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She barks out a laugh. “Elio, I’m under no illusions that this life is ever going to have a bottom. I think it’s probably just one thing after another, because you’re in this fully. You’re the boss. You run an organized crime organization. There is no end to it.”
Dio. The way that she says it makes me feel like… It’s a bad thing. “Yes, but it is not always this… chaotic,” I offer.
“Sure. Keep telling yourself that.”
“I am usually in more control,” I add.
She shakes her head. “I just want to be safe, Elio,” Caterina whispers.
I look at her. “Do you not feel safe now?”
“No. that has nothing to do with you, though. I mean, it has a little to do with you—” I wince at this, “—but mostly, I don’t think I’ve felt safe since…” her voice trails off.
Since the night my parents died.
I’m so certain that I know what she was going to say, because I feel the same way.
“I know,” I whisper.
“Do you?”
Caterina’s voice is so sharp, it pulls my attention. She’s frowning at me, her hands on her hips.
I have the distinct feeling that I have said the wrong thing.
“Yes. I have not felt safe most of my life, and with my parents’ killers on the loose, I have felt even less so.” I do not mention that I had originally thought Marco responsible, but that seems to go without saying.
Caterina knows where I stand on that.
“Huh. I see,” she looks away.
Merda.I have definitely put my foot in my mouth somehow.
“Caterina, what is wrong?”
“You really have no idea?”
I shake my head, feeling a little pathetic. “No, cara mia. I am not as smart as you think I am. Will you please tell me?”
She sighs, shutting her eyes for a minute. I see tears gather on the edges of her coal-dark lashes.
“Elio, I spent the last six years terrified that you would find me. That you would track Luna and me down. That you would kill me. And that you would take her from me.”
My heart sinks and my throat closes.
I have not felt safe because I did not know what Marco was planning. I did not know if he would strike again after killing my parents, to seal the deal and finish me off as well.
But I was never afraid.
Caterina spent the last six years afraid.
Of me.
The realization is almost too much to bear.
My mouth opens and closes like a fish trying to breathe on land. I wish to say something, anything, that will assuage her fears.
I have nothing to say. I have been Caterina’s monster.
