Their Little Princess | ✔️

Chapter Forty-Nine

My mind inadvertently goes back to the photos earlier and if that's one of the things that being ignorant would protect me from then don't I owe it to them to be grateful? That makes me think about Sandro's reaction to the photo of dad. How quickly he reacted, he didn't freeze, he didn't look hurt or shocked. It was odd and something nags at me telling me that isn't the first time he's seen that photo.

But seeing my other brothers' shocked reactions, they haven't.

Did he hide that from them to protect them? Keeping this away from my brothers so they could hold onto hope or something? My stomach feels uneasy at the idea that this is something that he's had to deal with, knowing how much it hurts to bear something like that without being able to tell anyone. To me, Sandro is the bravest person I know and it hurts to know that there's a chance that he could have something like that haunting him.

I wonder if he's ever struggled with nightmares.

"Is there anything else you want to say?" He asks me.

"Mom was a part of this, wasn't she?" I ask.

"She was," He says.

A part of me already knows that I want nothing to do with this. 

"We can talk more about it at home," Sandro says.

"Can I go see Zio Dante?" I ask. I just want someone to talk to.

"In one second," Sandro says, "I'm aware this has already been a lot. But you lived in Seattle with Elena. Is there any way footage of what happened the day you left?" He asks, purposefully leaving out details, "Photos, voice or motion monitors, anything?"

I feel a lot of pressure to give them something to help, "Um..." But I'm not exactly sure what they're looking for.

"If you don't know, that's okay," Elijah says, rubbing my shoulder gently.

"Mom had a camera embedded in the top side of the fence, it gave a full view of around the left side of the house if that um...If that helps. The code was 0809," I say unsurely. It was a camera that I never really understood the purpose of as it was almost never activated, "She said she activated it in emergencies only."

Sandro and Elijah share a look.

"Dad's birthday," Xander breathes, "I wouldn't have guessed that."

"Thank you, Madison. That's perfect," Elijah says, smiling.

I return the smile half-heartedly. "You can go ahead now. Thank you, Madison," Sandro says.

I stand up, "You're welcome."

I leave and walk to Zio Dante's office. 

Elijah's POV:

We all watch almost intently as Sandro clicks around on the laptop. "If it was emergency activated only, there might not be any footage if she was killed before turning it on," Sandro says.

The room is silent as the footage loads up and begins playing. I exhale in relief and I almost genuinely thank Elena. 

The room is dead silent as we all watch Sandro's screen.

Daniel, blood spilling from the open wound in his stomach, hobbles out of the house, his hand clutched to the wound, it's the footage we had before, but this time, Sandro clicks the arrow key and it switches to a different angle, showing the back of a man.

There's something eerily familiar about him as he begins speaking with Daniel. Almost as if they're having an argument. Then the man turns around, his face coming into full focus and my breath damn near gets caught in my lungs. I hear Carlo exhale sharply. My heart pounds in my chest.

"Zio Dante," Emilio says almost so quietly no one else hears, "It's Zio Dante."

It's no mistaking it's him. Almost as if on instinct, it clicks, did he kill dad? He was the only one with dad in Italy. He's the one who told us the news. It was all him.

This time though, Xander is the quickest to react, "Madison is with him." 

Maddie's POV:

I knock on Zio Dante's door and he calls for me to come in.

"Ah, hello principessa," He says, "My sincerest apologies for pressing you like that back there. Can I get you a glass of water?" He asks me.

I haven't even thought about food or drink since I got here but now that he's mentioned it, I'm parched, "Yeah, thanks," I say.

His voice becomes distant as he walks to the far corner of the large office to the water machine. I look around at all the various things in here.

"It's horrible that you had to see those photos in the first place. No one should have to see that."

I'm about to respond when a sweater catches my eye. It's cable-knit and tan, something about it makes my stomach queasy and my heart race.

He sets the glass of water in front of me and walks over to the bookshelf in the corner of the room, "And for them to put them in your bookbag. It hurts to think people would be that evil to want to hurt a child this way."

I'm so focused on the sweater, it doesn't even immediately occur to me that I never told anyone that I found the photos in my bag. "Where did you get this sweater?" I ask softly, my eyes seem to be stuck on the sweater. Daniel wore this sweater often. Down to the small thread-pull on the hem. I pray for the sip of water I take to clear my mind, but it doesn't, and I don't even realize when the water stops running, or when he stops talking, "Where did you get this water from?" I ask.

I grab my phone quickly, opening the Find My app and clicking on my AirPods.

Things are rushing in my mind a million miles a minute, I begin to feel woozy, but not tired, just loopy. My eyes start to well with tears in panic, I squeeze my eyes shut and press my wrists to my eyes. The room is spinning, my head is pounding. "Fuck," I whisper in pain.

I feel a hand cover my mouth, the other pressed to the front of my neck to restrict me from making any noise as a tear finally drops, landing on Zio Dante's hand. I have nothing to fight back with. There would be no point if I tried.

"That's it. Nice and Easy."