Twenty

Damian

I stand here, leaning against the counter. I've been standing here for thirty minutes, listening to the back-and-forth between Victoria and Stefano. I thought about disappearing into my room after her accusations, which I know are warranted. Still, I didn't want to hear them in such detail. Then I heard in a cold voice, void of any emotion, and turned to my left.

"Hello, Mother."

Fuck, Sofia!

Everyone looks at her in shock. I should have known this would happen after the phone call. I exchange glances with my father, and he seems uneasy. My brother’s expression is the same as my father's. I go to take a step toward my wife as Victoria takes a step forward, gasping.

"Sofia," she cries out, which sounds so full of pain. Mattia stands up next to her; he has a glint in his eye that I don't like.

I go to take another step toward my wife and end up stopping in my tracks when her left-hand reaches behind her back, and she draws out a pistol.

What the fuck?

"Sofia, baby, what are you doing?" I asked calmly. She points the gun at Mattia's head, and her mother gasps in shock. Tears run down her face while my father, Stefano, and Alexandr straighten up, my father shielding my mother's body. Mattia goes for his gun when a shot is fired. Victoria screams while I get my gun out of my holster. With my father and brother, Stefano runs toward Victoria. He grabs her, pulling her away from Mattia and shielding her body. It looks like his protective instincts have finally kicked in, and they look at their daughter in shock. I look to see if she's been hit, then I turn to look at Mattia. He has one of his hands in the air while the other is holding his ear, where blood is dripping. She hit his fucking ear.

"Sofia, moya lyubov, look at me." When she doesn't, I plead, "Please," desperately, which gets her attention. She keeps a partial eye on Mattia while her mother and father stand there gaping.

Fucking Italian don, my ass.

"What are you doing, malyshka?" I ask carefully. She just smirks at me, and then looks at Mattia with such hatred. What happened to my innocent wife?

"Damian?" she asks, everyone tensing at her tone.

"Yes, malyshka?” I ask calmly while I feel anything but. I need to get that gun out of her hand!

"Let's go down memory lane, shall we?" Her voice is void of emotion, and I'm tense. I don't want to go down memory lane. She doesn't wait for me to answer her, though.

She starts talking before I can even protest.

"Remember when you came over when I was thirteen? I was on my bed crying because Donny said I was fat because I didn't want to be his girlfriend," she asks sweetly, so sweetly that I tense some more.

"Yeah, you were suspended for hitting him, and your mother blamed you for it all. You cried in my arms while I plotted his death." I'm trying to keep my voice calm and steady for her; I really don't want her to hurt herself. Victoria tenses at the mention of her, and looks down, ashamed. Stefano looks at his wife, his brow furrowing at her reaction, because normally, she'd just laugh like it was the funniest thing.

Sofia looks at me, still keeping Mattia in her line of vision. "Did you know my mother made me only eat a salad at dinner with a glass of water every day after that? I wasn't allowed to eat anything else until I was no longer 'fat'. The only time I'd actually eat was when you took me out because, apparently, my father was na?ve and gullible whenever he had dinner with us, which was rare since he preferred his mistresses. He believed my mother when she said I only liked salad," she says with a sneer.

I tense up, rage wanting to take over. I hear my mother gasp. Victoria's tears run faster, ashamed of her treatment of her own daughter, clearly taking her anger out on the wrong person. Stefano pales, realizing he's at fault for his wife's mistreatment of their daughter.

"The stupid thing is, I knew it was because she didn't want me in a one-sided marriage like her. She thought if I was skinny and beautiful, then you wouldn't stray. She knew about the arrangement and was worried I'd end up like her. How wrong was she, hey?" She sounds so sad when she says that, and my heart hurts for her and what we all put her through.

Victoria lets out a sob while Stefano hangs his head in shame, keeping an arm wrapped around his wife.

"Hey, Damian," she says it again, looking back at Mattia. I tense, and so does everybody else. I clear my throat, looking at my father, who's breathing heavily, as well as Alexandr.

"Yeah, printsessa?" I reply, knowing I have to play along with her game. If I try and take that gun off of her, she could shoot herself, since she already proved she doesn't know how to aim.

"Remember the day you found me on the pier, you know, the day you told me you loved me?" Her voice tightens. She thinks I didn't mean it. My heart breaks. I did mean it, I just didn't know it at the time.

