Your daughter is lovely. And then, the photograph of her that Benedetto had taken. It was as though she’d been smacked in the solar plexus. She tried to pull her hand free; she couldn’t bear to be touched by him. But he was still so terrifyingly strong. She remembered the way his fingers had been able to press into her neck and stop her from breathing. So easily, as though he was kneading dough.
“This is a mistake,” she said haltingly, her body so flooded by terror that she felt like she might collapse to the ground at any moment.
“You bet your arse it is. I did not raise you for this. My God, Katherine, you disappeared for four years and now I find you’re living with this asshole? What the hell?”
“I’m not living with him,” she said softly. Her wrist was hurting, but she tried notto let him see that. Another lesson she’d learned over time – he enjoyed seeing her flinch. He liked wounding her. That was part of the control for him.
“You got that right. We’re leaving.”
The surge of certainty was powerful. If she left with him, she’d never be safe again. She’d escaped once. She couldn’t go back to a life in his orbit. But how could she break the lifetime habit she had of submitting to him? Of choosing the path least likely to inflame?
Benedetto.
He’d be home soon.
Whatever else he’d done, she knew he would never let Augustine hurt her. Nor would he let Augustine take her against her will.
“I need to grab a few things,” she said, playing for time.
But Augustine was smart. Too smart. He reached up and wrapped his fingers in her hair, close to her scalp, then pulled hard. It jerked her neck back. “Get out of his house, now. I will not let him have you.”
Kate sobbed. The pain was blinding. “Please don’t,” she said softly.
“He’s using you. Do you know that? He’s using you because he’s obsessed with punishing me. And you’re letting him. You’re a dumb bitch, Katherine, but I didn’t know you were so completely stupid.”
“Don’t,” she tried pull her head up but he yanked on it again.
“What the hell is going on here?” Benedetto’s voice came to her as if carried by the wings of angels. Tears were running down her cheeks. She knew that one way or another she would be saved from Augustine, and that was all she could think of. Beyond that, she would simply cope with things one step at a time.
“I’m only going to say this once: Get your hands off her.”
The silence sparked with caustic rage; it was beyond anything Kate could understand. But Augustine released her, and when she stood, blinking and rubbing the back of her hair to ease the throbbing pain, she could see why. The man she feared with all her heart was no match to the man she’d believed she loved with all her heart.
Physically, they were chalk and cheese. Benedetto could slay Augustine with a single punch, she had no doubt.
Benedetto stared at Kate, but he didn’t touch her.
He had no right. And she was glad. She couldn’t bear to be with either of them. As soon as Augustine was gone, and the coast was clear, she too would leave.
Her heart, so used to being broken and betrayed, switched off from feeling. She wouldn’t process the hurt now.
Survival mattered more.
“You had no right to do this,” Augustine spoke with cold fury.
“Do you think not?”
Kate braced herself against the wall behind her. Her wrist was throbbing.
“She’s nothing to you. Nothing to do with you and me. She is just my daughter.”
“And he was my father,” Benedetto responded with cold fury. “It is done now.” His eyes flashed to Kate. Guilt almost felled him.
“So what? You think this is revenge? You sleep with her and send me a photo? That’s pathetic and it won’t bring him back. Nothing will.” Augustine’s sneer was vile and at another time, Benedetto might have given into the desire to punch it from his face.
But violence did not come naturally to him.
Instead, he moved his body to stand between Augustine and Kate. “Get out of my house.”
