(TW//Explanations of abuse in this chapter)
Matteo
Waking up this particular morning to an empty bed set off warning bells in my head. After Kashera told me about what happened with her parents yesterday evening she started to become astoundingly distant by the hour. I guess because she pulled back in stagnant time increments she thought I wouldn't notice, but I knew from the moment she started explaining to me what happened that a lot more was said than what she'd disclosed. Though she didn't have to tell me every word, I hoped that she'd tell me the things that mattered to her the most, and somewhere in her story she left that out for one reason or another.
Taking a deep sigh, I rolled out of the bed and saw the clock reading seven a.m. The sunlight was just barely peeking through the curtains along the walls, and the room was cold. I couldn't decide just yet if the chill was from the thermostat or from the sorrowful feeling looming around in the space of this house. I went into the bathroom and ran through the motions of getting in the shower, brushing my teeth, and doing any of my hygiene I needed to do before going downstairs where she'd disappeared off to.
We'd only been back for two days, but things didn't stop because I did. Once Kashera went to check in with her family and run errands, I was thrown into meetings around the city with Clem, Papa, and Enzo over everything that needed to be handled now that I was firmly back into my role. Although things were settled legally, Anfernee was still a looming threat we'd been keeping surveillance on. Since the chief was gone it got easier to start mapping Anfernee's movements seeing he'd lost a vital element of his protection. His movements were becoming frantic as his paranoia grew. He knew I was coming, and we were about to enter into an interesting game of cat and mouse to see who'd strike first.
I was set to go work out and attend meetings this morning, but that was going to have to wait until I found a certain woman of mine who was going through some turmoil that she refused to tell me about for one reason or another.
Walking downstairs to the dim space with no sounds coming from anywhere admittedly threw me off. I swept the first floor to see if she was in the office, the kitchen, or maybe lying down on the couch, but she was nowhere to be found. I backtracked upstairs, and upon checking every room in the house I began getting worried. It was one thing for her to disappear, but Kashera didn't just up and leave without trace. She knew her safety was too reliant on my knowing of her relative locations. To sit here knowing nothing was putting me on edge because I knew how left things could go in a blink of eye.
Rubbing the bridge of my nose between my fingers, I grabbed my phone and made a call to the head of her security detail.
"Where in the hell are you all?" I asked as calmly as I could manage. Receiving radio silence, I pulled the phone back from my ear and looked to ensure that the call hadn't been disconnected. Once I saw that it wasn't, but instead it was that no one had bothered to speak, I laughed darkly before shooting off in Italian as I placed the phone on speaker.
"Don't make me fucking repeat myself or ignore me! I will fuck you the hell up and that entire detail! Where is she?" I roared. I heard the sharp exhalation of air on the other side as he began speaking carefully.
"I apologize Capo, but the Comare asked of us to keep her location a secret. She gave special instructions for us to not tell you. I can assure you she is more than protected-"
"You do realize that if anything happens to her I will literally have your heads on a pike, correct?" I cut him off as I grabbed my keys off the counter. He was on his work phone, and as he kept playing a game with his life I was tracking his location.
"I do sir, which is why nothing will. She's fine, physically, and we are spaced out carefully," He urged as if trying to keep me away. With a laugh I hung up the phone. I wanted to kick his ass, but I knew Kashera would have my head so I was trying to keep a lid on my rising temper. Whatever was going on she had a hell of a lot of explaining to do, but I knew in order to get that explanation from her I was going to have to calm down. I might have have been mad at her security, and put off about her taking off, but I knew better than to approach her irrationally. Something was really bothering her in order for her to leave, and that was the understanding in which I'd have to go to her.
Once I pulled up to the pond that rested a few acres inside of the compound's property, I let out a breath as I saw her sitting ahead on a blanket on the grass beside the bank. I turned the car off and treaded over to her. She said nothing to me as I took a seat beside her on the blanket. We sat silently for a while as I knew she'd talk when she was good and well ready.