"Yeah, baby, you had a split lip and bruising along your ribs. You said you fell down the stairs. We walked along the beach for a few hours, and then you sat between my legs, resting against my back while we watched the sunset." My voice is raw, remembering our days together, knowing I've missed three years of time with her. Suddenly, clarity hits me, and my heart beats faster, realizing she's about to tell it all!

She looks at her mother quickly with pained eyes, then looks back at Mattia, who's now extremely white, and says, "I lied."

Stefano steps closer to her while holding his wife, which catches Sofia’s attention, and she looks him in the eyes, devastating us all with her next words.

"Father had a 20-something girlfriend, so mother got drunk, not being able to handle my father's affairs. Now, don't get me wrong, it wasn't the first time she hit me, but normally she avoided the face, but she was always smashed when she did it. The physical violence didn't start until after I turned sixteen. Before that, it was verbal. It just escalated. The more my father made her feel unwanted yet treated me like I was his world, the worse my mother got, taking her anger out on the wrong person.

From there, everything got worse, but is wasn’t my mother that made it that way. No, she would drink and rant, going on and on about how he didn't care, how if I were a boy, he would love her and not stray, how I ruined her, and how she couldn't bear any more children. She kept saying how she loved me so much and that I was all she ever wanted but she needed me to be a boy, how she tried her hardest to make me pretty and skinny so I didn't end up like her, then she’d pass out. The time she split my lip, I told her to divorce him if she was so miserable, and she punched me. Of course, she couldn't divorce him; he was the other half of her soul.

And that was the case, in the beginning, before I turned seven. Back then, they were everything to each other, and we would look at them, wishing and hoping to have that kind of love." She looks back at her mother. "For years, you slept with the wrong men to try and get my father to fight for you, but the more you did that, the more he turned to his mistresses, not willing to fight for his own marriage. He was the selfish bastard, yet you took your anger out on me." She smiles sadly at that while Victoria lets out another sob. I can hear my mother also sobbing. "What you did was wrong, Mamma. I couldn't take the abuse anymore, that's why I moved in with Damian when I did. Still, that didn’t stop Mattia. If I had ever stayed in my old room, he would come….He even came to my room the night before my wedding, on my birthday, no less. You had passed out again after drinking heavily when you realized Father was with another woman again, the same woman to whom he was starting to get close. I know in your mind you were trying to help me; in reality, you were burying me."

Victoria goes toward her just as Mattia gets his gun aimed at my wife, clearly wanting to silence her. I see red, about to take a step forward. Stefano notices Mattia too, and pulls his wife back, but Sofia just tsks at him, then fires the gun again, this time hitting his gun hand. He screams out as he drops the weapon, and we all look at my wife in shock.

"Now, Mattia, you don't want me to accidentally kill you just yet, do you? I've been practicing since I left, so I'd stay still if I were you."

Alexandr kicks Mattia's gun away, then takes a step back to look at Sofia while I just stand here frozen, not knowing how to act toward this person in my wife's body.

She looks back at her mother, who is clinging to her husband.

"I need you to see the pain you put me through when you were punishing me for something I didn't even do, then leaving me for Mattia to do as he pleases."

Victoria stares at her daughter, her eyes red from her uncontrollable tears. I think she wants to hold her daughter. The old Victoria, Sofia’s mother, was returning bit by bit.

Sofia then looks at me. Her next words weaken my knees.

"Where was I with the memory lane story? Ah, yes, the time my mother split my lip while drunk." She waves her gun in the air, then aims it back at Mattia before continuing.

"It was also the first time she drunkenly told Mattia to do whatever he wanted to me, then proceeded to walk out of the room, and when I tried to run, he grabbed my hair and slammed me onto the floor before kicking me, cracking my already bruised ribs from when my mother shoved me into the banister two days beforehand. After kicking me, he yanked me up by my hair and he…he touched me!" Her eyes get wet at the last part, and I feel like I can't breathe.

"You're a fucking liar," Mattia screams out, but she ignores him.

"He said he was going to break me in for you, Damian. Now, at the time, I didn't know what he meant, seeing as you were only my friend, but he knew about the arrangement, too. I kneed him in the junk hard, then ran. You know the rest, since you found me." She looks back between her mother, who is clinging to her father, and Mattia, who looks pale. Mattia is looking at Victoria, who looks back at him. Murder shines in her eyes; she's furious, and I can see Stefano keeping a tight hold of her as she tries to grab his gun. Mamma Bear has finally returned, but maybe a bit too late.

