Page 113 of Enzo

A monster.

My hand, hanging loose at my side, still gripped the gun. I looked down and noted my fingers twitching, like they fought the urge to drop the weapon.

“I had to do it,” I said. It sounded pathetic even to me. “It’s the least I could do for Amara. To make them pay for letting her suffer when they could have eased it. Better yet, they could have saved her.” I didn’t want to tell Penelope she was a match all along, that would destroy her. No, that would be my burden to bear. “Atticus and his doctors used her as a tool to get revenge for something Luca did.”

She didn’t speak. Just stared. And it was the silence that gutted me.

I took a step forward. She didn’t flinch, but she didn’t come closer either.

“I had to,” I added, softer now. “You have to believe me.”

But her gaze no longer held the love and promise it had just days ago. Instead, her eyes were full of distrust.

Was there hate in them too?

Panic started to rise in my chest.

I’d seen hate before, in my mother’s face. Heard it in the words she spewed at my brother and me. Every time she tried to hurt me as a little boy. Every time she rambled nonsense at Amadeo and me, reminding us we were mistakes she never should’ve kept.

This look of Pen’s was the same.You’re dangerous. You’re wrong. I can’t love you anymore.

“No,” I whispered, more to myself than to her. “Don’t look at me like that. Like you hate me.”

She blinked. “I’m not looking at you like I hate you.”

But she did. And I could feel her slipping away, second by second, step by step, even if her body hadn’t moved.

“We have to leave before the police show up and we end up behind bars,” she reasoned.

I’d never allow my wife to be arrested, though at this very moment, it didn’t sound like such a bad place for someone like me.

But then my promise to Amara rang in my ears.

Make a better world. Maybe bring me flowers once in a while. Pen will need you.

“You said you loved me,” I said, a tremor in my voice.

“You didn’t say it back,” she murmured sadly.

“I do.” My voice cracked. “I love you, Penelope. I love you so fucking much it hurts to breathe when you’re not around. Before you, love at first sight was just a foreign phrase. Now… it makes sense, because I fell for you the moment I saw you. You’re theessence of my soul, the beat of my heart. You’re everything that’s right about me.”

“Then why wait to say it back?”

It was too late.

Cazzo!

I wanted to fall to my knees and scream that I loved her from the top of my lungs. But I couldn’t.

So I stood there, trembling, drowning in silence, and waiting for the inevitable.

For her to walk away.

45

PENELOPE

Crossroads.