I curled into myself, rocking back and forth. My nails digging into my arms. The pain was suffocating. The room smelled of old paper and polished wood and none of it was real, none of the four years had been real, and the floor was cold against my cheek the way the restroom floor had been cold, the way the pavement had been cold the night they threw me from the car.
"No, it can't be. No, it can't be. No, no, no—"
Liliana's POV
I don't know how long I cried on the floor of the consigliere's office, curled up like a ball, but when I finally stood up, I wiped my tears and sighed.
It couldn't get any worse than this. My marriage of four years to Giacomo Russo had been nothing but a farce.
I wanted to scream at him and ask why he would do such wickedness to me. Why tie me down for fifteen years?
Fifteen years ago, I moved into the Russo compound to take care of them after they lost their parents and their sister in a car bombing. I had been their closest friend and they asked me to live with them. For years I helped them heal. I woke Pietro up when he screamed from the nightmares of the explosion, the smell of burning metal still clinging to his skin.