WANTED: Love of my Life

34. The rage revealed

“Giacomo!” I screamed. Futilely, I struggled against his iron grip. Tears started welling up in my eyes. “Giacomo, what are you doing? Let go of me!”

He didn't answer. His face showed no emotion, as he took my purse out of my pocket and threw it to the grinning man.

I couldn't believe it! I'd just been robbed. Not by a stranger, not by a criminal – by my own boyfriend. The guy I thought I could trust more than anyone in the universe! What was happening? Something had to be wrong with the world.

“Now you have what you wanted,” Giacomo said. “Let us pass.”

I still struggled against him, as he attempted to pull me past and away from the men. But at a sign from the leader, two of them blocked his way.

“Not so fast. Since you're being so nice and helpful, you surely wouldn't mind if we had a bit more fun, would you? Who knows? We might even let you join in.”

“We are not very funny,” Giacomo stated. “In fact, we are not at all interesting.”

The leader snickered. “You might not be, but the chick... that's another matter.” Laughter again. Strange. Why were they laughing? I found the situation less and less amusing. I looked around at the eager smiles of the men. Everything seemed slightly unreal to me. Was I dreaming? Was I mixing my life with an adventure story from one of my books? If so, I was doing a bad job of it. This wasn't at all thrilling and adventurous. It was terrifying.

“She wouldn't be any fun,” I heard Giacomo's voice from above me. “Don't you see she's just a kid?”

“I don't know, you seem to enjoy holding on to her. Can't be that bad.”

I turned my head, attempting to see his eyes, but he still didn't loosen his grip. I could only see his chin, right above me. I couldn't read his face. He was still. But he couldn't be thinking about letting me go, could he? No. Even after what had just happened, I couldn't believe that. He was still my boyfriend. He... cared about me, right? He had to, at least a bit. Otherwise, what was the point of us?

He couldn’t give me up to them. He wouldn't.

There was an immeasurable second of silence. And then... Giacomo let go of me. I tried to hold on to him, desperate for the arms around me which only a moment ago I'd been trying to escape from. But he pushed me away. Giacomo pushed me away.

He would. He would let them have me. I sank onto the ground, crying, my heart in a thousand pieces. God, how could I have been such a fool? No, that was wrong. It didn't belong in the past. How could I be such a fool? For in spite of what he had done, in spite of what he was going to let them do, I still lo-

A voice from above me interrupted my thoughts.

“Leave now.” It was a harsh voice. A rough and deep voice, that didn't sound familiar. Probably one of the gang members sending the sniveling coward away, who I thought was my boyfriend. I caught myself hoping that he would get to safety, and cursed my own weakness! “Leave now, before it is too late!”

But the answering voice wasn't Giacomo's. It was the raucous laughter of the leader. That didn't make sense. Not unless it had been Giacomo speaking before... but I knew his voice, right? Better than anyone's, in fact. What was going on?

I looked up, and through a veil of tears, I could see Giacomo standing before me like a shield. One of the more drunken men stumbled forward, trying to push him aside. In a lightning-fast movement, Giacomo gripped the man's arm and his knee came up to meet the man's elbow. There was an earsplitting crack, and the man went to his knees, howling in pain.