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"I’m fine," I repeated myself, hoping she might believe it this time. "I know a lot has been happening, and I’m … I’m sorry I can’t tell you more."
Alex sank down next to me, slipping an arm around my shoulders. I wished I could tell Mom I was with him; she had always liked Alex, and she probably would have been glad to hear he was part of all of this.
"Promise me you’re okay," she told me. "Promise me, darling. I need to hear it from you."
"I’m okay, Mom," I replied, and she let out a long, shaky breath. I doubted she was entirely convinced by that, but it was something; a start, at least.
"But I need you to listen to me," I told her urgently. "You have to get out of the city, out of Bianco. You and Leo. As soon as you can, okay?"
"What are you talking about?" she asked, sounding confused.
"It doesn’t matter where you go, you just need to get out of the city for a while. A few days, maybe. Can you do that for me?"
"You need to tell me why," she replied, stubborn as ever. Like me, she’d listened to my father’s excuses for too long to take anything at face value, and she always demanded a reason for doing anything.
"Because I’m worried that Gregor might come after you and Leo," I confessed. "He … He’s looking for me. And I’ve seen … I’ve seen enough to know that he’s going to do whatever he can to get what he wants."
"But we don’t know anything."
"That’s not going to stop him," I warned her, a pang in my chest as I thought about how scary this had to be for her. As though she hadn’t been through enough as it was already …
She took a deep, shaky breath, which came down the line in a rush of static. I could tell she was trying to gather herself, trying to figure out just how to handle this. I knew she believed me; knew she took me seriously.
"We will," she promised me. "We will, darling."
"Thank you," I replied, breathing a long sigh of relief at the sound of those words coming out of her mouth. I needed them to be okay in all of this. I knew I would never have been able to forgive myself if something had happened to either of them because I had chosen not to go back to Gregor.
"Just tell me one thing," she pressed. "Before you go."
"Anything," I replied.
"You’re … You’re better off without him, aren’t you?" she asked me. "Away from him, I mean?"
"So much better off," I told her. "I’m sorry it had to cause all this trouble …"
"It’s not trouble, if it makes you happy," she promised me. "You know I never wanted you to have to go through with that wedding in the first place. You deserve your own life. Not one where you’re trying to make amends for everything your father did."
I pressed my lips together, holding back tears again. I just wanted to give her a giant hug, have her tell me that everything was going to be alright, even if neither of us really believed it. She was the only person who could make me feel sure like that, but I knew she was having to put her trust in me right now, and I was so grateful that she was willing to.
"I have to go," I told her. "But I’ll be in touch again as soon as I can, okay?"
"Okay, darling," she replied. "I love you."
"I love you too," I whispered back, and then I hung up the phone before she could hear me break down into tears at last.
Chapter Twelve – Alex
I listened to the shower running next door, and laid back on the bed, catching my breath after the chaos of everything that had happened today.
I was still trying to wrap my head around the enormity of it, everything that had gone down. It still felt crazy to me; the kind of crazy I wasn’t sure I was ever going to make sense of. The attack on the house, getting Morgan out of there, seeing my men lying dead on the ground and knowing the man behind it was likely still hot on our tail—it was a lot to take in, a lot to wrap my head around.
The TV was on beside me, but I could hardly pay attention to whatever was happening on it. The conversation I’d heard Morgan have with her mother was playing over and over again in my mind, as she had pleaded with her mom to get somewhere safe. I had lost my mom years ago, when I was a kid, but I couldn’t imagine how hard it must have been for her to know her family was at risk because of the choice she’d made—the choice to stay away from Gregor instead of giving that monster what he wanted.
I had known, from the moment I had decided to get her out of there, that it wasn’t going to be easy. I wasn’t stupid, and I knew what Gregor was capable of. I had heard stories through the grapevine through the years, but I had never thought he would turn that wrath on me.
I supposed some part of me couldn’t wrap my head around the reality of what he wanted from Morgan, how far he was willing to go to get what he wanted from her, even though she clearly hated the thought of it. How could any man willingly push a woman into the life he was trying to force from her? Did he get off on it in some way, knowing she had no choice but to go through with it? It was sickening to imagine.
I just wanted her to be free from that, but what cost did it come at? That was the question I had to ask myself. Was it a price I was willing to pay? I felt this connection to her, this draw to her. It was more than just physical; no, it ran deeper than that. I had known her for so long, and I felt duty bound to protect her and keep her from this nightmare she had been pulled into. She deserved better. She always had.
