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And she had yet to mention what must have caused her the most turmoil.
“What about Mauricio?”
She turned, her eyes eclipsed by terrible memories. But there was no attempt to hide anything in them anymore.
“He’s your son.”
He’d already been certain. Still, hearing her say it was a bullet of shame and regret through the heart.
“I discovered my pregnancy just before Burton suspected I might have exposed his secrets. I would have had to run anyway even if he never did, since he would have considered I betrayed him in a way that mattered even more to him. I gave birth to Mauri four months afterward, almost three months before I was due. For weeks I thought I’d end up losing him or he’d suffer some major defects. It took the better part of a year before I was finally assured there were no ill effects of his being born so premature.”
Their gazes locked over the knowledge of yet another crime on his record. Her emotional and physical distress as she’d escaped a madman’s pursuit while carrying the burden of her whole family, not to mention her grief over losing him, must have caused her premature delivery. And what she’d suffered during and after... His mind almost shut down imagining the enormity of her torment.
“But as I said before, I hadn’t put two and two together at the time. So I named him Ricardo, after you.”
The consecutive blows had already numbed him. This new one gashed him the deepest. But he’d lost the ability to react to the agony, just welcomed suffering it.
“By the time I worked out what you’d done, and I couldn’t bear being reminded of you every time I called him, he was two. It took him a year to get used to being called by his second name, my father’s, and another to forget his first one.”
So she’d cherished remembering him for two years every time she’d called their son, until she’d discovered his exploitation and the treasured memories had turned to bitterness and betrayal.
His eyes lowered, seeing nothing but a scape of roiling darkness where the most extreme forms of self-punishment swirled in his imagination like hideous phantasms.
“Now it’s your turn.”
Raising his gaze to hers, he no longer even considered not giving her the truth. Not only what she’d asked for, but his whole truth. Every single shred of it.
What no one else knew about him.
* * *
Isabella felt as if she’d just turned herself inside out.
But besides nearly collapsing after she’d poured everything inside her out to Richard, she felt...relieved. More. Freed. She’d never shared this with anyone. Even her mother and siblings. She’d protected them from the burden of the full truth. Though her mother suspected a lot, she’d never caused her the injury of validating her suspicions or inflicting the details on her.
Now only Richard knew everything about her.
His only overt reactions had been to bring half the bar over, guzzle down half a bottle, then smash a window fifty feet away. Apart from that, it was as if he’d turned to stone. He’d had no response to finding out Mauri was his.
He raised his gaze to her, his eyes incandescent silver, his face an impassive mask. And she knew he’d keep his word, would tell her his side of the truth. He’d warned it would horrify her. She’d claimed nothing ever could again.
But she’d lied. Her defenses were nonexistent where he was concerned. Anything with or from Richard devastated her. He was the only one who could destroy her.
Then he started.
“My father was in the Special Forces in the British army before he was dishonorably discharged. Bitter and suffering from severe financial problems after many failed investments, he joined a crime syndicate when I was six. He’d trained me in all lethal disciplines since I can remember, and I was so good that he involved me in his work. Not that I realized what we were doing for a couple of years. Then one day five years later, when Rose turned one, his partners came to tell us he’d been killed. Shortly thereafter, one of those partners started coming to our home. Then one day soon after that, my mother told me she and he just got married and the man—Burton—would now live with us.”
Isabella sat forward, poured herself a drink, having no idea what it was. He’d already knocked her over with the disclosure that Rose was family and Burton had been his stepfather, too. She had a feeling she’d need anything to bolster her for the rest of his revelations.
“I knew Burton had killed my father because he wanted my mother. He’d been fixated on her as he had been with you. But because my mother was nowhere in your caliber, he soon began to mistreat her. And I could do nothing about it.
“Like you, I had a home filled with vulnerable targets, and though already a formidable fighter, I wasn’t fully grown. Even if I could have killed him, that would have destroyed my family. I would have been put in a juvenile prison and my mother wouldn’t have been able to carry on without me. So I did as you did. I played the part of the obedient boy who looked up to him, kept him placated every way I could. I tried to curb my younger brother, too, but Robert couldn’t understand why I was being so nice to him. Rose soon took Robert’s side, and it became Burton’s favorite pastime to abuse them verbally, mentally and then, finally, physically. I hid my murderous hatred, channeled the perfect disciple, knowing it was the only thing that kept him in check, that he could easily kill them as he had our father.”
She gulped down the horrible liquid in her glass, her eyes filling. His gaze showed no indication of his thoughts as he continued recounting his atrocious past like a nuance-less automaton.
“When I was around sixteen, Burton started displaying signs of big money. I sucked up to him even more to find out its source, until he said he was now working for a major cartel just called The Organization, who turned abducted or sold children into mercenaries. He said he could make a bundle if he gave them Robert and Rose, that it would serve the two brats right.
“Knowing he’d do just that, I said surely their price would be a one-time thing, but if I became one of their ‘handlers,’ they’d pay me big money continuously, and he could have it all. Burton didn’t like that it seemed I was protecting my siblings when I always said I could barely tolerate them. He also thought it fishy that I’d offer to give him the money I worked for. I allayed his suspicions, saying I considered it a benefit on all sides. I’d get out of the dump we called home, get rid of my clinging family, and get the best on-the-job experience. The money was in return for giving me this opportunity, as I wouldn’t be doing anything with it for years, with all my needs paid for by my new employers.”
