CHAPTER 8

Alessandro's POV

I got to my penthouse and went straight into my bathroom to wash off my father's wife's blood from my body. I discarded my clothes in the trash can and took a bath, making a mental note that I needed to take my Mesarati to the car wash. It was my favorite.

After I was done, I went into my study. I was working on the security system for a research company in the UK, and I thought I could work on that since I was not feeling sleepy even though it was already 2am. 

I tried to concentrate on my computer, but my mind kept drifting back to Amelia. The haunting images of her frail body on the floor, in the back seat of my car and her on the stretcher bed were etched in my head. The sound of her whimpers echoed in my mind, refusing to fade away.

Amelia had made her choices, and now she was suffering the consequences of her involvement with my father. I was not supposed to be feeling any empathy for her; she was a willing victim

I sighed, trying to push my thoughts aside and focus on the codes on my screen. But my concentration was broken. My mind seemed to have shut down on me. I glanced beside my computer and was met by the picture of my mother. She always looked out for everyone. And she definitely would want me to do what was in my power to help someone. I imagined she would be frowning at my current behavior wherever she was.

"F*ck it!" I cursed and opened a new page in my browser. 

It took me a few minutes to be able to hack into his security system. His security system was better than most systems, recently upgraded, and that was probably because of the recent attack on him during his wedding. But I was gone at what I did.

As I had suspected, my father had taken Amelia from the hospital. I watched as my father walked her into his house. She had her hands wrapped around her ribcage and was limping. She was in no shape to have been discharged, but my father definitely did not care at all. What he cared about was keeping his evil deeds under wraps. Having his wife in a hospital with browsing and broken ribs that were clearly from being beaten was not the kind of image he wanted for himself.

Once they got to the living room, Calliope appeared, and my irritation grew further. Her and my father started talking while Amelia hovered behind my father, probably scared to make any move that would anger my father. She had a hand on her forehead and was leaning on the couch to support her weak body. She had just had a concoction and was supposed to be in a hospital bed. They could at least take better care of her if they dragged her out of the hospital. But my father and Calliope were not the most thoughtful people in the world, and neither did they come with a caring heart.

At least it looked like the worst had passed. And then again, she was none of my business, and I had already done my part, so I shut down my computer and left the study. It was already clear to me I was not going to get anything done.

Sleeping turned out not to be an easy task, and by 5 am, I was already up, driving to my father’s house, telling myself I needed to see my father before he left for the day so that we could finally get over and done with the pending conversation. I got to his house, and sure enough, he was having breakfast with Amelia, who was better off casting in “The Walking Dead,” sitting on his right as he sat at the head of the table.

This was exactly what I had hoped I would not walk into, and I felt a wave of anger rise inside me. She was not supposed to be sitting there having breakfast while her body was probably screaming in pain. I felt the anger and the pain I always felt back then whenever my mother would wake up to join my father for breakfast, even after having taken punches from my father the previous night. My father was obviously a man of tradition, and I don’t know why I was delusional that he had changed over the years.

“Alessandro,” my father’s voice boomed throughout the room as he looked up to see me. “Good to see you up this early. Join us,” he said, motioning for me to sit on his left.

I clenched my hands and walked to join them on the table, discretely keeping my eyes on Amelia.

“Good morning,” I greeted, and only my father responded.

“Good morning,” I said again, my gaze on Amelia, but she did not notice and neither did she hear me. She kept on pushing the eggs on her plate around. My father looked at her, and then his gaze moved to me.

“Don’t worry about her. She is suckling that she won’t be seeing her little brother for a long time due to her behavior last night,” my father said, and my gaze moved to his, my mind racing.

She had mentioned his father and brother the other day, but I had not bothered to look into it. She was none of my business. I was sure that Amelia did not belong to any of the famiglias or neither was her family influential. She was a random, beautiful woman my father had taken a liking to, and I had thought she had agreed to marry my father for money and status. That was the reason why women who were born outside the mafia married mad me. Money and status.

But my father’s statement made me think maybe there was actually another reason. And that reason would be the one why Amelia had married my father.

Blackmail.

I knew my father very well. He was not avoid blackmailing people into beading what he wanted. He had used my mother to blackmail me into fighting at The Underground. And I could not put past him the idea of him using Amelia’s family to blackmail her into marrying him.

“I thought I was going to have to chase you around so that we can have a meaningful conversation for change,” my father said but Amelia’s words from the night we first rang my mind.

“Your father did not pay a dime for me! And neither do I care about his money! Your father…,”

She had caught herself before she said what she had intended to say. Probably knowing she had said more that she was supposed to say. Was she about to say my father had blackmailed her into marrying her? I wished that I could go back to that night and not act like a jerk. I hated my father and I had been projecting that hate on her. But then I had not done that with his previous wife. I had met her a handful of time and could not careless about her. But Amelia had caught my attention from the moment I saw her and that grated on my nerves too.

“You would never have caught me,” I absentmindedly answered him while I reached for a toast.

Immediately I felt his challenging gaze on me and I looked up to meet his gaze. Challenging my father was not on my to do list, but crumbling under his gaze was not either. I was grown up man and was not going to be detected by him. After all, maybe I had the pride of the Conti man that he liked to boast about.