“Amelia,” my father begins to speak.
“It’s nothing,” I remark and look back at Enzo. “Just clean me up, please?”
“It is something. What happened?” my father asks, coming into view more. I can see worry etch across his face and watch me with total concern. It’s almost laughable.
"He flipped out," I comment dryly as Enzo presses more cotton ball doused in antiseptic to my forehead. "It must have been a reaction to the poison or something."
"Your neck," my father states, his eyes darken considerably. I haven’t seen the bruising on my neck or face so I have no idea how much the coloring is coming out. "He put his damn hands on you, Amelia."
"He's dead," I reply back, keeping it on point. "Job done. You can't do anything worse to him than I already have." I hiss as Enzo wipes the cut again and close my eyes as they water.
"I was told this wouldn't happen," my father speaks through clenched teeth. "You're never meant to get hurt." I could almost think for a moment that my father cares, but just as it always has been, the caring family man dies out and back comes the leader of the Abbiatis. "There had better not be anything that could have linked you to that crime scene."
I roll my eyes. "I called your guys. They are working on cleaning it up." I knew the concern wouldn't lay solely on me. It's probably best I prepare myself for being below my father's number one priority - never get caught. “So don’t worry, I took a beating, but Big Al is dead, your secret’s safe with me!” And just like that my nerves disband and I feel an overwhelming need to escape the room. I swat Enzo away, telling him to stop, and I begin to rise. I do it all too quickly, but my ribs stop me as they begin to feel like they’re being attacked all over again. I hiss and drop back down to my seat, breathing through the pain the best I can.
“How bad?” my father asks, coming to my side.
“Nothing that won’t heal,” I brush off, to diffuse his worry. Finally standing, I move away from everyone, but my father stops me. “I just want to go up to my room.”
“How does this happen, Bambina?” he asks me, and I shake my head. Apparently, in doing so, I only make him think it was all my fault. “I don’t understand how he got this physical with you. You’re supposed to spike his drink or something! Not get so carried away with your sexual needs that he learns the whole truth before you’re able to kill him! I knew this was a stupid idea.” He puts his hands onto his head and curses. “Fuck, Amelia. You are just supposed to lure them in, not get greedy! I learned from Jimmy’s death that you really liked to fuck them around before you kill them, but to allow Big Al to get this far? What did you do that provoked him? Did you tell him, or did he catch you trying to poison him? Were you stupid and reckless with this one?”
As his questions fly at me, I flip. Just like that, all my rational senses defuse, and I lash out.
“Big Al tried to rape me! Are you happy now?” I scream at him, and instinctively his hands come to grab me. I start pushing his hands away, agitation taking me over. “He knew the game before I had even started playing it. He knew what I was up to, and it took me slamming my fucking heel into his neck to stop him from raping me and sending me back as a gift to you!”
I see the shock on his face and decide to carry on.
“He nearly got me as well, by the way.” I lay another brick of truth in front of him. “If I hadn’t have had that opportunity, then I dread to think of what mess I’d have come home as. He was so close to making it happen,” I tell him, letting every truth out. “And for once, I realized my name wasn’t going to save me. The fact I’m your daughter wasn’t going to help me out. What I’ve done for you in the past didn’t stop him either. I’m not some invincible little princess like you made me think I am.” I look at him, bearing my soul and hatred all at once. “I’m just as expendable, as twisted, and as helpless as the rest of them, and I’m just sorry it took me this long to realize it.”
I begin to break down before my father. Years of abusive torment and empty threats so powerful I cowered to my father’s every whim are now destroying me from the inside out. I was full of confliction and lacked the ability to just say no, but now it’s all killing me. Slowly, piece by piece, my soul becomes weaker and weaker. I’m so oppressed in this family, that it’s suffocating me, and my only reason to live, my only source of oxygen, has a limit on his time alive.
As I falter, my father steps in, putting his arms onto my biceps, and I react as if he’s burned me.