Broken Soul ☆ Daniel Ricciardo

26 | Inside the envelope

♪
Douglas - Cope:
'I don't wanna have to cope with this, I don't wanna feel alone in the midst. 'Cause all emotions lose control and I'm pissed, 'cause I just wanna be with you'

Leaving Daniel to go back home after being with him for 5 days straight, was very hard. Emilia's heart broke when she saw him wave at her after she went through security. He was leaving to go to America soon and he wouldn't be back until next month because of the triple-header. Emilia kept thinking about the winter break and how the season was almost over. Luckily the flight back to Firenze was short and because of all the catching up she had to do with her best friend, it was over before she knew it. The girls exited the plane, went through customs and waited for their luggage before they headed back to Gia's car. 

Gia dropped Emilia off at her apartment, Isabel was still in London, but she didn't mind being alone for a while. There was a lot of work to catch up on after all. Emilia rolled her suitcase into the apartment when she spotted a letter on the floor. There was no name or address on the envelope so it must have been delivered by the person who wrote it. When she opened the envelope, she pulled out a letter but didn't notice the other piece of paper that fell out onto the floor in the hallway. A strange feeling came over her because she knew no one who still wrote handwritten letters. But after reading the first few words, she immediately knew who sent it.

"Emilia,

I have warned you plenty of times now. I told you to come home. You know I don't like it when you don't listen, so I guess I just have to show you the consequences. Inside the envelope is a picture I've taken of you when we were together. I have many of those, I always liked looking at them. If you don't dump the rich boy and come back to me, I'll spread them everywhere. And I mean everywhere, so I would have a good think about it if I were you. Can't wait to see you again.

-M."

Emilia's heartbeat quickened and she felt nauseous right away. Marcus had no idea she was living with Isabel, how did he find out? But then again, he followed her to Monaco for god's sake.. She quickly opened the envelope again to search for the picture he was talking about but she couldn't find it. With trembling fingers, she rolled her suitcase away to look if it had fallen out and there it was: a picture of Emilia, naked, in the bathroom in the apartment she used to share with Marcus. It was probably taken after she had a shower because her hair was wet and she was brushing it. Tears formed in Emilia's eyes and she didn't know what she could do. She didn't want to leave Daniel, but she definitely didn't want Marcus to spread all of her nudes across the internet or even worse, her home town. 

When she received the first email, Emilia had thought it was just a joke or a way to scare her. After finding out he followed her to Monaco to spy on her, she had felt paranoid the entire time. Everywhere they went, Emilia had looked over her shoulder to see if she could spot him. But it looked like he got home earlier to prepare this letter. It had gotten out of hand now and the idea of being home alone while Marcus clearly had bad intentions, made her skin crawl. All of a sudden she realised she hadn't checked the rest of the rooms. With shaking hands, Emilia opened the door to the living room, finding it empty and exactly how they had left it on Sunday evening. Her bedroom was at the end of the hall and on her way over she checked Isabel's room and the bathroom as well. She softly opened the door to her room, while also keeping the hallway behind her in her sight. There was no one in the room.

Emilia let out a big breath and ran back towards the front door. All the windows were closed and she made sure to lock the door from now on as well. She quickly decided she needed to tell someone. The best thing to do was to just call Daniel, tell him everything and ignore Marcus. But she knew he wasn't joking about what he was going to do. It had only now occurred to her that he said he had more pictures of her, which meant that he took photographs of her all the time when she was naked. Emilia felt nauseous and her head started to pound. She grabbed her phone and looked at her contact list. Isabel wasn't coming home for another few days, she didn't want to distract Daniel from his races and she surely didn't want her brothers to find out. Even though she had just seen her ten minutes ago, Emilia decided to call Gia.

