Page 130 of Brutal Legacy

Elio just watched me storm over to the table and fumble it open.

“Did you look in here?” I asked and ripped the lid open.

He shook his head slowly.

“Why not? You don’t care that much about me to know? I mean so little to you nowadays that you don’t even care what I’d bother trying to preserve?”

“Georgia. We don’t have time for you to lose your mind right now,” Elio ground out.

I had the box open, and the contents spilled across the table. His eyes drifted to the photos and papers from the box and then slid away.

I collected the photos and shoved them at Elio.

“Look at my family pictures — look at them!”

“I don’t have time to walk down memory lane with you right now.”

I scoffed, but air had become too precious, and I could barely afford it.

“You just don’t want to know the truth, because then all those years of hating me would have been for nothing,” I wheezed out and slammed my eyes closed. “You want to blame me. It’s all my fault, right?” The words left me before I could call them back.

I knew he blamed me, though I wasn’t sure why. His sister had alluded to that much. The past was a yawning dark chasm that threatened to swallow us both. It had to come out. We had to put those demons to rest.

“Are you punishing me? Is this the game?” My voice was high and desperate, untamable.

“Punishing you? You have no idea about the ways I’ve been punished for loving you!” he roared at me.

I stilled, my lungs growing tighter. His sudden rage shocked me. I’d never seen Elio lose control like that. His eyes were blazing, and his expression was livid.

“I was punished in prison, every single fucking day, for loving you. For daring to touch you — I was beaten every single night.”

“What?” I wheezed out.

“Then I was shipped off, far from home, alone, in the blistering sun, fighting other men’s wars, representing other interests, while I lost my fucking soul! And I didn’t care — I didn’t even try to fight it, because if I couldn’t have you, I didn’t need it anyway.”

His words echoed around the room and arrested my panic attack completely.

My lungs released and filled, and the fight left me. I closed my eyes, allowing my mind to drift.

“I saw you — footage of you stealing some bag with money in it and running away… And then a PI I hired found some taxi driver who claimed he’d driven you to the train station… a young man with a Naples accent and light-green eyes.”

I opened my eyes to meet his.

“You.”

He stared at me, shocked into silence.

“I sat at my window every night for weeks flickering that damn light toward the barn. Every night I was sure that the light would flash back. You’d have come back for me… but you never did.”

Elio wet his lips and cleared his throat. “You married Conti,” he reminded me.

I nodded and looked down at the photos I was still clutching in my hand. I pulled out one in particular and handed it to Elio.

“I married Tommaso because I couldn’t stay in that house without you. After knowing you… I couldn’t stay. I’d break completely. So, I married Tommaso, and I ran away like you.”

I pressed the photograph into his hand.

“That was my family.”

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