared to the ones Adriano and Domenico had. He is the last of them all and it is only the next Don that could kill Raphael and get away with it. He would be hunted down for the rest of his life if he were caught. How did things go so wrong so quickly?
I could feel Domenico's shaking body beside me, trying to put up a good front but failing to hide the absolute terror in his eyes at the thought of me leaving like this. Gregorio's given himself the task of fixing things that we all fear are irreplaceable and Adriano has gone so cold it hurts because I know he is falling apart silently on the inside.
We all were, I was so fucking mad at them, so mad but my mind couldn't help but travel to so many other places now as the dots began to connect together. My uncle died before I was even born, meaning this all began before I became a factor. I wanted to be able to scream just to be able to communicate something but there is one truth that no one wants to talk about and it is the fact my father is Lucas Brown.
From the shadows he allowed himself to be beaten down just so he could rise now. He killed their mother just as Raphael killed his brother but that also made him smart in some sick and perverse way. Nobody goes years hiding from any mafia and my father had managed to do so my entire childhood. There was more to this than I think any of us knew but they were all morons if they believed my father was unaware of the uninvited guest he would be having at his party tomorrow.
And while changing the plans behind Raphael's back could work, it is only when I realized how unbelievably tense Adriano is that I remembered the other fact no one is talking about. If Raphael dies, Adriano is going to become the Don of the Mafia.
My eyes widened at him to realize what that means because he is going to be the uttermost powerful leader of the crime families that are made up of the Vegas Blaster Crime Family and hold the responsibility of the title along with it. The mafia was not a world I grew up in and I don't even know a fraction of what the position entails but what I do know is that it is a life Adriano doesn't want. He told me the morning after he had traced his initials on my hip a week ago, saying it would be like a prison sentence with nothing more than a pretty cage.
That was the same morning I had promised him that if things ever came down to him being forced into the position, I would run away with him to the ends of the earth if that is what it took. Gregorio and Domenico would be by our sides and we would never have to look back again. In a better world, that could be a reality. In a fair world, people like Raphael would simply cease to exist.
But this life is not better nor is it fair, all we have is the chilling grasp of reality that leaves one option and that is to survive.
"I need to go," I sniffed as I pushed myself up from the floor or at least tried to and failed.
"I need to go," I said again as though I was trying to convince myself of that.
They did help me, Domenico gently grabbed my hand and Gregorio kept a hold of my face but the new kind of pain across their faces wasn't out of pity but it was out of regret for the fact they weren't going to let me leave.
"It is not fair for you to be gone right now, darling." Domenico shakes his head and even though I am furious with them, I can tell forcing me to stay wasn't something he wanted to do. Truthfully, I didn't really care.
"Let go," I cried as I pulled myself away from all of them and thankfully, they listened even if it looked like it hurt them to do so.
"I am going home." I said, the worst part about those words was that I thought this was the only home I ever needed.
I didn't say any more words to them and instead I used the desk to steady myself upright, standing even as sobs threatened to wrack my body. I knew I was about to start hyperventilating soon and I didn't want to be anywhere near here when that happened. Thinking back to home broken I was and still I am over everything that happened with my mother, I feared I wasn't going to be able to recover from this kind of loss after the true reality of this sinks in.
"Please…."
"Don't," Adriano cuts Gregorio off and his tone actually startled me for a second before I looked over to find him shaking despite his expressionless face.
He is not looking at either of us right now but I am pretty sure he is aware of things as small as the heavy breaths currently leaving my body. Everything about the way he stood caused an icy cold wave of acceptance to wash over me because even if I somehow found it in myself to forgive them, things could never be the same now.
I will admit, as much as they could have just come clean, this wasn't only about me anymore. Maybe it makes me stupid but I really do believe they will do everything they can to keep my father alive. If they wouldn't then Adriano wouldn't be standing like everything was going to be stripped away from him, both me and his freedom of a life without the confinement of being Don.
Although, hating them would make everything about this so much easier, I couldn't not even now. Trapping himself in a future like that is something I will never wish upon him or Gregorio or Domenico because I know they would be just as stuck as him.
"My father is smart enough to work through things on his own." I said, lifting my chin slightly just to cause more tears to trickle out of the corners of my eyes.
"If you chose to kill Raphael, any of you, don't do it for me. That is not what I want."
It was the only thing I would ask of them because I wasn't going to give them the illusion his death would make everything okay again. I don't know if anything could. The air stirred around my body as Domenico stood up followed by Gregorio but neither of them tried to reach out to me this time when I took a heart shattering step forward. I refused to look at how they were feeling, so I chose numbness instead, waiting for Adriano to move out of the door frame.
"You want to go back to Nancy?" He asked in a horribly demanding way, however I knew he was doing it out of respect for me.
"Yes, I bit my cheek as my bottom lip quivered, my mind very quickly becoming a mess of emotion I already knew would consume me the second I was alone.
I felt Gregorio's shuddering inhale as though it were my own lungs breathing in the devastating tension but I couldn't look away as more tears fell down Adriano's face. When I forced myself to stop being a coward, I looked at Domenico first, finding his hands curled tight at his sides to restrain himself from going to me. Something passed through us when our eyes connected and the force of his pain was strong enough to nearly make me fall down all over again.
It didn't matter that it was their fault they lied, this was tearing all of us apart and I hurt for them just as much as I was angry that they caused this.
"Okay," Adriano said and that was it.
Nothing was keeping me here but myself. There was still so much, too much I had to process. Namely the fact that I was unbelievably upset and torn from my father's involvement in this too but right now the only thing that mattered is us.
Adriano, my always. Domenico, my everything and Gregorio, my forever. This felt like goodbye and when I took a second step towards the door, this time I didn't stop.
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