31
KRUM
As I open up all the doors of the Temple and I can't find her, I feel the muscle tissue contracting and extending to the point that I'm afraid they will tear out of my body. The heat spreads from my temples to my neck, down onto the chest and sinks into my stomach. I'm burning, burning with anger and worry. She cannot have disappeared into nowhere, she cannot have gone away, not after what we've had, not after I've opened my heart to her.
I gave myself to this woman, fuck. She cannot have left me like this, suddenly, without looking into my eyes at least one last time.
She hates and will always hate you.
I put my hands on my face, rub it and almost slap it. What else have I done this time to deserve this? I hate feeling so helpless!
I go back to her room and check to see if there is something missing, but her clothes are here, her things are exactly where she's left them. I panic and my mind draws intolerable images: Manuel taking her away, Manuel hurting her.
I bring the blouse she sleeps in to my nostrils It smells like the infusion that is now becoming my obsession. I cannot breathe anything except her. I am taken by an intolerable fear. I've never been so anxious for someone, nor for my fate, not even when I was little and expecting to work for my dad. No, never, nothing has sunk in so deeply to break down these walls so painfully built. Nothing has ever been so unique, essential, vital.
She will ruin me, she will drive me crazy, she will be the wind that will pierce and freeze me and then disappear into space.
I had felt her detachment, I felt she was moving away from me, but then we were back together, we opened our hearts. I put my heart in her hands, I gave her free access to my soul and made her part of my world, I wanted her in my world.
She couldn't have run away from this. You cannot run away from happiness. I cannot believe it.
And if... no! If she had listened to my conversation with Leonardo and she had heard about her father?
I run out of the room and walk through the corridors like crazy. I'm furious! If she left for this reason, I'll become a beast. If she left me because she heard that conversation, I'll kill her.
I ask all the servants I meet in the villa about her. I get to the kitchen and start my macabre questioning.
“Have any of you seen Miss Livori?” I don’t ask, I scream.
The maid, kneading something, sneaks a look to the co-worker next to her, who - with the usual haughty air - comes and says,
“She was here a few hours ago.”
“And where is she now?”
“I don’t know.”
I take the woman's arm and shake her. The silver spoon falls out of her hand and lands on the floor: it sounds like my heart crashed to the ground.
“Maybe… maybe…”
“Maybe what?” I shout.
“The delivery man,” she pauses.
“Speak up, damn it!”
“She could have gone out with the delivery man.”
“Why didn’t anyone say anything?” I kill them all with my gaze, my voice, my breath filling the air with terror. I see them tremble in my presence and I rediscover the pleasure of seeing people submitting to me.
I'm partly encouraged to hear that nobody has named Manuel, but I'm certainly not happy, sure that the damn bitch ran away without saying a word.
I had told her that she belonged to me and that she couldn't leave me anymore, but she, evidently, preferred to be the heroine of the situation and do things her way. I knew she would be naughty before becoming a member of the Sect, but shit, leave me, without saying anything. It's unacceptable.
I scold the servants for being distracted and totally useless. I rush to Leonardo to tell him that my bitch has run away. I cannot wait for him to let me go hunting; the impatience of finding her is destroying me. I'd like to have her on her knees in this moment, just to punish her and shout to her face all my regret. What am I for her? Nothing. At this point, I am nothing. I thought I had given her all the possible security, I thought she trusted me. I gave her my heart.
I gave her my heart.
I find Leonardo standing in front of the large French door in the living room.
“Ambra ran away,” my voice rumbles and he suddenly turns to me.
He's impassive, which should worry the most glacial of the guardians. But at the moment, the only thing that worries me most is to find out where the little shit is.
“I knew it would happen,” he says, coming to me with his arms behind his back. “You know what to do, Krum.”
I nod as a soldier, staring at the space in front of me.
“I have to find her and bring her back to the Temple.”
“Exactly, and if other complications arise…”
He cannot ask me to do it.
“There won’t be any.”
