I lurch toward the back door, but before I can reach it, Mrs. Santoro sees me and hurries to block my way. Her eyes going wide, taking me in. For a moment, something like pity flickers across her face.
Then her gaze hardens, and she takes a deep breath. “Cristiano.” Her voice is quiet, but there’s steel underneath. “Go upstairs.”
“I need to see Mina.” Blood drips onto the kitchen tiles. I must look like a monster, bloody, half naked, and wild-eyed with desperation.
“Mina doesn’t want to see you.”
Through the window, I can see Mina in the passenger seat. She’s staring at me, her eyes red-rimmed and swollen from crying, looking very small and frightened.
“Please, Mrs. Santoro. I just need to talk to her for a minute.” The words come out ragged. I’m shaking with need to get to Mina.
“No. I’m sorry, Cristiano.” She doesn’t raise her voice, but her gaze is unwavering.
“I would never hurt her,” I plead. “I love her.”
“I know you believe that.” Mrs. Santoro’s eyes flick to the knife block on the counter, within arm’s reach. She’s an employee and has spent years deferring to the Montonis, keeping her head down and her opinions to herself. But right now, she’s a mother. And she’ll pull a knife from that block and threaten me with it before she lets me near her daughter.
“I’m taking Mina away from this house,” she says. “You’re not going to follow her. You’re not going to call. You’re going to leave her alone.”
“Please. You can’t. I’m begging you. I’ll get on my knees right here on this kitchen floor if that’s what it takes.”
“It’s best for both of you. Don’t make your father angrier than he already is, for your own sake, Cristiano. Mina doesn’t understand what happened today, and frankly, neither do I. But my daughter needs to get away from this house, and from you.”
She moves back toward the car, keeping her body between me and Mina.
“Stay here, Cristiano. Do not come outside.”
She slips outside before I can stop her, closing the door firmly behind her, and by the time I fumble it open, she’s already in the driver’s seat. The engine turns over.
I stumble outside, my ribs screaming, my vision blurring. The gravel of the drive bites into my bare feet, but I don’t care. I don’t care about anything except getting to that car before it drives away.
“Mina!”
Our eyes meet through the passenger window. Mina’s face is a wreck of tears, confusion, and pain, all tangled together. I reach the passenger door and try the handle, but it’s locked. I press my palms against the glass, leaving smears of blood. “Mina, open this door. Mina, please.”
My voice comes out broken and desperate as I beg the girl I love not to leave me.
“Please, don’t go. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. Just give me a chance to make this right.”
She doesn’t move. Doesn’t roll down the window. Doesn’t do anything except stare at me with those dark eyes full of tears.
The car starts to move.
“No. No, no, no—” I try to keep up, stumbling alongside the passenger door, but the pain in my ribs won’t let me run, and the car is pulling away. Mina is still staring at me, her face crumpling as the distance between us grows.
“Mina.”
The car reaches the end of the drive and turns onto the street.
I make it three more steps before my legs give out, and I collapse onto the gravel, the world spinning around me.
By the time I lift my head, the taillights have disappeared.
She’s gone.
I kneel there in the driveway, blood dripping onto the stones, and there’s only black emptiness inside me.
I was going to kill my father, marry Mina, and build a life with her. A real life, full of love and hope, and nothing of the violence and cruelty that’s defined my existence. Instead, I’m bleeding in a driveway while the only person I love disappears.
