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The voices go on and on for so long that I’m starting to think it’s all in my head, although after maybe thirty minutes, they finally stop. The lights are off now, and I look at my phone. The time reads ten p.m. I was right to come this late for low visibility from the guards below, but also to make sure no one would interrupt further.
I knock on the door subtly and wait, but no one comes. After what feels like forever, I decide to take matters into my own hands and open the door. The room is dark, not one speck of light to illuminate my steps, so I shine my phone’s flashlight at the bed.
It’s empty.
The doors are closed, so no one knows I’m here. Now that I look more closely, the bathroom light is on. I walk toward it with light footsteps, trying to keep as quiet as possible with the hardwood floors and turn the doorknob. It gives way, letting me into a massive bathroom with an extended vanity and three mirrors side by side. A glass shower is in my line of sight, yet there’s no sound coming from it to let me know anyone is in it.
Slowly and quietly, I walk further into the bathroom and stop short at the sight in front of me. Camilla is in the bathtub, her head visible one second and gone the next. She dunks herself under the water until bubbles disappear, and I walk faster. She holds on to the edges of the tub and closes her eyes. She looks relaxed, but either way, I grab her by the arm and yank her up.
Camilla struggles, not knowing what is happening. She sputters and coughs, her hand on her chest and her eyes scrunched shut. I grip her hair at the nape and pull her head back until her eyes meet mine.
“What the fuck do you think you’re doing, princess?” I ask her with a growl, “I know you know you can’t drown yourself.”
“Nik!” she yells, and I shush her. “Baby.” Her face scrunches up as tears roll down her cheeks and she sniffles.
“I love you, Camilla.” I kneel by the tub and she sits up willingly.
“I love you.”
“What. The. Fuck. Were. You. Doing?”
“Not what you were thinking.” She shakes her head.
“What then?”
“Just trying to get peace and quiet, Nik,” she cries out. “I can’t stop dreaming of him, of his death. His image is burned into my brain and I know I’ll never be able to remove it. I don’t want to keep living this way.”
“Youwilllive, though.” I don’t really care what she feels like. It’s insensitive, but as long as I have her, she can have her nightmares. I’m selfish, I’ve never claimed to be anything else. “You’re not leaving me in any way.”
“I already have,” she confirms, her tone nonnegotiable. “Look around, Nikolai. I’m trapped here and I’m not getting out.”
“I’mgetting you out.” She’s delusional if she believes I’ll let her stay here. “But if we want to have a life then we need your father on board. Did Leonardo tell him the news yet?”
Camilla looks at the ring on her finger—which I’m not sure how she got back—and I let go of her, letting her rest her head on the edge of the tub. She sighs, “Yes, he did. Let’s just sayPapàwasn’t happy.”
“Let me guess…” I smirk. “He’s fucking furious and still has high hopes you will marry the man he chose for you. Does he know where we got married?”
“He does.” She looks back at me with fear in her eyes. “He’s going to kill you, Nik. He already said he would and Matteo DeLuca doesn’t fuck around.”
“Maybe, but I’m going to try like hell to convince him to let me stay with you.”
“And how are you going to do that?”
“I’ll offer him something of mine, something important, in exchange for you.”
“Like what, Nik?” She scoffs. “What could he possibly want from you?”
“My seat at the table.”
That’s all I have to offer. My seat in exchange for Camilla. He can fill it with another Italian and return the odds to his favor.
“You’re crazy,” Camilla whispers. “Why would you do that?”
“Because without you my world would cease to exist,” I tell her as I grab her chin and turn her face toward me. “I’mnothingwithout you in my life.”
“I love you,” she whispers, tears falling from her eyes.
“Here’s what’s going to happen, Camilla.” We search each other’s gazes. “You’re going to tell your dad that you want to go somewhere for dinner and he will take you there. I will show up and sit at your table, and we will have a family dinner in public.”
