Page 79 of Brutal Husband

The only comfort I have is my tattoo. I stare at the flower for hours, days, thinking of her. Rieta is my anchor. She’s the only thing that helps me remember that I’m human.

When they drag me out and throw me back in with the other prisoners, Bogdan tuts and shakes his head.

“They are going to kill you one day if you do not learn to shut your mouth and keep your head down.”

“I can’t help myself. Every time I look at these fucking guards, I picture Luca, and I lose all control.”

“Then you will do your job for your brother. You will die, and his hands will stay clean.”

I’m going to die here. The cold and hunger will get to me, or more likely my temper will get me beaten to death. With every day that passes, I slip further into despair.

Until one day, a guard pulls open the door to the cell I share with the other prisoners and shouts Luca’s name.

23

Rieta

The tale Nero tells is devastating and incredible, but I have no trouble believing that every word is true. I’ve seen the scars on his back. Witnessed his rage upon his return. Who wouldn’t be angry after being locked away in that nightmare place for so long?

“How did you get home?” I ask in a trembling voice. “How did you escape?”

We’ve left Costa’s apartment, and we’re at home, sitting on the sofas. I’ve changed out of my lace dress and into some pajamas. Nero has taken off his jacket, but he’s still wearing his shirt.

His eyes widen. “You believe me? I thought you would tell me that I’ve gone mad, or that I should stop lying to your face. I’ve told you so many lies,cara mia.”

He has, but I remember the words he said to me at our wedding reception right before he left.I will always be yours.It wasn’t so much what he said, but the way he said it. Hespoke with so much intensity and devotion. He must have been thinking about his confrontation with Luca and how difficult it would be to convince his brother that we should be together. He was leaving my side, but he had every intention of coming back to me, and when he did, he and I were going to be together forever.

Only his plan failed, and both our lives became nightmares as we were manipulated and controlled by Luca.

“I believe you. So tell me how you did it.”

“I didn’t escape,” Nero tells me. “You freed me.”

“Me?” I exclaim. “I didn’t do anything.”

He touches the daisy tattoo on his arm. I thought he got the ink to mock me, but Nero used memories of me to survive that awful place. I can picture him in that icy cell, the paper clip wire clutched in his fingers as he shivered, painstakingly inking the petals.

“You killed Luca, and because he was no longer paying the bill for my imprisonment, they kicked me out into the snow. I was in the middle of nowhere with no food, money, and no warm clothing. I didn’t know why I was free, but I wasn’t going to squander this miracle. I started walking and I found a village. A smuggler realized where I came from and took me in. I suppose it happens now and then that prisoners are released, or they escape, and for a hefty sum of money, the smuggler told me he could get me back to America.”

“But you didn’t have any money.”

“Not on me, but Luca hadn’t thought to lock me out of our bank accounts. The smuggler let me use his computer, and I was able to remember some numbers. I was in a pretty bad way, physically and mentally, but while I waited for arrangements to be made for my travels, I ate and slept and got my strength back. It took nearly two weeks for the smuggler to find passage for me back to the United States. It wasn’t easy. I had to enterillegally from an Alaskan port in the middle of nowhere, but finally, I made it back here. And I watched you. There you were, the woman of my dreams, going about her life as if nothing happened and I never existed, with no sign of my brother anywhere.”

Those weeks he watched me, I felt his angry eyes on me. I knew I was being watched, but I didn’t know it was my own husband stalking me. “Why didn’t you just talk to me?”

He shakes his head slowly. “I’m not proud of this, Rieta. My head was a frightening place. For months, I had imagined confronting Luca about what he did to me, visualized it and fantasized about it as much as I fantasized about you, only to return and see that you were doing fine without me, and that there was no trace of Luca. I would never be able to confront him. Make him apologize to me. Understandwhy. All my anger at my brother was transferred onto you.”

It’s painful remembering how angry Nero was when he returned, and the things he said and did. It’s even worse imagining him in that prison, being tortured and starved with no hope of ever returning home, and all because of the brother to whom he’d been so loyal. After the ordeal Nero went through because of Luca, it’s amazing he was able to cling to his sanity.

“After what you’d been through, of course you were angry. You were traumatized in that place.” I step closer and put a hand against his cheek.

He captures my hand and pulls it away, gripping my fingers hard. “I don’t deserve your pity after everything I’ve done to you.”

I trace the hard line of his jaw with my eyes. The dark slashes of his brows.

After everything he’s done to me. The lies. The brutality. Becoming my savior and then vanishing into thin air.

I should hate him, shouldn’t I?

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