As I waited, I took in her quiet demeanor. She'd been crying, and she looked so tired. I could tell from the track marks on her face. When I sat down, she folded in on herself some so that she sat elbows on her knees and chin on her fist. Whatever it was troubling her was serious, and as much as I wanted to gather her up in my arms to tell her everything would be fine, I didn't know if I could considering that everything wasn't looking fine. She had been pulling away since last night, and I had a hard time gauging in the silence just how far out she'd made it.
She took a deep breath as she pressed her forehead on her fist before she lowly began talking.
"Christopher Demar Williams was my own personal hell on this Earth. I was in my last years of law school when everything started. He was one of Marcus' friends, and we'd known of each other for a little while. I was scarred to get close to him because he was one of my brother's friends. However, when Marcus caught wind of us liking each other he actually gave us his blessing. He thought that if anybody was going to be worth the hassle of him dealing with his baby sister having a boyfriend, it ought to have been someone he trusted and knew well.
Little did he know that his friend was so good at his manipulative craft that even he couldn't detect that the man he'd allowed into his life, and now into mine, was a walking incarnation of Satan himself.
He was like everything the songs warned a girl about. He was sweet, but he was a flirt, and whenever I got put off by it he'd comfort my fears. He was so devastatingly handsome and could sweet talk a nun out of her panties, and at the time I couldn't for the life of me understand what he saw in me so I dealt with the few imperfections I saw before we became official. Little did I know, that was exactly what it was that he saw in me: a naive, young, inexperienced girl who he could mold to his whims without her ever batting an eye.
The first year we were perfect. Too perfect in hindsight. He never said or did anything wrong after he became my boyfriend. He was doting, sweet, and Mommy and Brook adored him. He made sure I was cared for, but he also made me dependent on him in the long run not as much materialistically as he did mentally.
He had me groomed to his will without my knowing. I saught his approval for everything. Any decisions I made I had to make sure he was okay with. Though he never got upset, if it was something he didn't like I knew it, and the feelings that came with that were so bad I tried to avoid them at all cost. He could ghost me for hours on end out of the blue sometimes, and there I was looking lost behind him like I had done something wrong. He'd reappear making everything seem fine after I begged for him, but it really wasn't fine at all. It never was," She paused for a moment.
I sat still looking over the water knowing things were about to take a turn I was sure I wasn't ready for.
"Some time into our second year together he started to change. He got moody, he got upset, and he let me know how I could do nothing right. One day Christopher found out he wouldn't be getting the internship he wanted at a firm we both applied for. It sucked, but I still held onto hope that I would be able to get it at least. I ended up getting it, and I even got an extended offer with pay. I remember going into his apartment on cloud nine. I should've noticed how something was off with him when he answered the door.
When I told him I was so happy I could burst. I was talking a mile a minute about what getting the internship meant, and what it felt like to get the news. Then before I could blink my head had snapped so hard to the side I thought I saw stars," She said releasing a harsh breath as mine got stuck inside of my throat. My leg began to bounce lightly as I tried to hold myself together. She was being brave enough to share this with me, and just as she'd taken on my turmoil as her own, I would do the same for her no matter how much it felt like acid was being poured atop my heart.
"I couldn't tell you what he screamed at me as he stood in the ear on the side of my face he'd smacked the life out of. All I could hear was white noise. I do know that when I came to, I screamed so loud I startled him. I began shoving him away, but he instantly took to me. He comforted me and promised to never do it again, but I fought against him and left as soon as I could.I avoided him for weeks, and though it shocked everybody I never said a word about why we were apart. I was embarrassed and confused because for some dumb ass reason I still loved him.
The day I took him back was the day I regret the most in my life. It was the first day of the internship, and I was leaving out of the office after our short introductory half day. When I walked out he was standing there waiting for me looking like perfection with regret and yearning all over his face. He begged for me to just go out to lunch with him to talk, and despite my better judgement I fell right back into him.