“If she is not a member, she won't be anything else. It's the rule.”
“Ambra Livori will be a member. I guarantee it.”
Leonardo sighs exasperated. I swallow the anger and remain rigid and immobile. If I move, I'll feel my body absorb the tingling that never leaves me anymore. I don’t want to think of the possibility… No, I don’t want to think about it.
“Go and look for her. Bring her back here,” he pats my shoulder and goes away. Only when I hear his footstep fade in silence, I turn around and act.
I take the Maserati, usually driven by Oscar and drive to Ambra's home. If she isn't there, I know how to get information from her mother. My methods are infallible and I won’t save Mrs. Livori just because she is Ambra's mother. I don’t give a fuck. In order to find her, I'll step on everybody and everything.
I arrive at villa Livori and the gate opens, but only after a certain time since I've announced myself as Krum Botev.
I thought it wouldn't be so easy to be received, but maybe Ambra is here and has given the permission to let me in. Inside I feel divided in half: a part of me is happy to know that I may find her in the house and hug her again; the other part of me is a raging fire that cannot wait to punish her for leaving that way.
I park the Maserati and ring the bell, Mrs. Livori personally comes to meet me. I'm pleased. The woman looks so much like my Ambra that I feel a sword in my chest.
“Who are you?”
“Botev, Krum Botev.” She turns her head with that typical behavior of a rich woman. She gazes at me as if I were a madman. “I'm your daughter's man. Where's Ambra?”
I put a hand on her side and push her aside. I go in, hearing her complaining behind my back.
“Who did you say you are?” She yells.
“I said that I'm your daughter's man,” I repeat. I ignore her and start patrolling the house.
“Who gave you permission to come into my house this way? I didn’t give any permission!”
I keep ignoring her. I go to the living room, then to the dining room. She follows me running. Her expensive heels are tapping on the expensive floor. I am not surprised that Ambra is a first class bitch, she has always had everything. Now I'll show her what it means to have everything and, then, lose it.
“Where is your daughter?” I turn and fulminate her with my unmistakable glance: I know for sure it pierces like a frozen blade. The lady steps back frightened. She puts a hand on her neck - like my Ambra, shit - and grabs, with her fingers, the pearl necklace that stands out from her neckline.
“My daughter isn't at home.”
“I wanna know where she is. Tell me, or I'm going to break everything in sight.”
My threat shakes her visibly, she is horrified. Well, this is who I am, dear mother-in-law.
“Ambra has explicitly asked to see no one.”
I begin to lose my patience. A storm is coming out of my nostrils, not just smoke.
“I am no one.”
“She's never told me about you, she hasn't told me anything. That means you are nothing to her.”
Having a sharp tongue must be a family thing.
“Or you tell me where Ambra is,” I say, threateningly advancing, “or I'll start destroying your things, your home and finally… you.”
I am a few inches away from my mother-in-law-viper. She looks at me with contempt, so familiar to me. I know I'm introducing myself in the worst way, but I must find Ambra or I'll go crazy and really destroy everything.
“You said you are my daughter's man.”
“That's right.” Let's make it clear.
“My daughter cannot stay with a rude man like you, with such a barbarian, such a rough and violent man…”
“What did you say?” My hand is already on the lady's wrist. I hold it tight and I think I'm hurting her, as her gold trinkets are in the middle of my grip.
“Now I understand why my daughter ran away.”
“You don’t know anything.”
“I know everything and my daughter, too,” she yells. “Now what do you want to do? Kill me because I know? Do you want to find my daughter to kill her as you did with her father?”
In a moment my doubts are confirmed. The grasp of my hand automatically loosens and frees the lady that, now, is only a mother protecting her daughter. I don’t understand maternal love and I don’t think it can be so strong, but they say a mother loves her children more than her own life and maybe this woman will never tell me where to find Ambra, not even if I should torture her for the rest of her days.
“I'll protect her,” I say. The woman widens her eyes and I feel I have to give her an explanation. “I just want to find her and take care of her.”