Sofia continues, "For nearly two years, I dodged every attempted sexual assault while my mother got drunk and passed out, hating that my father just can't love her anymore. She was devastated because she loved him, always had." Stefano's head whips down to meet Victoria's gaze, and she drops her head, knowing it's the truth. When she looks up at her husband, tears glisten in her eyes.

"In my mother's eyes, her husband loved their daughter more and never paid attention to her; her mind played tricks on her, but we all know that a little birdie was whispering crap to her, bringing out insecurities she didn't even know she had. She was told it was because her husband needed a boy, so she caused problems on purpose just to get a reaction from him to get her husband home, but it only backfired. He decided to never come home, so instead, she went after her daughter, hoping she would open her mouth and bring her husband home after he stopped answering her calls and texts, but her daughter never did; she thought she had to be strong." Sofia takes a deep breath, keeping the gun trained on Mattia, who is gripping his bleeding hand, and she looks at her parents; they're still staring at each other, with confusion in Stefano's eyes and tears in Victoria's.

I remember when Stefano said a reliable source stated she was cheating on him, but maybe it was wrong all along. I look at my father, who nods, remembering the same thing.

Despite talking directly to her parents, Sofia keeps Mattia in her sights, her gun always trained on him.

"After she physically cut off her own daughter, she gave up; the guilt was too hard for her to bear, and she started drinking more, not remembering what day it was. To me, I think she deserved better. Maybe then my father would have opened his stupid eyes and seen the pain and turmoil he put his wife through every day!

He would have seen that someone had gotten into her head and his. Instead, he turned into a manwhore." Everyone looks at Sofia in shock, especially her mom. She is sticking up for her mother even though the woman doesn't deserve it.

Sofia looks into her mom's eyes.

"I loved you then, and I still love you now; you never hurt me when you were sober; it doesn't make it right, but it's the truth. You are my mother, but you should have just opened your mouth. Neither of you want a divorce; you love each other, you just didn't know how to show it. He strayed because he thought you did first, which you did unintentionally, you somehow had it in your mind that he was straying because someone told you that, and I think that someone was bullshitting and most likely told father the same thing. You changed because you couldn't handle the pain, so you verbally abused me to try and get me to be someone I wasn’t, so I didn't end up like you. You pushed him away when you decided to play him at his own game instead of talking to him, and the more attention he showed me the worse you got. He was just a proud father. Instead of acting jealous, you should of embraced him and found happiness. He never looked at another person until someone got into his head, telling him you were straying, telling you he was straying, which lead to both of you straying to get back at the other—all you had to do was fucking talk to each other," she states. Victoria pales again, realizing her mistake, while Stefano runs a hand through his hair, hearing the lies someone told his insecure wife about him, looking pissed that he fell for it, too.

My parents and brother stand silently, watching everything go down, while my father stays alert.

"There was a time I was your whole world. I went everywhere with you, and I don't want this person that you became fifteen years ago anywhere near my daughter. I asked you at my wedding to get help. I was saying goodbye to you, Mother, because you are part of why I ran. I can't have the woman you are today treat my daughter the way you treated me all because he would show his granddaughter affection. I want the woman who would tuck me in, kiss my forehead, and read bedtime stories. The woman who would bake cookies, then proceed to have a flour fight in the kitchen. That's the woman my kid deserves as a grandmother, the woman I had before before the lies. Now do me a fucking favor, the pair of you, and get fucking counseling and sort your fucking selves out, or you can kiss goodbye to ever meeting your only grandchild!" she sneers the last bit, and my father clears his throat to hide his chuckle.

I bite my lip, and I can see both my brother and mother's shoulders shaking in silent laughter, hearing Sofia being the parent instead of the other way around is hilarious.

Victoria shakes her head at her daughter, giving her a small smile, then finally looks up at Stefano. They're wrapped in each other's arms, and he leans down, whispering how sorry he is and that they'll get to the bottom of what happened before kissing her. Sofia gives a small smile; even after everything her mother did, she still helped her open her eyes. My girl, and my heart. Now, I just need her to forgive me. Maybe counseling, too?

"Hey, Damian." We all tense at her words, and her parents break apart, looking at her wide-eyed. Victoria seems confused, wondering what else could have happened without her knowing. She looks at Mattia, and he tenses. Everyone else looks at me, waiting for me to answer her.

"Yeah, moya lyubov.” My mother gasps at the endearment; she obviously missed it before.

"Remember the day you proposed?" she asks sweetly, and my body goes ridged, remembering how scared she looked.