He hit me again two weeks later to that day. I don't even remember what for. When I regained my strength I threatened to call Marcus. I walked away from him and picked up the phone ready to make that call, and the next thing I knew I had a gun pressed to the back of my head-" She broke off.
My eyes snapped to her as my chest got tight. I was already fighting to keep myself in check, but it was getting harder to do so by the minute. Seeing her trembling frame, I knew she was going back to that night, so I slowly moved closer to her and adjusted so I sat in front of her. I opened my legs so that she sat between them as I reached out and began letting my hands rub slowly up and down her claves making her sigh and the trembling gradually subside. I would give anything to take her pain away, but I knew there wasn't anything that I could do except be here with her.
"I- I didn't know what to do. He told me if I ever told anyone he'd kill me and anybody else I got involved without a thought. He was crazy enough to smack me around and hold me at gunpoint so of course I believed him. I didn't sleep for days because I was scarred he'd pop up and have his way with me.
He gave me flowers again, gave me gifts again, apologized profusely again and again, and he kissed the incidents away with promises that he would change again. I stayed because I loved him, and I thought he would change. Deep down inside, though I knew he wouldn't.
I was a mess, but I was a law student so when I told everyone it was stress it was believable. I'd gotten so good at lying about the abuse I almost would believe myself sometimes. Brooklyn was concerned, and she was the first to come from underneath the spell of Christopher because she didn't get why he wasn't doing more to help me when he was always out having fun. He was going around hanging out with the dope boys with money, and yet I was the one at home loosing weight, stressing myself to death, and sinking further into a depression I couldn't see a way out from. I didn't blame anyone else for not noticing, because outside of the times he'd slap me, any other abuse he did was tactically done in places no one would see. My mind being the most prominent example.
The breaking point came when Brooklyn discovered he was cheating on me. She'd went out with some other friends to a party and caught him with some girl. She clowned so bad everyone in our circles at school found out about it. Everything went to hell after that. Him and Marcus fought to the death it seemed the next day, and Brooklyn was adamant on getting me to leave. I almost left, too, until one day I got snatched up between buildings on campus and he almost strangled me to death until I gave my word that I'd stay," She said almost whispering at the end.
I pulled her closer to me just a bit as I heard the hopelessness seeping into her voice. It was the smallness of a young girl who wanted to be saved from the hell she was being forced to endure. A young girl who was so close to that freedom just to have it ripped away from her in a moment.
"I stayed but then that just made everything worse with everybody else because they couldn't understand why I would. How could they though? Nobody knew that he'd had me conditioned to be mentally dependent on him. Nobody knew that once we got back together every time they said something to him about it, every time he so much as thought somebody was speaking on his affairs, he'd come home and beat me to the brink. Nobody knew and I just let myself suffer through my last year of law school in silence praying for some type of salvation until I got it-" She said before a sob left her. She began rocking as I took her pain in earnest stride even though it was dutifully killing me inside to see her break like this before me.
"Matteo what day is it?" She asked softly. Hesitantly I gave her the date and she hummed in response as she rocked silently for a moment longer.
"It's been four years and I still get wrecked every year. This year it seems to hurt even more," she said looking up and at me with tears streaming down her face. She reached down and took my hand in hers and squeezed as she looked off over my shoulder out to the waters behind me.
"When I found out I was pregnant, I was so scarred I cried for hours," She breathed out. I cursed helplessly in Italian as I squeezed her hand harder before bringing it up to my mouth.
"I thought that was the absolute worst thing that could happen to me. I was wrong as hell of course, but I didn't know that at the time. All I could think about was the fact that I was going to bring a child into this bullshit. My father was basking in my misery at home. I was barely maintaining my stature at school, and I was scarred to come home every single day. Yet, somehow I was supposed to bring a child into all of that? Most of all, I couldn't shake the fact that I was going to be stuck with him forever.
