Chapter 92

I am rooted to the spot, paralysed and I literally start to tremble; that look never breaking, and he doesn’t blink once.

I can almost feel myself getting faint as my body gives way a little. Gino is talking at him, getting minimal response, but it’s holding the beast at bay. Gino looks at me over his shoulder and I can see the tension, the air of concern that he knows he’s only just marginally keeping Alexi under control and has doubts as to whether he can keep it up. He looks genuinely concerned, and it just fuels the wave of nausea which overpowers me.

‘‘Go upstairs, Camilla … Now!’’ Gino snaps and I can almost see Alexi’s muscles bulging and tensing with growing anger, hating me and barely keeping himself under control as I turn and hightail it upstairs. I get to the upper balcony and halt when I hear his tone and it makes my blood curdle.

‘’I’m going to fucking kill her. No one runs from me.’’ Alexi sounds insane and it just adds new levels of terror to what I already feel. I sink down, my body suddenly weak, and I’m unable to keep moving on my legs that have given up the game, clinging to the bannister in a bid to ground myself.

‘’Be smart … think about this and calm the fuck down.’’ Gino, I presume, as he sounds exactly the same, only not angry just indulgent and calmer. He sounds like someone who knows how to pacify the devil or at least try to.

‘’Calm down? She had the nerve to run Gino, which part of that don’t you get? How this looks and what that means.’’ Alexi sounds volcanic and I have never seen or heard him lose his cool quite like this. This terrifies me more than that danger tone of his. This one is purely emotional and unbridled anger.

‘’Why did she run Alexi, huh? Because you are making her terrified. She’s obviously afraid of you and whatever you did to make her run. You’re only going to make it happen again if you go up there like this.’’

Listen to your brother, he talks sense. I couldn’t be any more afraid of him than I have become and this only fuels that fire. Gino has a very good point. I ran because of Alexi.

‘’I’ll chain her to the fucking house.’’ He growls in response, and I curl up tightly on the landing and try not to cry. Sliding my arms around my legs and rocking myself to try and stay calm while listening intently. I want to know my fate rather than sit and wait in my room for it to come to me, and judging by his tone and responses, I don’t have much of a future left.

‘‘I brought her here to keep her safe and this is how she repays me!’’ I can make out footsteps pacing around, and I can almost imagine him like a caged animal, crazily walking the room to simmer that temper and keep his shit together. Although he’s right, he did bring me here to keep me safe, yet the only person who is an actual danger to me is Alexi.

‘‘She came back, didn’t she? She came to face you knowing what was waiting for her. You got to give it to her Alexi, she’s got balls. For all that sweet face and vulnerable look, she’s a gutsy one and obviously under your skin if this is anything to go by.’’ Gino sounds less intimidating than Alexi, a kinder tone to his voice but I still don’t trust him, he’s definitely one to watch. Devious should be the Carrero middle name.

‘’You don’t know her like I do, it’s all an act. She’s a born manipulator and a whore.’’ It cuts more than it should, I don’t know why but it does. It’s not just that he thinks everything I do or say is gameplay, but the fact he’s calling me that when he doesn’t even know what I was. That word has always been a huge trigger for me; I hate it and what it represents, what it means to be called that. I abhor it with every fibre of my being, and I start to silently well up with as much anger as fear over his use of something I despise.

What would he call me if he knew all the tiny dirty details of my past?

Tears break loose and pour down my cheeks, my heart aching even though it’s for a dumb reason. I hate him, I never want him to touch me ever again yet it wounds me to hear him call me that. I didn’t choose that path, I had to live with the hand I was dealt and survive while doing it.