Page 23 of Sins of the Son

“Amara, I have a fucking guard following me around! You think that’s normal?”

“Yeah, what the hell is that all about?”

I took a deep breath. This was so not the time for any of this. I threw my head back and stared at the ceiling, trying to form the words. “You know the thing that we never talk about?”

Amara eyed me warily as she sat back down on the edge of the ottoman. “The thing that happened at school? The reason you hate Cesare?”

I swallowed past the dryness in my throat as I blinked back the tears that threatened. Already the walls of the bathroom were pulsing and vibrating. “Yeah, that thing… and the other thing we don’t talk about?”

Amara tilted her head as her lower lip trembled. She knew this was a painful subject for me. She reached out and patted my forearm. “The nightmares?”

I nervously toyed with the thin, gold Gemini charm around my neck as I nodded.

Sometimes the most amazing thing about best friends was not what you told them, but what you didn't have to tell them. I’d never spoken to Amara about what happened that day. Never spoke about the almost-attack, the betrayal, or the lingering trauma and trust issues. And she never asked. Never pushed. She just gave me a shoulder to cry on and let me hide my pain behind a mask of laughter and makeup. And when the nightmares came, and I started leaving the lights on and needing the windows open, she never questioned it or made me feel silly or stupid or weak.

I swiped at a tear as my vision blurred. “I couldn’t do it. I wanted so badly to be happy for you, and to just forget the past, but I couldn’t. So last night I packed my bags, and I was going to leave for Rome.”

Amara sprang up and hugged me tightly. “I knew it. I knew you were going to leave me.”

I wrapped my arms around her middle and pressed my face to her shoulder. “I’m so sorry. I tried. You have to believe me, I tried, but I can’t. I can’t be around them. I can’t be around him. It’s too much.”

She held me close and stroked my hair. “If I hadn’t refused to move into the villa with Barone, he wouldn’t have worried about me being alone at the cottage, which only encouraged Cesare to take you there. I’m the reason you see them all the time now.”

I scoffed. “‘Take me there’ is an awfully nice term for barging into my apartment, declaring it unsuitable, slinging me over his shoulder, and dragging me to the cottage for my own protection.”

Amara leaned back and gave me a weak smile. “But bonus, you get to share the awesome wardrobe Barone bought me.” She then sighed as she hugged me harder. “This is all my fault.”

I pulled away and stared at her. “No. None of this is our fault. It’s their fault. Don’t you see? No one is safe around the Cavalieris.”

She paled. “Don’t say that. I love Barone. He’s a good man. I told you those rumors about him are not true. I mean, technically, some of it is true, but it’s not like people think.”

I sighed. How could I make her understand? “I don’t doubt that you love him or that he loves you. It’s how he loves you I have concerns about.”

She blinked.

I had hit my mark.

She slowly shook her head. “No, Milana. Don’t do this. I’m happy. For the first time since my mother died, I’m happy, and it’s not his money or the things he buys me, it’s him. I love him and he loves me. He wants to marry me.”

“Have you said yes?”

She looked away. “It’s not that simple.”

“Yes, it is. If you love him, and he loves you, then it is that simple. Have… you… said… yes?”

“We’ve barely started dating!”

“Not the point.”

“It’s still too soon.”

“Also not the point if you love one another.”

Amara threw her hands in the air and stepped a few paces away. “Why are we talking about me, anyway? I thought we were talking about you and what happened last night and why you have a freaking guard following you around?”

I crossed my arms over my chest. “We are talking about you because we are both caught in the same damn trap. The Cavalieri trap.”

She rolled her eyes. “There’s no need to make things sound so sinister.”

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