My heart thundered in my chest as I picked up the piece of paper and scanned Amelia’s elegant handwriting.
My Nestore,
I know you won’t understand my decision. I had to leave. Every moment in this hauntedhouse robbed me of my happiness. It’s full of horrid memories. The walls echo with our past screams, with misery and pain. I can’t bear a day longer under this roof.
I wish you could have come with me, but you can’t. You are on a path of self-destruction that breaks my heart. I wish I could save you. I wish our liberation had been that for you, but you aren’t free of the demons of your past. You want to chase them when, instead, they are chasing you.
This isn’t goodbye for good. This is a “see you later”. One day, we’ll be reunited. When you’ve made peace with yourself and left the past behind. I miss my Nestore. I know he’s still in there. I can’t wait to see him again one day.
With love,
Amelia
I let out a roar as my heart seemed to splinter into a million pieces inside my chest and ripped the letter apart, unable to read it a second time. Amelia was gone. She’d left me.
She’d betrayed the promise she’d given me. My vision turned black at the edges, and pain unlike anything I had ever experienced filled my chest. I screamed again and beganto destroy everything around me. My fists and feet smashed against wood and plaster, and tore at curtains and slashed through canvas, but the pain remained.
Eventually, I sank to my knees amid the rubble of furniture and breathed harshly. I ran a hand over my face, and it came away wet. Tears. I didn’t know I still had them in me. Rage bubbled up and banished the sorrow. How could she leave me? She had been by my side for three years, had risked her life and given her freedom for me, and now that we were both free and I had the power to protect her, she ran?
“Nestore?”
I glared at Niccolo, who hovered in the doorway with a look of uncertainty on his face.
“She left.”
He nodded. “I told you.”
“I’ll bring her back. I’ll find her.”
“She could be anywhere. She doesn’t have a phone or credit cards we could track.”
“I’ll catch her. Tell every soldier in my territory to look for her. I won’t rest until I have her.”
“You need to show your men that you’re capable of leading them. You’ve only been an Underboss for three weeks. You are young, and people will think they can take what’s yours. Remo expects you to rule over California for him. He won’t understand it if you fail because you’re chasing a girl.”
She wasn’t just a girl. “I won’t fail. I’ll rule, and I’ll kill whoever doubts me, but I won’t give up Amelia. She is mine.”
Rage for the guards who’d let her escape rushed through me. “Set up death fights with the men who failed to protect Amelia. They’ll fight me.”
“It’ll be done.”
“But we need to find her. I won’t rest until she’s mine again. I can’t.”
Niccolo scanned the room again, then released a sigh. “I’ll tell everyone we’re looking for her. Do you have a photo of her?”
I froze. I didn’t. There wasn’t a single photo of Amelia and me. And all the old pictures of her had been burned by her father. Not a single one could be found in the entire house.
“I don’t have one,” I murmured, my heart clenching. An image of her played vividly in my head. “Bring me an artist who can do portraits. He needs to create a drawing of her that we can use to send to my men.”
“I never told you happy birthday on turning eighteen, Nestore.” Niccolo took a step back, hesitating, then turned and left.
I had turned eighteen while fighting at Remo’s side and had forgotten my birthday. I had celebrated my last three birthdays with Amelia. Even locked in a cell, my birthday had been better than this one simply because Amelia had been there. I pressed my face into my hands. I hadn’t seen Amelia in four days. Who knew how much longer I wouldn’t get to see her?
I stumbled to my feet, filled with resolve. While locked in the musty basement, I had lived because I had dreamed about a future with Amelia, about a life with her by my side, of her as my wife. I wouldn’t let anyone take that future from me, not even Amelia.
She’d become my wife whether she wanted it or not.
20 years old
