“Now the cat’s got your tongue?” He tuts. “You were very mouthy that day in the park. Come now, amore. It’s me we’re talking about. Speak. Let me hear you.”
I spit on the floor between us. “You are the scum of the earth.”
He’s unfazed by my words. He even goes as far as to laugh. Not just a low chuckle; this is a boisterous roar that makes him throw his head back.
“You flatter me, Beatrice. But since you won’t ask, I’ll just tell you—you’re in my home now,” he continues, strolling in like a king inspecting his favorite possession. “Your new one. And you’ll stay here, under my rule, just as it was meant to be all these years.”
I don’t move. I don’t blink.
Then he leans forward slightly, his voice dropping to a venomous whisper.
“You’ll behave if you want your son to stay alive, of course. Wouldn’t want anything bad happening to him while you’re here, unaware of anything outside these four walls.”
The words hit me like a blade to the spine. My breath halts. My jaw clenches.
But I lift my chin, trying to muster whatever little courage I have left. I stare him in the eye as the words leave my lips. “Matteo will come for me.”
His grin widens, slow and deliberate. Without breaking eye contact, he lifts a folder and lets it fall at my feet.
Photos slide across the floor.
I track them without moving.
It takes a second for my mind to catch up with what my eyes are seeing.
A funeral.
A white casket adorned with yellow roses. Mourners gathered around it, dressed in black—but that’s not what catches my eye.
In one of the photos, I see my husband holding Daniele. Both of them wear dark glasses, standing front and center. I see the tear stains on my son’s face, and I know instantly what this is.
I fall to my knees, my heart pounding.
It can’t be. It can’t be real.
Giacomo watches me silently, then crouches in front of me. The toxic scent of spice and leather scars the inside of my nose.
“A man will not come for something he believes to be dead. They buried you,” he says. “To them, you’re gone. You no longer exist.”
I can’t breathe.
“If you want to keep our son safe,” he says, “you’ll do exactly as I say. But if you so much as step out of line once, I will deliver his head to you on a silver platter.”
He reaches for my face, but I pull away. He laughs.
“Oh, Beatrice. I told you—I always get what I want at the end of the day.” He stares down at me, his nose tilted toward thefloor, as if I’m beneath him. “You and your little fun—but now you’ve been returned to exactly where you belong.”
I don’t answer. My eyes stay locked on the pictures laid out on the floor in front of me.
He turns on his heels, promising to be back soon, then shuts the door behind him, caging me inside these four metal walls with no way out.
More photos slip free as the file crumples beside me. One of them catches my eye.
Valerio.
He’s standing alone at the edge of my grave. Shoulders hunched, no sunglasses, so I can see the bloodshot eyes. Tears streak down his face, his jaw set hard in place.
He looks like a man broken in half.
