Chapter 8
Isabella
I was restless after Leo left and I was tired of staying in my room, waiting for papa to call for me. I needed to see him, I needed to talk to him and find out what was going on. I wanted to trust Leo and I wanted to believe what he was saying because he was the only one who had made me safe…but I still wanted to give papa a chance. He was my father and I believed he deserved that chance to explain himself to me.
I changed into some comfortable clothes and headed back downstairs. It was late in the evening by now and I wandered around the house, looking for papa. He wasn’t in his study as I’d expected him to be, instead I found him in the library, where I’d found all our old things. That was the last place I was expecting to find him.
I walked in the room and he turned to look at me. He had been staring out of the window with his two bodyguards in the background.
“Papa?” I said softly and I was relieved to find that he looked a little more relaxed than earlier. I knew he had a wild temper, and he wasn’t the kind of man who showed his feelings…so I decided to forgive him his rudeness from before.
“Hello, Bella…have you eaten?” he asked.
“Papa, can we talk alone? I feel like it’s been thirteen years and we haven’t really talked,” I said, walking towards him.
He looked at his bodyguards and gave them a nod. The two men finally walked out of the room and papa and I were alone.
“What do you want to talk about, Bella?” papa asked and I gave him a weak smile.
“I don’t even know where to begin, I feel like everything’s changed now…ever since mama died, ever since you sent me away,” I said and he looked away from me without replying.
“What are you doing in this room? I didn’t think you ever came here. This room looks so unkempt and dusty,” I said and papa sighed deeply.
“I come here sometimes, to remind myself of simpler times. All the things we owned could be fit in these few boxes,” papa said, looking around him.
“I miss it, I miss the life we had…I miss mama, do you miss her too?” I asked, staring at him, hopeful that finally maybe he would open up to me. Now that I wasn’t a child anymore, I felt like I deserved that.
He sighed again and then looked at me with a blank expression on his face.
“She’s gone and that’s all there is to it. I don’t think about it anymore,” he replied.
“You don’t think about your dead wife?” I snapped, the emotion was rising in my voice again. What would I have to do to get him to open up?
“I don’t think about her because she’s not in our lives anymore, do you get that? You should move on too!” Papa snapped at me, making me flinch as I stared at him. This was not the reaction I was hoping from him while in conversation about mama. I was hoping that he might be more sentimental.
“Papa…I can’t forget her. I can’t just move on!” I said, raising my voice now and he glared at me angrily.
“So, what do you want me to do about it?” he shouted.
“Tell me what happened! How did she die? You’ve refused to give me any information. That day, you kept me locked in my room, saying that mama was missing and the next thing I knew, I was wearing black and attending her funeral!” I shouted back.
Papa whipped away from me, walking to the window again like he didn’t want to look into my eyes. I chased after him. I wanted answers. I had returned home for answers and he was the only one who could give them to me.
“Papa, please, just put me out of my misery, please!” I begged him and finally, he turned to me again.
“They kidnapped her when we went Christmas shopping for her presents,” he said. My eyes grew wide, I could feel the tears brimming.
“When you and I went shopping to buy her that bracelet?” I asked and papa nodded. There was a blank look on his face, like he was feeling nothing.
“It was that pussy Andrei Cavallini. He thought I was encroaching on his turf with my distribution and he wanted to teach me a lesson,” papa continued while I stared at him in horror.
“So he kidnapped her?” I asked, my hands rose up to my mouth, I was trying not to scream.
“And he killed her,” papa said, in a deep quiet growl. I could see the anger in his eyes.
“And you killed him,” I added and slowly, he nodded his head.
“Nobody touches my wife, nobody lays a hand on my family. I punish everyone who even tries,” he growled and clenching his fist into a ball, he rammed it into the wall. I stepped away from him, gasping with shock.
“Papa, we need to go. We need to leave Naples,” I cried and he looked at me again, his eyes red and bloodshot.
“What did you say?” he asked threateningly, but I wasn’t afraid of him anymore. He was just a man who had become ruthless because of all the things that happened to him in his life. I was determined to believe that even though he claimed that he never thought about mama, he really did miss her.
“Gino is coming after you, after us…for murdering his father and he’s going to do it. This time papa, he’s going to kill you, kill me and this whole family you’ve built over the years. We have to make our escape. We have to get out of here when we still have the chance,” I continued.
Papa was taking threateningly slow steps towards me and I started backing away from him.
“Who is putting these ideas in your head? Is it that bastard Leo? After everything I’ve done for him!” papa raged and I shook my head.
“No, papa, Leo has nothing to do with this. I just want us to be safe. We could go back to New York. I have a life there, trust me, you will like it there,” I said, trying to sound hopeful. Papa kept inching closer to me.
“And what do you want me to do? Retire? Live by some fucking lake and go fishing on the weekends? You’re just like your mama, weak and stupid!” he raged. The tears rolled down my cheeks now. I couldn’t believe he would talk to me this way, talk about mama this way.
“I just want what’s best for you, papa. I just want us to be a family again. We can start over, in New York, you and me as a family. Mama would be so happy if she could see that,” I said.
I had my back up against a wall now and papa stood threateningly over me. He narrowed his eyes at me and I could sense the rage seeping out of his every pore.
“Weak and stupid. That is what you are. And you get it from your mother. I should have had a boy. I deserved a boy, who could be like me, and instead, I fucking got you!” he hissed.
“Papa, you’re not thinking straight. You don’t see the danger,” I said weakly.
His slap came from nowhere, landing smack on my cheek and forcing my face sideways. A shrill cry escaped my lips and papa stepped away from me, realizing what he had done.
“Bella…” he said and I moved away from him. I could still feel the sting of that slap on my skin. I couldn’t look at him anymore.
“You’re asking me to give up. You’re asking me to surrender, Bella, I can’t do that…” I heard him say. His voice had become more apologetic now. He was already regretting slapping me, but it was too late.
I had seen him in his true self, now I knew that Leo was right…papa would never change. His business and his pride would always come first, just like mama had meant nothing to him.
Anger bubbled inside my chest as tears streamed down my face. Without another word, I turned quickly and rushed out of the room.
“Bella!” he called after me as I ran to the door. I ran past the two bodyguards who were stationed outside the room and up the stairs to my bedroom. I kept wiping the tears from my cheeks but they kept falling. My tears were uncontrollable now.
That slap was exactly what I needed to bring me back to reality. I was a foolish naive girl in thinking that there was still hope for my family. There wasn’t. I needed to get out of here and Leo was the only person I trusted.