Page 113 of Runaway in the Mafia
Eight minutes later, she quietly slipped into my car.
I couldn’t get myself to look at her. But couldn’t stop myself from asking, either. “Is this why you didn’t want me fucking you raw? I’ve been thinking you wanted to run your business. Thought I was supporting your professional needs. Didn’t realise it was so you could pretend you were still fucking the limp dick.” Her lack of an answer drummed loudly in my ears. With a heavy sigh, I leaned forward and started the car. “It would be difficult, of course, to explain a mixed child.” I shook my head. “To think I thought I knew my fucking wife.”
I drove blindly. Used my sixth sense rather than my eyesight. A thousand times I’d taken this route. This was the only time that would cling to my nightmares.
The second the motor strummed to a stop, her voice seeped into my heart. “I thought I was yours,” she whispered quietly.
I laughed, the hollowness of it sinking deep into my chest. “You were never mine to begin with. I was an idiot to think you ever were.”
She turned to me, a speech ready to burst out of her sweet lips. Could tell already from her stance from the corner of my eye. “Please let me come back with you.” She clutched my hand. “I don’t want to be without you.”
I sighed. Didn’t she know? I couldn’t survive without her. Wouldn’t last a day. But I needed her mind, body, and soul. A worse agony than an absent wife was one present in form but too far buried in her soul to ever be yours.
I turned, laced my fingers along her hand, and tucked her hair behind her ear. Her eyes were red-rimmed. Haunted. The love she had for her papa, I wanted that. The type of love that she would sacrifice everything for him.
I touched her chin softly because I couldn’t help myself. Couldn’t keep myself from being close to her. Trying to wrap around her and hope she’d forget everyone and embrace me.
“I can’t. I want all of you or nothing.”
I would never stand in her way with her family. The choice was always hers. Never mine to make. Never mine.
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
AHANA
My feet dragged on the gravel as his car took off with a burst of its engine. A distant roar and a cloud of dust was all that remained. As temporary as the bond between us had been.
The front door flew open, and Ada rushed out. Somehow, seeing her brought it all back.It really is over.I had wanted to control everything. Up to how I told Papa and when I did it. In that battle for his safety, I had somehow lost the one thing that had brought me back from the hellhole I had been in. Him. Realisation hit me like stones in my chest. My knees buckled and hit the gravel. Sobs retched out of my lungs. Next to me, Ada fell to her knees and held me in her arms.
Vaguely, I thought how different she was from Maa. She held me and let me sob it out. She didn’t ask why, where, when, or what. She didn’t tell me to pick myself up and crawl back to my husband. But that was probably because she knew. There wasn’t any hope of him ever accepting me back. Vitale loved like a lunatic. But when hate infiltrated his heart, he raged like thedevil.Unforgotten. Unforgiven.That thought made my heart rip apart.
So we sat there, under the hot sun of Sicily, on the dusty gravelled path, the only noise my heart-wrenching sobs.
Eventually, even my glands dried up. Only dry heaves remained of a disastrous day. Finally, I gathered up the courage to stand up. Ada held on to me, and together we hobbled inside. When the front door slammed shut behind me, it felt as final as the end of my short-lived marriage.
“Your room is still here for you,” Ada said.
I nodded and pulled myself up the stairs. I didn’t know how she knew me so well, but without me telling her, she knew I wanted to crawl into my bed and bawl under my sheets. And that’s exactly what I did. In my dress, stained with dust, I hid from the world I’d destroyed and wept.
My first marriage fell apart through no fault of mine. But this was all on me. And the only direction I could point with my fingers was right back at me.
My conscience didn’t prickle. It screamed accusations. Somehow, somewhere, I’d lost the plot. Not deciding was deciding. I’d decided to shield my family. Used one excuse after another not to risk losing them, and in that single action, pushed the man I loved away. The same one who loved me back. Tirelessly. Even though I’d pushed him away countless times. Stood on my tiptoes to run away at any given time.
He hadn’t said those words. Not even close. But buried deep within his hard fucks, dark glares, and harsh words, something sparked so brightly I could see it like a veil lifted off, and the Maharaja’s heirlooms were on display.
Overwhelming guilt flooded into my mind.
When I finally told Maa that Rajesh beat me, her response had shocked me. Changed me. Ripped the naivety I’d carried off me.Suck it up, Ahana.My mother, who was supposed toprotect me no matter what the cost. Who should have loved me. Unconditionally. She let me down that day and every day that passed. Only one who didn’t was the man I’d hurt through my actions. He killed him without a single doubt. Didn’t even have to prove anything. Give him the sordid details of how, when, and where. He believed me. Just like that.
I’d been insulted by Maa so many times. Too many to count. Yet once was all it took for him to pull his knife and drop his uncle to the floor.
He chose me. Every single time.
Even Papa had stuck to traditions. He hadn’t allowed me to work. And he’d followed through with an arranged marriage, even though he should have known in his heart of hearts that I wasn’t ready for it. He’d allowed Maa to persuade him. Gone ahead and done what society announced was normal.
But Vitale had defied his, so he could marry me.
Tight emotion burned in my throat. Made my eyes gush with a fresh batch of tears.