She doesn’t believe me, it's obvious she doesn’t believe me.
“Follow me.”
I bat my eyebrows incredulously, maybe she believed me. I must have a new glow around me. Generally, people are trampled by my words. Mrs. Livori approaches the phone and dials a number. I understand that she doesn’t want me to see it, but I know for sure she is calling her. I clear my throat and go over in my mind all that I'm going to tell her. When I hear the lady calling Ambra, my chest freezes and I'm afraid I won't be able to talk, I won't be able to convince her to come back to me.
“Krum is here. Do you want to talk to him or should I send him away?”
I don’t give her time to hear the answer on the other side of the handset when I've already taken the phone from her hands and I put it on my ear.
“Where the fuck are you?” I shout.
“Don’t touch my mother. Don’t even try, Krum!” She, too, is yelling from the other side. I have to move the handset away from my ear.
“Tell me where you are, I'll come and pick you up.”
“No, Krum. You won’t come and pick me up! You won’t find me, I won’t return to the Temple, I have no intention of being part of a group of killers! I heard you, you and your sick Father, you are beasts.”
“What did you hear?” I interrupt her. Mrs. Livori is in tears. “What did you hear, Ambra? Tell me!”
“That you and the Sect put my father out of order. God, I cannot even say that word.”
“Stop crying and listen to me!”
“No, I won’t listen to you. Stop it! I don’t want to hear your lies anymore.”
“Do you think I've lied to you?” I have to turn my back to Mrs. Livori, because I can feel my eyes burning and I don't want to show how I feel. “I've never lied to you, Ambra, I would never do it.”
“I don’t want to see you ever again. You were the biggest disappointment in my life, Krum. I didn’t think you could hurt me so badly, I didn’t think you could even be able to... kill.”
“Fuck!” I shout and kick the table so hard that everything lands on the ground causing a deafening thud. The elastic cord of the phone allows me to keep it close to my ear where she's screaming furiously.
“What's going on? Don’t touch my mother, don’t hurt her!”
“Tell me where you are!”
“Are you threatening me? If I don’t tell you where I am, are you going to kill my mother, too?”
“Ambra, damn you!”
“Shut up. I want you to leave my house and stay away from my mother. Hurt her and I'll become like you.”
I begin to breathe tormented; air abandons my lungs. Kicking the objects on the floor doesn’t help. It only shakes Mrs. Livori who is motionless behind me. Knowing that Ambra thinks I'm the monster she believes, makes me sink into the depths of the earth. At the moment, it's all dark for me. I'm unable to reply, to find the right words to reassure her, to make her feel protected, loved.
“Ambra,” I sigh exhausted, I cannot handle it anymore.
“I hate you, Krum!” I understand between one sob and the other. “You ruined my life. I had seen something in you, instead… there is nothing. You have nothing inside.”
I have you inside, my love.
Tell her.
Tell her.
Each syllable, every word, becomes a crack in my chest and I feel my heart covered by that frozen coat again. Now I know that my frost is the only thing to protect me from this: the pain a person can cause you when she abandons you and loses confidence, esteem and respect for you. I come back to my old self, what I used to be. I erase every trace of her from my body.
I breathe deeply, and moved by the most cruel part of me, I hiss: “Run as far as you can and never let me find you. If I find you, it's your end. If I find you and you don’t obey, you're dead and if you die, you'll take me to hell with you, too. It's your choice: either you let me find you and save both of us, or keep running away from me and live without knowing what I did and what I would do for you. Hate me, but hate me all the way. Hate me, if that makes you feel better. I will, too. I’ll hate you forgetting the way you left me, erasing what you have been for me. I knew that you were just passing through, an appearance in my miserable existence. I should have accepted the idea that you would never stay. No one stays, not for me. Now run away. I hope to be in your worst nightmares, so you'll know who I really am…”
Beep, beep, beep, beep...
She hung up.
I freeze listening to the sound of the end.