I’ve been left in the dark while Salvatore works with his men to try and find them. No one has heard from him in years, so why now? Why all of a sudden would he come back and take two innocent people? Why wouldn’t he take John or Cecily? It doesn’t add up. I know there has got to be more.
Guilt surges through my veins. I’m the only one who came out of this nightmare unscathed, except for the knot on the side of my head where I must have gotten bumped on impact when the truck flipped and crashed into a building. Cecily has a broken arm, bruises on her face, and burns across her neck and shoulder from the seatbelt. John is banged up all to hell. He’s got stitches in his forehead and some broken ribs. It’s a damn miracle any of us are even alive.
Cecily is going crazy, crying constantly over not knowing where her daughter and her nephew are. John has been bandaged and is gone, looking for a man who is known to do worse things to his victims than even himself. I need to be out there helping instead of here with my hopeless thoughts. I just got her back. I need her. We all need them both.
“Fuck!”
I can’t stay here anymore. They’re out there somewhere, I know they are.
“Cain.”
I turn around to the sound of Salvatore’s voice. He strides in with the same clothes on from yesterday, looking like shit. There isn’t any other way to describe it. He hasn’t slept from his worry, just like the rest of us. His wife, Lola, is going out of her mind. She’s normally so calm and collected just like Cecily, and now she’s just a shell of a woman. She is guilt-stricken, blaming herself for all of this.
“Any news?” I ask Salvatore, veering away from the window.
“Not a damn thing,” he sighs in frustration.
“They’re out there, I know they are. I can feel it in here.” I pound my fist against my chest.
“We’ll find them. Look,” he says, “I know you feel helpless here, but if I let you go out there to help with the search and something happens to you, I will never forgive myself. I need you here. I need you to take care of Lola and Cecily while I’m gone.”
His sudden change of course has me puzzled.
“I thought you said you were staying here in case he calls?”
“I can’t stay here anymore. It’s me he really wants. It’s me who he thinks destroyed him and kicked him out of this family. I need to make myself visible. He wants me and he knows he can’t get to me here. I’m going to make it easy on him.”
“He’ll kill you,” I caution him.
“He won’t kill anybody until he gets what he wants.”
“Salvatore, you need to tell me everything. You need to tell me why in the hell your oldest son would turn on his family.”
“I’ll tell you why.”
Lola stands in the doorway. Her once strikingly beautiful dark hair is unkempt and there are dark rings around her eyes. Her mouth set in a tight line. For a fifty-one year old lady she’s always looked so much younger than her years, but today she looks well past her age. This has got to be hard on her, knowing that one of her children has taken the other and is doing God knows what to him.
“Lola,” Salvatore warns.
“Don’t ‘Lola’ me. Damnit, Sal. Cain has a right to know. That’s his wife out there somewhere with Royal, and he deserves to know why. So either you tell him, or I will. You have no other choice.”
The two of them study each other powerfully. For the first time since I’ve known Salvatore, I see fear mixed with pain in his expression. The way he looks at Lola, telling her with his stare how sorry he is, makes me wonder even more what the hell is happening around here and how it affects Calla.
“Very well. Shower, Cain. Meet me downstairs in the kitchen in half an hour. We will tell you everything.”