My breaths deepened, each one matching my heartbeat. As we got closer to Aurelio's club, the air felt tense and heavy. Opening the car door, my body trembled with each step on the ground. One of the twins signaled the club's guard to call Aurelio.
Leaning against the car, my face turned paler as I waited. A sudden dizziness blurred my vision. Just as I was about to collapse, Aurelio caught me, gently brushing my hair aside as he checked my eyes.
"Damn it," he muttered. "You're bleeding." I hadn't noticed the blood staining his hands. My hand moved to my stomach, finding a bullet wound from Giovanni's gun. My eyelids grew heavy, slowly closing.
Aurelio lifted me, instructing the twins, "Get in and drive, now!"
"Head to Guapo's," he commanded.
"The club?" one of the twins asked.
"No, you idiot, the doctor," Aurelio snapped, focused on me as he pressed his blazer against my wound to stop the bleeding.
The world around me started to spin, and I could feel myself slipping into the darkness, the blood loss taking its toll.
***
My eyes fluttered open, the pain still lingering, flashbacks surging like waves as I lay in bed. My hand instinctively moved to my abdomen, now adorned with stitches, and swathed in bandages. My vision was blurred, my mind disoriented, yet tears managed to escape, tracing a wet path down my cheeks.
In Apollo's absence, all I could do was acknowledge my pain and hope for its departure.
"Where am I?" I whispered.
"The boys brought you here just in time," the doctor informed me.
Aurelio leaned in, his face a comforting presence above mine. In a soothing whisper, he reassured me, "You'll be fine."
I withdrew my hand from Aurelio's grasp, tears continuing their journey down my cheeks.
I found myself questioning God, wondering why I had to endure such pain. But I knew I couldn't blame God for the actions of a wicked man, nor could I blame myself for simply being present.
If I were to blame everyone, the list would be endless, but the ache in my heart was far greater as I yearned for Apollo. I craved his presence and yearned to lose myself once again in our shared bubble of happiness.
I turned to the other side of the bed, surrendering myself to my thoughts.
"You've already met the twins," Aurelio stated, his words hanging in the air with a weight that belied their simplicity.
"Boris and Ivan will protect you," he declared, leaving me stunned, lost in my own thoughts. His voice remained firm, underlining the gravity of the situation.
"I have to leave now, but you must understand, you're now the most wanted woman among families," he sighed, "You need twins by your side."
With a comforting hand on my shoulder, he reassured me before leaving. Left with Boris and Ivan, I saw the weight of their experiences in their eyes. Boris gazed out the window, lost in thought, while Ivan sat with a somber expression, tears threatening to fall.
"We know what he did to you," Boris said softly, his voice full of empathy.
"He got what he deserved," Ivan added, anger simmering beneath his words. "We were just kids when he took us in... You can't imagine the horrors we've been through."
Ivan's pain echoed his brother's. "He scarred us for life. Every time I see my reflection, I'm reminded of what he did."
Their scars told stories of agony and survival, some bearing an eerie resemblance to Apollo's own scars. The realization struck me like a thunderbolt – could Apollo too have been a victim of his uncle's cruelty? His silence, his visible fear, hinted at a pain deeper than physical wounds.
It appears their memories were leaking from their eyes, cascading down their cheeks as they voiced their truth. Now, I was the one who bore witness to their silent cries.
As I looked into their eyes, I saw beyond the facade of strength and resilience. Underneath it all was two boys who had endured a living nightmare.
All I could manage to say, through the pain that tightened around my throat, was a sincere, "Thank you."
***
As I shifted in bed, exhaustion weighed heavy on my eyelids, pulling me towards sleep. Yet, Giovanni's haunting figure lingered, a specter in the darkness. His face, etched with pain and longing, remained eternally imprinted in my mind.
Darkness descended like a shroud, enveloping me, and suffocating my thoughts. Every time I closed my eyes, his presence intensified, a relentless reminder of the anguish within me.
Tears streamed down my cheeks, silent witnesses to the agony threatening to overwhelm me. I yearned for the solace of sleep, to escape the torment of his memory, but he awaited me in the depths of my subconscious.
With a trembling breath, I forced my eyes shut once more, hoping to escape my tormentor's grasp. But as darkness surrounded me, Giovanni's hands closed around my neck, cutting off my air. Panic surged through me as I struggled against his suffocating hold.
