Page 264 of Anti-Heroes in Love Duet

The streets were fairly empty for Manhattan, the sky dense with snow clouds that threatened to fall at any moment. I pulled up in front of the house that had been split into eight apartments in Queens where Bambi and Rora lived and sprinted up the stairs, shivering because I’d forgotten a coat.

I knocked on the door for a long minute before it creaked open, and Rora appeared. Her face was tearstained, her hair a tangled mess around her pouting face. She was fully dressed even though it was long past her bedtime, even a pair of pink sneakers on her feet.

“Are you here to save us?” she asked me, sniffing through it.

My heart constricted. “Yes,gattina mia, I’m here to save you. Where is your mama?”

“She’s crying in her bedroom.”

I sighed as I stepped into the house and closed the door behind me, locking it and pulling the deadbolt across the frame. Rora grabbed my hands in both of hers, squeezing tightly as if she was afraid I’d let go.

“Are you scared?” I asked her gently, bending to push her messy hair back from her sweet face. “What are you scared of?”

“My papa,” she whispered so quietly, I almost missed it. “He says he loves me, but he scares Mama.”

I hadn’t realized the man who’d been stalking them was her father, and I couldn’t understand why Bambi hadn’t just told me. But I smiled at the little girl and stood to let her lead me back to the bedrooms.

“Bambi?” I asked as we rounded the corner, and I found her sitting on her bed among a pile of strewn clothes and two open suitcases.

She was sobbing so hard it sounded like she was choking.

I went to her, sitting beside her hunched form so I could pull her into my arms for a tight hug.

“Hush,” I urged, stroking her back. “It’s okay. Calm down.Calmati.”

I held her for a few minutes with Rora standing there tugging on a lock of her hair, watching us with wide, frightened eyes.

“Can you talk now?” I asked Bambi, moving back to look at her. I pushed her hair from her face andtsked at her swollen eyes and red face. “You’ve made yourself sick crying. Everything will be okay, I promise. Dante and I will make it better.”

That set her off again.

My patience was a fraying rope. Aurora absolutely did not need to see her mother going to pieces, not when she was obviously frightened herself.

I gently shook Bambi by the shoulders and cooled my voice, hoping it would shock her like cold water. “Georgina! Listen to me, okay? You’re making yourself sick, and you are scaring your daughter. Take a few deep breaths with me,si?”

She gave me a shuddering nod, hiccoughing through three deep breaths. Finally, she seemed to regain the ability to speak because she whispered something to me.

“Scusi?” I asked because I didn’t catch it.

“I’m sorry,” she repeated again, her voice wrecked. “I’m so sorry.”

“For what?” I asked, still so focused on comforting her that I almost missed the niggle of premonition in my gut.

Slowly, disbelieving, I pulled back from her.

She sobbed, catching it in her palm as she slapped it over her mouth.

“Bambi?” I asked, each word tightly bound with control so I wouldn’t lash out before I knew for sure. “What have you done to be sorry about?”

“H-he told me he would take Aurora,” she explained, her voice wet and thick with snot. “He told me he would take her away and never let me see her again.”

“Who did?” I snapped so hard she flinched.

“Auggie,” Aurora chimed in sullenly. “My papa.”

“Auggie?” I racked my brain trying to think of who the hell Auggie was, but then I didn’t have to.

“Agostino di Carlo,” Bambi explained, tears squeezing out the corners of her eyes. They fell off her chin in a steady stream. “Agostino is Aurora’s father.”