The phone only rang two times before her best friend answered. "Emilia? Did you forget something in my car? I can drive ba.." She heard her say. "You need to help me. Please come over, I really need your help!" Emilia interrupted her and Gia mumbled she was on her way before the line went dead. The three best friends had promised each other to drop everything they were doing if one of them ever needed help, Gia and Isabel never wanted to see Emilia with a black eye and broken shoulder again. After a few minutes, Emilia saw the headlights of Gia's car appear onto the parking lot of their apartment building and she waited until she was sure it was her friend before she opened the door. The adrenaline had kept her from crying, but when she fell into Gia's arms, the tears came pouring out.

"What happened?" Gia asked, trying to stay calm but Emilia could sense the panic in her voice. She couldn't speak because she was sobbing so loudly, so she just handed the letter over to her best friend. She kept the picture in the back pocket of her jeans for now. Gia's eyes glided across the paper and her mouth fell open in shock. "Wait.. What the actual fuck?" She blurted out and she threw the paper on the console table in the hallway before she took her best friend back into her arms. "Mil, have you heard from him before this? He said that he had warned you.." Emilia softly nodded and she felt Gia guide her to the sofa in the living room. She sat down and after ten seconds, her friend came back with a glass of water. Emilia had regained her breath a little and tried to speak up.

"I g-got an email from him the n-night we went out for dinner in M-Monaco. We had posted p-pictures of us with Michael and Daniel and he h-had probably seen them". Gia handed her the glass of water and she slowly took a sip. "I thought it was just a joke or s-something, so I didn't tell anyone, but after our day on the boat, I got another email. He f-followed us to Monaco, G". Emilia pulled out her phone and showed the emails to her friend, whose face got angrier by the second. She carefully read the emails a few times, screenshotted them and sent them to her own number just to be sure. "We need to call the police Mil, this guy is dangerous. You should have told me sooner.." Gia softly said, grabbing her best friends hand.

"I didn't know what to do. I didn't want Daniel to worry, he has three races in the next three weeks to focus on. That's so much more important than my shit.." Gia threw her arms around Emilia and rubbed random patterns on her back to try and calm her down. "I'm calling the police, okay? Do you have the photo he mentioned in the letter?" Emilia nodded and took the picture out of the back pocket of her jeans, laying it on the table in front of them. She saw the compassion in her friend's eyes before she saw her dial the number of the local police. Gia explained the situation to them and they told her that they would send over an officer right away to get a statement. Emilia felt relieved that they were handling it right now and she knew she had made the right decision.

A few hours, a lot of explaining and many cups of tea later, the female officer left. She told them that there was not much they could do right now, because all he had done was send her a few emails and a letter. They were, however, going to keep an eye on him and Emilia had a direct line with this officer in case of an emergency. The lady told her that she didn't like leaving her like this and she wished she could have done more, but it was all they had for now. Gia decided Emilia would be staying at her place for a few days, at least until Isabel was back. So here they were, grabbing the same suitcase as Emilia brought to Monaco, to head to Gia's house. She only needed essentials anyway, she could borrow her friend's clothes if necessary.

"What do I do now, G? I really don't want to tell Daniel. I want him to be able to fully focus on his races and I know he is going to worry when I tell him.." Emilia asked when they were tucked up in Gia's bed after checking if every window and door was locked. It was silent for a while, both of them just thinking about this situation. The silence drove Emilia wild, so she grabbed the remote to turn on the tv for some background noise. "Let's just wait and see if anything else happens. Maybe he gives up if you just ignore him or maybe he thinks you and Daniel broke up if he doesn't see you together in the next few weeks.." Emilia thought about her friends answer for a while. She was right, maybe he would just lose interest if she didn't react. But then again, she knew how much he hated being ignored. 

It was hard for Emilia to fall asleep that evening. She had texted back and forth with Daniel for a while, saying they had landed safely and that she didn't want to be alone so she decided to stay at Gia's for a few days. It wasn't a complete lie. Emilia hated not being able to tell him the full truth, but it was what was best for him. His season was almost finished and he needed every point he could get. She would tell him when all of this was over.