Just as I felt myself slipping away, another face appeared in my dreams. Apollo, his gentle features filled with sorrow, stood beside Giovanni, silently witnessing my suffering. Their presence intertwined, a cruel blend of past and present, weaving a tapestry of pain that threatened to unravel me.
Gasping for air, I fought to wake up, my heart racing like a bird trapped in a cage. Sitting up, I struggled to catch my breath, feeling the fragile thread that bound me to life.
In the quiet of the night, I clung to the fragments of my shattered composure, my hand trembling against my racing heart. Each beat echoed in the stillness, a reminder of my strength in the face of darkness.
"Donna, are you okay?" Ivan's gentle voice shattered the remnants of my nightmare.
"I can't sleep," I confessed, my voice barely a whisper, echoing the depth of my pain.
"With time, it becomes more bearable," Ivan offered softly. "Sometimes, survival demands turning the tables on the abuser."
"But that's not who I am. I've always been a survivor, nothing more," I asserted.
"No, Donna, you're a fighter," Ivan gently corrected. "Survivors endure, but you... you fought back."
"A part of me gave in down there," I admitted, my words a whispered confession to the silent night.
"We all face a kind of death, in various ways," Ivan shared, revealing a scar near his neck from a harrowing encounter at age five.
"I barely made it through."
His fingers traced another scar on his chest.
"This was the price for taking too much," he sighed. "Just a bowl of oatmeal was deemed more than I deserved."
Tears blurred my vision as I saw scars like Apollo's etched on Ivan's skin. The weight of his silent suffering weighed heavy on my heart, a poignant realization of the horrors he endured.
"Was Apollo Colucci one of the boys who survived?" I asked, the words heavy with uncertainty and dread.
Ivan's silence filled the air like a thick fog, his gaze drifting towards the window as if searching for solace in the distant horizon.
"Ivan, was he?" I pressed, urgency trembling in my voice, a desperate need clawing at my chest.
"He was known as 'pretty boy'," Ivan finally spoke, his tone tinged with sorrow and resignation, as if each word carried the weight of countless unspoken truths.
"By Giovanni?" I asked, the pieces of a horrifying puzzle slowly coming together, revealing a chilling picture of torment and suffering.
"He despised him," Ivan's words carried the weight of memories too painful to bear. "I remember like it was yesterday, Giovanni holding Apollo captive near a box teeming with rats."
A gasp escaped me, my hand instinctively flying to my mouth to stifle the cry of horror that threatened to escape. Tears welled up, blurring the world around.
"Apollo remained silent," Ivan's voice broke the heavy silence, each word a solemn echo of the horrors he bore witness to.
"Disobeying Giovanni was asking for trouble. If you dared to speak up or violate his rules, you'd find yourself in solitary confinement or, worse, in the rat box. And if you tried to shield someone from Giovanni's wrath, your punishment would be even harsher."
His words painted a harrowing picture of relentless cruelty, etched in the lines of his weary face.
My heart clenched with unbearable pain, the weight of Apollo's suffering pressing down on me like a cloak. I had seen the scars on his skin, assuming them to be the remnants of savage battles fought in the shadows. Never did I imagine they were the cruel souvenirs of such unspeakable horrors inflicted by the hands of men like Giovanni.
Beasts are not born; they are forged – in the crucible of brutality, in the twisted tales spun by those who delight in the agony of others.
My heart pounded in my chest, its frantic beat a desperate plea for release from the suffocating grip of despair. Each breath came in shallow gasps, the air heavy with unshed tears and unspoken sorrows.
"Donna, you're having a panic attack," Ivan's voice broke through the chaos, filled with genuine concern.
But this was more than a panic attack. It was a storm of anguish, a tempest of emotions raging within me for Apollo.
I was falling, tumbling into the depths of my love for this man, this 'Beast' whose soul bore the scars of unimaginable pain.
I needed him, more than I dared to admit, longing to share in our mutual torment, to find solace in each other's arms.
Together, we could defy the shadows threatening to consume us, to carve out a glimmer of light in the engulfing darkness.
Together, we could mend the wounds of our pasts, forging a path towards redemption amidst the ruins of our shattered lives.
Without him, I feared I would be forever lost in the labyrinth of despair, trapped in the chains of darkness that bound me to a fate without hope or salvation.
But with him beside me, I believed we could conquer the demons that haunted us, emerging victorious in the battle for our souls.