Their Little Princess

Chapter Fifty

Emilio's POV:

"Close off every exit to the warehouse." Alessandro sends out demands on his way to Dante's office. 

Elijah rushes to the security footage in the main floor outside the office. Carlo and Francesco search the rest of the building. Alessandro flips through the papers on the desk, searching for some kind of address. My heart races, I've never felt as panicked as I do at this moment. As a child, I never experienced the anxiety that some of my siblings had, certainly not as bad as Maddie's which is reasonable with what she's gone through, but in this moment, knowing as little as I do about the entire situation, it's as if I can't operate. 

"Her phone," Xander says, kneeling to the floor and picking it up from under the desk.

Sandro grabs it from his hand, inspecting it. Everyone else is quiet. "It's sending a search signal to her airpods," He says. My eyes stay glued to my oldest brother, everyone's are. He'll figure it out. 

He's under the kind of pressure that would crush anyone.

"Why would she..." Xander trails off.

"That means she's in the building," Sandro says, pocketing the phone and walking out of the room quickly, "Search every room, I don't want a single room unchecked," He says, slamming doors open and looking inside briefly as he walks.

I finally snap back to attention, "Got it," I say immediately.

Please, Maddie. Please be okay.

Maddie's POV:

It's dark. 

I can't move. My arms are pinned to my side as I'm bound to the chair by rope. The first sensation I'm aware of is the pain in my ribs. The rope is putting excruciating pain on my ribs since they never fully healed yet. 

I feel odd, like I'm in multiple places at once. It's the after effect of drugs. I'm certain there was something in the water he gave me. 

My lip trembles slightly at the thought that it was my own uncle who did this. Family. I don't know why, lately it turns out there's a lot about this family that I don't know, but he acted like I could trust him. He comforted me, he...He never cared, did he? I look around, the room is dark, but I can tell it's pretty big, about the size of the sitting room at home. I can vaguely make out a rectangular shape, it looks like a TV. When the door opens, a bright light infiltrates the room and I shut my eyes tightly, turning my head slightly at the sharp pain in my head.

Dante enters the room through the door, shutting it behind him. He looks at me for a moment before walking over to a table and setting a box on it, looking through it.

The betrayal I feel as I watch him work makes my chest physically hurt. I want to vomit, and scream, and sob. I want to break down and destroy things, but I can't even move. The pure hurt in my stomach, the feeling of wanting to give up already, holds me back tighter than any rope in the world.

"Why are you doing this?" I ask, my voice shakes.

He looks at me over his shoulder, "Oh, good. You're awake."

He doesn't answer my question, instead focusing his attention on the box he's digging through, he pulls out what looks like a knife, slipping it into his pocket.

"What did I do?" I plead, "Please."

It sounds pathetic. I know it does, but I don't know what he plans to do, and I don't know if Sandro or any of my brothers will be able to find, that is if they even know I'm gone, and I need to buy time. I need to buy them time. Even if it means begging. 

He walks over slowly and crouches in front of me, "You really were a nice girl. I hate that there's no other choice."

But he doesn't sound like he hates it. He doesn't sound like he cares at all. "There is another choice though," I say, trying to convince him, the restraints are starting to make me panic, I can't move anything but my head, I try not to let my anxiety get the best of me. The truth is, I can't convince him there's another choice because I don't know why he's doing this. There's so much about all of this that I don't know, so many things that I'm not sure I want to know.

But not a single explanation I can come up with in my mind makes sense as to why he would do this. Is he angry at Sandro, does he blame him for dad's death? Does he blame me for dad's death? He could be upset that brother died and he doesn't know who to blame. That kind of misplaced hurt hits home for me and I can feel my eyes welling with tears.

"Are you doing this because your brother was killed?" I ask.

He practically scoffs in response, "So naive, Madison. You're making me feel guilty." But once again, he doesn't look like he means it as he stands back up. "Do you think we'd be here if I cared an ounce about my brother?"

I stop struggling against the restraint, looking up at his face as he sharpens a knife. "What?" My voice comes out quietly.

"Your father was weak. He allowed our father to force him to marry Elena. He allowed Elena to gain power over him, and he allowed himself to give his love to his children."

I'm quiet as I watch him with a mixture of confusion and hurt.

"I've dedicated my entire life to this business. I never found a wife, I never had children. I gave my life for this. I gave it all up because Lorenzo, your father swore to me that if we found you, he would give the business to me rather than his eldest son."

He scoffs, shaking his head, "We went to Italy, spent a few days with our parent when I overheard their conversation about giving the business to Alessandro. Everything I worked for was going down the drain, and if I was a coward, then I would have let that happen. Instead, I killed him."

My heart drops. He killed him. He killed his own brother. He killed my father. 

"But you...You cared! You were there for me when I—" My voice gets caught in my throat. There's no way he would betray me like that. I'm his niece, I'm his only niece, I've never done anything to him. "I trusted you."

"Then I suppose that was your first mistake."

Trust is a weapon. As long as you trust someone, they will always hold the knife. They will always have the power over you. If there was a flame burning in my heart, a small flicker of hope. It's gone. I can feel it die. I can feel my chest close in on itself as if there's no heart there.

I hear my brother's voices getting closer, there's slamming, it sounds like doors. But Dante doesn't hurry to lock the door, he just stands beside where I'm tied to the chair and waits.

The door breaks open and Dante puts the barrel of the gun to the side of my head.