Pride
Pride was the feeling searing Icaro’s chest as he watched his wife maintain a composure most people, man or woman, would struggle to hold. Facing the man who’d tortured her the entirety of her life with dignity and grace and only one curse word, he almost smiled as he considered her saying fuck earlier, was a thing of beauty.
While Ippocrate Giannone thrashed like a rabid bull on the table which was creaking under his enormous weight, Icaro was fixed purely on his wife and her reactions and responses. She was leaned against Chester for support, and he was grateful for the fact she had him in her life now.
He walked to Zorah and rested his palms on her shoulders and smiled softly, “Amoré, why don’t you and your father head back to the house. We will finish up here and I will see you in the morning. We will head back to New York after you make your statement to the police. We can move into the renovated house. Would you like this?”
“I would like this very much.”
“No. This is not what God wants for you Zorah,” Ippocrate’s chest was heaving. “He wants you to devote your life to serving Him, not this filth.”
“Filth?” Zorah spun away from Icaro furiously and she moved back towards the man laying in the bed. “You call him filth? You who has beat me, verbally abused me, watched me dress and undress, touched my bare skin inappropriately has the nerve to call him filth? You who built this prison with bars on the windows and plotted to steal my babies to trade off to some low life thug as their second wife, dare to call anyone else names when you are the scum of the earth? Let me tell you something Ippocrate Giannone. I’m going to expose you. At first, I was embarrassed and humiliated and I didn’t want anyone to know the things you did to me. I felt such shame, such utter degradation I never wanted anyone to know. I didn’t want anyone to know you took my pants down.”
Icaro felt his rage ramping up as his wife, his sweet, innocent wife with the heart bigger than the world they inhabited faced her demons head on with tears streaming down her face. This fucker in the bed was going to die a slow painful death before they blew him to smithereens. Actually, he thought wickedly, maybe he’d leave him alive just enough to feel the explosion when his body was obliterated into nothingness.
Zorah was taking shaking breaths as she gulped air, “I didn’t want to tell anyone about how you hurt me while I was naked. How you put me over your lap and smacked me with a paddle have been some of the worst memories of my life. Yet,” she raised shaking hands to wipe tears, “this isn’t my sin. This isn’t my fault. I didn’t do anything wrong. I was born to people who abused their power and harbored such evil and rage there is nothing good in their souls. So, I’m going to expose you. I’m going to make sure every single parishioner of your church knows you were touching me. I’m going to make sure the evidence we’ve collected gets presented. I’m going to sue the church because I know multiple nuns over the years reported both your and mom’s excessive discipline on me as a child to the Bishop and because you were bringing in money, my husband’s money, they turned a blind eye. I’m going to drag your name through the mud until the name Ippocrate Giannone is associated with child abuse and sexual perversion.”
Icaro almost laughed as Zorah stood between the flailing legs of the man she told off.
“It was done out of love.”
“It was done because you’re a perverted, disgusting, sick, horrible slug who should have been castrated.” She turned and before he could stop her, Zorah ripped the crowbar from Icaro’s hand.
Icaro’s eyebrows rose, his hand outstretched to try to grab the metal back from her but then he pulled it back suddenly avoiding the way she wildly swung it. The screaming from the man on the bed as she delivered blow after blow on the man’s crotch area, pausing only when the clawed end of the tool caught the fabric and tore it away, taking a chunk of flesh with it. A collective groan rose from the men in the room, half of them grabbing their pelvises in horror as she stalled her swing only to resume it again.
When she finally stopped, she was heaving hard, her breath in short bursts and Ippocrate was screaming in agony but one of the four men who’d stepped up to hold him down so she could deliver her punishment, shoved a wad of fabric in his mouth and then ran duct tape over it.
Zorah walked to the head of the bed keeping her eyes trained on Ippocrate and surprising Icaro, spit in Ippocrate’s face. “You asked me earlier if I was going to convince them to let you live. The answer is no. You’re going to die. Tomorrow, I’ll be sad. I will feel guilt. I will likely feel true remorse for my involvement in this and when I do, when I truly feel bad, I will go to Sicily to a real priest, a real man of God and I will confess my sins and though you will already be dead, I will pray for forgiveness. Do you know how many times I heard you going on and on in the pulpit about confessions? All sins can be forgiven if you’re truly repentant. You’re going to die Father Giannone but before you do, I want you to know the world is going to think you died by suicide out of guilt for what you did to me.”
“Chester,” Icaro finally stepped to his wife, “it is time for you to take Zorah home. She has said her piece.” He tugged her by the arm and walked her to the door, “I love you. I am so proud of you. You are brave and strong, and I am the luckiest man in the world to have you as my wife. I want you to go now. Sidonia is with Keturah at the house where Chester is taking you. You’re going to have an evening with the girls. I will be home tomorrow.”
She nodded as he wiped tears from her cheeks with his thumbs.
“I love you.” He said it again.
“I love you too,” she whispered as she met his gaze shyly.
The words seemed to set Ippocrate off again and it made them this much sweeter to him. Icaro nodded to Chester and then turned his attention back to Ippocrate.
“Did you hear? My wife loves me. Took under a month for her to give me her heart. Funny, I’m an assassin who kills people for money, but I managed to remember to be gentle, loving and kind to my bride. You are a priest who is supposed to spare the rod and spoil the child and do unto others as you would have them do to you and yet you couldn’t make your own family love you. You’re going to die tonight Ippocrate Giannone as my wife said you would but not until I exact revenge on her behalf.” He motioned to the men as Chester edged Zorah away. “Cut his clothes off. It’s time to show this fucker what it means to cross a Lucchesi.”
Log in with Google Account
Chapters
Favorite
Settings
