Belladonna (Tom Holland)

Thirteen

    "He killed her, not even a year later," Jacob explained, "Well, let me backtrack, he killed her husband. She just happened to be with him and Lorenzo likes to eliminate everything." A tear rolled down his eye and he wiped it away quickly, as if he despised the emotions he was feeling. "She was pregnant, too," he said, turning to me with a broken smile, "I was going to be an uncle." It felt like the air was sucked from the car. I couldn't imagine the pain he felt when he found out. Jacob was going to have a family, a niece or nephew to dote on, and it was taken away like it was nothing.

    "I wanted to kill Lorenzo. I wanted to leave the family and destroy it at the same time. But the thing about mafia loyalty is that it's a death sentence. You have one chance to prove your loyalty to someone, so you have to make sure it's to the right person. So in short, I was fucked. I lost my sister and her baby, but I couldn't leave her killer," Jacob turned into the hospital and parked, turning the car off, "So I offered my information to Tom. At first it was because I wanted revenge, but then I found a family in Tom than I did with the Biancattis. Everything always comes back to family, doesn't it?"

    I had no words, so the only thing I did was nod. Jacob and I were similar in that all we ever wanted was a family. But Lorenzo took that away from us, because the only thing that was worth more than family was business, and business didn't know blood. While Jacob looked for revenge, I looked for more family, and we both found it. However, we found it in each other somehow. It's crazy how so many different roads can lead you to the same home.

    We took a moment in the car and sat around, listening to the music. None of us dared to speak even though there were words at the tip of our tongues. The silence was just too beautiful to ruin. Finally, Jacob opened the door, killing the radio and I did the same. We both walked to the ER, garnering strange looks from passersby. I wasn't surprised, I probably looked as if I rose from the grave. I had a stab wound in my hand and numerous bruises and cuts everywhere. It didn't help that I limped like I was undead either. My leg wasn't hurting me, but I was so exhausted every one of my limbs were beginning to shut down.

    We entered and the hospital stopped what they were doing to stare at us. "What the fuck are you staring at? Get her some help!" Jacob shouted and immediately the hospital resumed its busy nature. Nurses swept me away from Jacob and took me into a separate room, bandaging me up before taking my vitals and asking for my information.  Everything was a blur, and my increasing exhaustion was making everything so much worse. I was pretty sure one of the nurses asked for my name and I told her my address. Soon, my eyelids flickered on and off and I felt myself sliding off of whatever they sat me on.

    When I came to, I was in a hospital bed with Jacob sitting next to me. He was eating chicken and rice and the smell made me realize how little I had eaten the past few days. As I watched him eat, I considered taking the plate from him and eating the rest, but considering my company, I figured he would have no qualms about killing me. So instead I resorted to speaking, "Hey...hey, Jacob."

    "Well look who's alive!" he dropped his fork onto his plate and beamed, "How are you doing?" I sat up, groaning as I did so. I felt like I got hit by a truck, I couldn't move any part of my body. "Starving," I said and pointed at his food, "Is there any more of that in the cafeteria?" "Yeah, you want me to get you a plate?" he stood up and brushed rice off of his suit. It was the same suit he wore when he took me to the hospital, so that left me with two hypotheses: he stayed the night here, or I wasn't unconscious that long.

    I nodded and he left to go get me chicken and rice, but that didn't stop me from eating a bit off of his tray. I closed my eyes and soaked in the beautiful taste of hospital food. I wanted to eat the rest of the tray, but considering it was probably Jacob's dinner it would've been dickish of me to do so, so I opted for starving until he returned.