Page 99 of Thorns of Desire

“It was you,” he breathed.

My brows furrowed. “What was me?”

“That kid I caught singing eleven years ago,” he said, and realization settled. He didn’t remember that kid he caught. Had never connected the dots. “The girl who kicked me and bolted.”

I smiled sheepishly.

“I thought you knew.” He shook his head and worry flooded my mind. “Are you mad?”

“Am I mad you kicked me? No.” He dragged his hand through his hair. “Am I mad your mother used you like that? Fuck yes.”

I shut my laptop and stood up, wrapping my arms around him. “She didn’t really have a choice. She couldn’t sing that day because her vocal cords were damaged.”

“She should have informed the opera house and postponed the show, then; not used you.”

“We needed the money,” I protested weakly. It wasn’t until I was an adult that I learned the opera house actually fronted Mom the money. We could have left for the States immediately after the Triads’ attack. Instead, she lingered, giving them a chance to attack me a week later and bury me in a box, effectively guaranteeing a life filled with terrible memories.

Manuel cupped my cheeks. “You don’t believe that,amorina.”

“Honestly, I’m not sure why she insisted I do it,” I admitted. “Or why we stayed after you discovered what we’d done.”

His expression turned thunderous. “Maybe because she was busy scheming how to appear as a victim.”

My brow furrowed in confusion. “What do you mean?”

He made a dismissive noise in the back of his throat. “About a week after that performance, I got an urgent call from thecarabinieri.” I scrambled for the word in my ever-growing vocabulary and couldn’t find it. “Police force,” he added. “She bribed the hospital staff to admit her, lying about being attacked. She had them call me, making it sound like she was on her deathbed.”

I stiffened, my mind shuffling through the events of that week. The attack in our apartment. The performance. Then a week later when… the box…

Oh, Mom, what did you do?

Goose bumps rose on my skin while dread weighed on my chest.

“A week after the performance?” I asked with a tremor.

“Yes.”

A single word changed everything, and my relationship with my mother would never be the same.

FORTY

ATHENA

Manuel’s phone rang and he cursed under his breath.

I wrapped my fingers around his forearm and squeezed it.

“Take care of that. I’ll use the time to finish up my book,” I lied.

“You’ll let me read your book before your fans get it, right?” He raised a brow when I didn’t answer. “Right,moglie?”

Damn, I loved it when he called me his wife. I’d been learning more Italian, thanks to my app and my patient husband.

“Certamente,” I answered, smiling. “Now answer that.”

As per usual, he answered the phone and disappeared, probably back into his office. He didn’t discuss business around me, and I was perfectly fine with that. Especially today. The moment I could no longer hear his booming voice or his footsteps, I pulled out my phone and made my own call.

My mother answered on the first ring. “Athena.”