"You sprinted to my car; you had a bruise on your eye, and you told me you were just clumsy again," I rasp. This time, her mother gasps, looking shocked, and Stefano squeezes his arms around her.

"The last time my mother hit me was when she split my lip, after that, she barely said two words to me, always drinking. I was actually scared she'd try hurting herself; it was my biggest fear, but it didn't stop Mattia from continuing his attacks. I had been trying to dodge assault after assault for months, and that day, I fought back for the first time."

I hold my breath. Don't say it, baby, don't, please don't. I plead with her with my gaze.

"I snapped and mouthed back at my mother; it was harsh and cruel, but I'd had enough. She went red and stormed out the back door, driving off in her car, probably to the beach house for the surprise party, leaving me alone with Mattia. He saw this as an opportunity, but I couldn't realize the danger of my situation quickly enough to run for it. When I realized he was approaching me, I slowly walked backward, knowing I only had a small window of opportunity to run for it. Unfortunately, I wasn’t fast enough. He grabbed hold of me, called me a whore, and then he touched my private area under my dress. He covered my mouth, then rubbed me hard through my panties. I struggled, but he just chuckled. He grabbed my breasts, and just before he could reach into my panties, I slammed my head into his nose. After that, I was able to get loose and run."

This has to be a nightmare—she's not saying this, please!

"I managed to just get a few feet away before he grabbed my arm and spun me around. He punched me in the eye. Thankfully, I wasn't close enough to feel the full force, just close enough for it to fucking hurt and bruise. I stumbled back a little but then managed to kick him hard in his family jewels. I ran upstairs." She looks at me again. "I was originally wearing the black dress you bought me for my 18th birthday, but he tore it during the attack, so I wore the white one instead. I knew you would be there any moment, so I grabbed my bag, and as I unlocked the door to run out, he charged into my room." She takes a deep breath, then looks at Mattia.

My gun hand itches to lift and shoot the fucker.

She looks at me and says, "He knocked me onto the floor, and that white dress you said you loved me wearing because it reminded you of what it would be like to marry me…."

I close my eyes, taking a deep breath. I loved that dress. It was lacy and went to her knees. I kept picturing her walking down the aisle in it, which should have been a big clue to how I actually fucking felt for her. I look at her again.

"He tore it from the straps down, and when I fought back, he punched my face again. I got dizzy, and it dazed me for a moment, just long enough for him to rip my underwear and, sh…shove his fingers inside me."

I rage, grabbing the vase next to me on the side table, and throwing it across the room, breathing heavily. I can see my father in my side-eye view, holding Alexandr back from killing Mattia. I look at Mattia and raise my gun, and he pales. Victoria is hysterically crying, gripping Stefano, who wants to grab Mattia, but he's holding his wife up, all the guilt tearing out of her. I can hear my mother sob behind me, but I ignore it all as I keep my gun trained on Mattia, pointing at his dick.

Then I feel a soft hand on top of mine, making me take a deep, shuddering breath. It's been so long since I've felt her touch. I turn my head to look into her eyes, which have turned soft, and mine fill with unshed tears, wanting to fall, not giving a shit about anyone in the room if they do. She still has one hand on her gun, trained on the piece of shit. I use my left hand to cup her face; the cold metal of my wedding ring touches her. She closes her eyes for just a second, leaning into my touch.

That is a good sign, right?

She puts pressure on my gun hand, and I let her lower it. I remove my hand from her face and then wrap it around her waist, pulling her body into mine. I lean my head against her shoulder as tears fall from my eyes, staining her beautiful skin while she continues.

"He squeezed my breast, and he tried to kiss me, so I headbutted him again, making more blood run from his nose. It dazed him, and I managed to wrangle my way from under him and bolt to my bathroom. I locked the door, and as I looked around, I noticed the baby blue dress with dark swirls all over it, the one that goes to my feet, remember it?"

I nod against her shoulder, the tears falling down my cheeks.

"He started banging on the door, and I knew it wouldn't hold for long, so I quickly changed, then climbed out of my bathroom window and onto the trellis I had under it, and climbed down. When I saw you drive in, I sprinted. That was the last time I was alone in the same room with him. He would always glare at me, but I made sure to never be left alone with him…until the night before our wedding," she says it so softly, but I still feel tense at her words.

Fuck, I love her.

I press my forehead on hers, closing my eyes as the tears continue. I take a deep breath, inhaling her scent of vanilla and chocolate.