CHAPTER V

Plate after plate smashed against the white walls.

“Miss Caterina please, you’re going to hurt yourself!”

Another one, a heavy bowl this time, flew across the room. It didn’t break to pieces as I expected but it bounced on the solid surface. I heard a squeal, followed by hurried steps fading out.

I lifted another bowl and threw my arm back, flinging it to the wall like a baseball, its silver bits joining the scattered pieces on the marble floor. A feeling of satisfaction surged through me, the sounds of breaking glass quenching my frustration and the need to violate the purity of this house when the owner was anything but.

It all soon melted away as I sensed a threatening presence nearby. True enough, Dante was already standing by the archway with his arms crossed. I didn’t even hear him come in. His eyes were silently watching me, the hard expression on his face immediately made me drop the hand that was holding the mug I was about to throw next.

“Leave us,” he addressed Annalise and two of his guards over his shoulder. The deep timbre of his voice traveled down my skin like icicles.

He barely glanced at the mess I created like he’s used to it before his eyes zeroed in on me again. “You didn’t change your hair.” He let out a noise of disapproval. “You’re going to have to learn to follow my orders.”

This wasn’t the reaction I was hoping to get out of him. If anything, this made me more frustrated than I already was and so, without preamble, I flung the mug at the same wall I’ve been target practicing to show him what I thought of his orders.

He didn’t even flinch.

“Are you done?”

“No. Not until you let me go.”

His eyes flashed. “Never.”

I reached for another ware with a plan to chuck it at him this time but a piece of glass must have found its way on the counter from the impact and cut through my palm.

“Ah!”

“Shit.”

Glass crunched under heavy footsteps and before I knew it, Dante was right beside me and bent slightly so he could carry me in his arms. A yelp escaped my lips.

“Put me do-”

His glare shut me up instantly and I bowed my head, trying my best to focus on the blood trickling down my hand, and not on the crisp masculine scent invading my nostrils and the feel of his biceps under the skin of my exposed legs. 

He opened the door to the nearest bathroom with the hand holding my legs and dumped me none-too-gently on the vanity. The cut wasn’t that deep but he's acting as if I’ve got a bullet hole in it. His brows furrowed as he inspected my hand, searching if there were embedded glasses before placing it under water. I tried to pull away when he reached for the soap but he just tsked at me and tightened his grip. I’m not proud of it but I have a low tolerance when it comes to pain. I looked anywhere but the sink.

I hissed as he suddenly squeezed my hand, leaving a slight sting of pain. 

“Don’t move.” Dante moved to the cabinets and I just let the cold water washed away the remaining blood. He came back with a first aid kit and began to dress my wound.

As silence unfurled between us like a rotten fruit, my skin became highly sensitive to his every touch. His rough hands were surprisingly gentle and I hated how it brought a tingle at the bottom of my stomach. Then, I remembered how I got into this situation in the first place and the burning feeling was extinguished.

I pulled my hand away just as he was done with the bandage. “You said last night that you’d explain in the morning.”

“I was called for an emergency meeting. I didn’t expect that it would go on ‘til noon.” He rested his hands on the counter right by either side of my waist. My dress had ridden up to my thighs, and his fingers found the hemline and played with it absent-mindedly. “I’m here now.”

His voice was soothing as though he was implying that he forgave me for my behavior already even though I never asked for it. The rough fabric of his suit abraded my bare skin and goosebumps trailed along the contact. I certainly feel so underdressed now. 

I cleared my throat, trying to ignore the warmth emanating from his body. “Then start explaining.”

Thankfully, he pulled away from me as he plucked his wallet from inside his blazer. He proceeded to pull out a photo from it and showed it to me.

 It's like I was doused with cold water.

 It's the same picture that my father was looking at the day we fought. A smiling ballerina with the same light brown eyes and black hair as mine. Every detail down to the arch of her nose was a mirror of me. Except that she has no mole under the corner of her eye. The one thing I didn’t catch the first time. Maybe that’s why I have no memory of it ever being taken.

It wasn’t me to begin with.

"Impossible,” I mumbled as I tried to make sense of it all.

The only explanation for him to have the same picture as my father was that…

“I can’t have a twin…are we related?”

“No.” He sounded so sure but didn’t elaborate further. 

"As you can see she's not here." He took one last look at the picture before placing it back inside his wallet. The look he gave me was that of irritation like he’d rather that I was the one gone than the one in the picture. "But you are. That's why I need you to be her just until she shows up. Otherwise I'd look pathetic in the altar with no bride walking down the aisle."

His words were vague. For all I know, his fiancé ran away from him. But that’s not my problem. One thing that kept coming back to me was how come my father had the same photograph?

Unless…

My heart pounded in my ribcage. The thought that my father could have something to do with the disappearance of this girl made me want to throw up. 

I twisted away from him and got down from the sink. 

"I'm sorry that things didn't work out between you two but you can't expect me to give up possibly my whole life just so you can have your dream wedding."

"I'm losing my patience with you, Caterina." 

The coolness in his voice was gone and his jaw was tight with contained anger. Before he could do anything else, I escaped to the living room. I could hear his heavy footsteps following me. "This marriage isn't something out of a fucking Disney movie. A lot is at stake at the outcome of this wedding."

He didn't seem to have any idea that my father knew his fiancé. All he thought he’s doing was that he’s collecting a debt by taking the daughter who looked like his missing fiancé as payment. He’s practically killing two birds with one stone.

But another nagging thought pecked its way on my mind. It was my father who offered me, allegedly.

I need to get out of here.

"I refuse. This is just too...creepy."

"Creepy?" He repeated. The cruelty I saw last night returned in his eyes like it was just simmering beneath a façade. 

“I can make you easily agreeable, you know. Do you still want to see that creeper you lived with in that pathetic excuse for a house?”

Ice flooded my veins. I held on to the back of the couch, the only thing that’s separating me from him, my hands clammy.

“What did you do to my father?”

“Relax. He’s still alive. Death will be too generous for a traitor like him.”

“How much did he owe you? I’ll try to repay it. I’ll get a job, I swear I won’t hide like him. You can put guards on me until I pay the full price of my father’s betrayal, I don't care. I’d even help you to find your fiancé. Just don’t hurt him,” I pleaded. I don’t care about my damn pride anymore. I was just realizing it’s futile to keep it high around him. 

Unlike last night, his face showed no mercy.

“You don’t have to concern yourself with other matters. All you have to get through inside that pretty head is that your father’s debt isn’t the kind that can’t be repaid with money, fiorellino. This is going to happen.”

“This isn’t right and even for a killer, you must know that,” I spat out.

There was a momentary pause. I knew I stepped into a land mine. My feet took a step back as he removed his blazer and rolled his shoulders as though ridding himself of a muscle knot.

“Antonio, Noel, Simone, Raul, Ferdinand,” he listed down and I just gave him a look of confusion.

“Those are the names of my family, your father killed in cold-blood. Tell me since you seem to assume the role of a moral compass, that also wasn’t right, right?”

I wasn’t able to react as he grabbed me by the arm and started dragging me across the room and up the stairs. He threw open the door to the master’s bedroom and chucked me inside.

“You’re in time-out.”

The lock on the door snapped.