I take a deep breath, and let it out slowly, coming to a decision. “Ariana, Damiano and I aren’t related. We met when I was ten, and his father and sister were killed. I’m sorry we lied to you.”
Damiano looks at me sharply, but what’s the point in hiding it anymore?
Mom’s head snaps up. Ariana stares at me wide-eyed, and then my sister starts to laugh. Shaky, near-hysterical laughter. Tears fill her eyes and spill down her cheeks. “So you’re free to marry the man you love, and he loves you back? Great. That’s just great. I thought we were all going to suffer together, but it’s just me who’s going to be miserable and trapped for the rest of my life.”
Mom rushes toward me with a scream and raises her hand. Before she can strike me, Damiano seizes her shoulders and holds her back.
“Mom, don’t you dare lay a finger on her.”
“You lying little bitch,” Mom screams at me, her face turning from red to purple, and a vein bulges in her forehead. She struggles against Damiano to get to me. “You heinous, spiteful little cow. You’re not related to him? We never needed to adopt you? You disgusting littleparasite.”
Her words are daggers that are meant to wound me. As I look at Mom, turned ugly by her rage, I’m relieved I don’t have to pretend to love her anymore.
I wait for her to draw a breath between screams, and tell her, “Since I was ten years old, I’ve been haunted by the knowledge that I’m the unwanted Barone, and I was terrified that someone would find out my secret. I’m glad you don’t think I’m part of your family. You can go to hell.”
Mom reels back, as if it’s preposterous that anyone wouldn’t clamor to be a Barone. “How dare you? You have ruined our lives. When your father is back on his feet, he is going to…going to…”
Mom falters and falls silent as a man dressed in surgical scrubs comes into the room wearing a somber expression.
Mom hurries over to him. “My husband?”
The surgeon’s expression is sympathetic as he looks at her, though he probably heard our screaming from the other side of the hospital. “He’s alive, but barely. He’s asking for Damiano. You only have a few minutes.”
20
Damiano
The surgeon looks at me, his expression grave. “I warn you, he’s very weak.”
I wasn’t expecting this. I thought Dad would refuse to see me, and that his last act would be to curse me for what I’ve done. Lucy squeezes my hand once, and I see the worry in her eyes.
I follow the surgeon down the sterile corridor, our footsteps echoing off the linoleum. He stops at a door, pushes it open, and gestures me inside.
“Five minutes,” he repeats quietly.
The ICU is cold and filled with the rhythmic beeping of machines. Tubes and wires run from my father’s body to various monitors. An oxygen mask covers his nose and mouth, fogging with each labored breath.
I approach the bed slowly. His eyes are closed, his skin ashen. This is the man who ruled my life and Malus with an iron fist. Hecommanded respect and fear from every family in the city. Now he can barely breathe.
His eyelids flutter open, and his formerly sharp, calculating eyes struggle to focus as they fix on me. He reaches up with a trembling hand and pulls the oxygen mask down slightly. His voice is a rasp, barely audible over the machines.
“Damiano.”
I stand at his bedside, my hands clenched at my sides. “I’m here.”
He studies my face for a long moment. The silence stretches between us, filled only by the beeping monitors and his labored breathing. My stomach clenches as I anticipate what’s coming.
“You and Lucy.” Each word is an effort. “You’re not blood siblings, are you?”
“No. We’re not related. We met the day my father and sister died in the meth lab explosion. I lied to you for ten years so I could protect her and keep her with me.”
I wait for the final curse of a dying man, but Dad just closes his eyes and takes several ragged breaths.
“I should have seen it,” he finally says. “All these years. The way you looked at her. The way you protected her.”
“You’re not angry?”
He makes a sound that might be a laugh. “Angry? I’m dying. I don’t have time for anger.” He pauses, struggling for air. “Lucy kept her suspicions about Andreas to herself, and lying here, I have been wondering what I would have done if she came to me with them.”
