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I shake my head. “He loves you, Liesel.”
“No, I tried for years to get him to love me like I loved him. When we were teenagers, he learned to piss his father off enough so he would torture him instead of me. He took the punishment meant for me. And of course, I fell in love with him for protecting me. But he wouldn’t let himself fall for me.
“When we got older, I persuaded him to date. It didn’t last long. And even though we were both screwed up, I fell hard. He was the one for me. He protected me. He saved me. He worshipped me. And he vowed to never let another man hurt me again. The fucking was incredible, and his lifestyle was intoxicating. But he never let himself love me. Eventually, he realized he was hurting me more than helping me by dating me, so he broke it off.”
For the first time since Liesel started talking, I see tears in her eyes.
“I loved him, and he broke me. And I can’t ever heal from that.”
I want to tell her how sorry I am. I want to tell her how I understand. But I can’t. It won’t make her feel any better.
“Enzo can’t save those that he loves, so he doesn’t allow himself to fall in the first place.”
“But he protected you,” I say.
“Only after months of abuse.”
I suck in a breath, realizing what Liesel is saying.
“Enzo can’t protect those he loves.
“He couldn’t save his mother.
“He couldn’t protect me.
“He’d rather face the pain himself.”
“What do you want me to do, Liesel? I know that’s the point of the story. Some lesson.”
She cocks her head, shielding her eyes from the sun so she can look at me. “Not a lesson, but a warning. Enzo will never love you. I know you’ve already fallen for him. But you have to let him go.”
“And what if I can’t?” I whisper, clutching my coffee in my hands like it’s a lifeline.
“Then protect him like he would protect any of us.”
“How?”
“You already know the answer to that.”
I nod. I do. Enzo can’t handle those he cares about in pain. He can’t handle not being able to save them. He can’t handle not being enough.
“Promise me you will protect him, put his needs above your own desire to play superhero,” Liesel says.
“I promise,” I say, knowing exactly what I’m promising. That I have to keep myself safe at all costs, even if Enzo gets physically hurt. Because that hurts him less than seeing me suffer.
Liesel and I don’t speak again. We just drink and soak up the sun, waiting for Enzo to finish his surveillance of Milo’s residence.
I thought this whole time I was the broken one. That I was the one who needed healing. Enzo may refuse to love, but he couldn’t stop the feeling from happening. His love saved me. And maybe my love can heal him back.
But what happens if I were to succeed? If I healed him and showed him he is capable of loving? And that love is what makes life worth living. That he can’t fear it. Then what?
Would he choose me, a broken girl who he has to fight for an empire? Or would he pick his childhood friend, who has never betrayed him?
18
ENZO
I KNOW everything there is to know about Milo Wallace.