I wanted to kill myself, and I'm not saying that figuratively." she admitted. I closed my eyes with a harsh sigh as I kept her hand close to my face, "That seemed like my only out to everything. I was holding a bottles worth of pills in my hand one morning. I was so zoned out that I didn't hear the front door open. I'd forgotten that Brooklyn was coming over altogether. My mind was zoned in on ending all the pain I was in. When she came in and saw the pills, she smacked them all across the bathroom and I fell apart in her arms on the floor. I told her about the pregnancy, the stress, some of the fear, but I still couldn't fix myself to tell her about the abuse.
I knew that I had ways out, but sitting on that floor made me think that maybe something could give. Just maybe there was a reason for all this despite how meek everything seemed in the moment. We came up with a plan to tell him, and once the cat got out of the bag, things changed. He was back to being prince charming. He treated me like a princess, and I thought maybe the salvation I prayed for was this little blimp growing by the day in my stomach.
Marcus still hated his guts, so did Mommy and Brook, but everybody played nice for the sake of my well being. As long as I was happy so were they. I thought salvation had come at last, but then today happened," Pausing her eyes casted down to the ground for a long moment. When she looked up again she rolled her lip between her teeth nervously before she spoke in a borderline whisper.
"I'd gotten the news that I'd passed the bar. I was so happy, and I went home to tell him just to see him on the phone with some girl. I snapped. I marched over to him, took the phone, and hung it up. I started to question him about the girl, and next thing I know I felt the glass entering my skin. He lifted my head from the ground by my hair hard as ever, and in the blink of an eye threw me back down into the glass covered floor.
Once the kicks came, I started trying to fight back, but that only made it worse. I remember him lifting me up and whispering in my ear. He told me that I was worthless, that I was nobody without him, and that he was doing me a favor by ending my life. To this day I don't know why Marcus came to the house that night.
Once he barged in, Christopher threw me as hard as he could manage into the brick wall behind the TV and glass television stand. I couldn't make out what all I went though and broke. I still couldn't if I tried. I just felt blood and glass everywhere from my head to my toes. My vision blurred, and I heard the sounds of more crashing and a gunshot before I blacked out," She said. Her eyes weren't open anymore but the pain that twisted on her face finally broke me. I lifted my hand to wipe my face hastily as I looked at the woman in front of me.
Before I could stop myself I pulled her into my arms and she let me hold her. However, she only clung to me lightly, letting me know she was still detached from me despite all her forthcomings, and I was scarred of the possible why's. As I held her trembling body I prayed that Marcus killed him or that he was in jail where I could send someone to do the bidding myself. Either way it went, there wasn't enough forgiveness or time in the world to justify him being able to take a breath in this world as far as I was concerned. Just picturing the scene she described had me quivering in anger, hurt, and a thirsty need to have the blood of a man I'd never seen nor met on my hands.
"When I woke up it had been three days since the incident, and my four month hardened baby bump was gone. I screamed for what seemed like hours. They wouldn't stop leaving my mouth. I couldn't stop them, and I didn't want to try. I screamed and cried until my voice went raw while my mother and Brooklyn squeezed into the hospital bed and let me fall apart on them as they cried with me. I'd felt pain, but that was something so earth-shattering that I wouldn't wish it on my worse enemy, and that wasn't even the end. The doctors came and told me that-" She started but abruptly stopped as she harshly jerked away from me. She crawled back on the blanked and gripped the blankets at her sides for dear life as she sobbed. I followed her crawling forward.
"Don't come close to me, please!" She pleaded and I froze in place.
"Kash-"
"No! I would much rather not feel you change against me while I'm in your arms. Let me have that dignity. I'm begging you to let me have that dignity," She pleaded desperately to me with the strain blatantly evident in her voice.
My eyes widened as the breath left my body. I pushed forward softly, as a cold prickling fear settled over my heart at her broken words. Her eyes would live in my nightmares as she looked as if she was watching the most horrific death take place right before her. As if she was watching us break before her, and I prayed to God she would give me an understanding as to why.
"Kashera, Bambina, don't shut me out. I'm here with you through anything-"
"Anything has limitations!" She screamed making me pause as the prickles intensified into slashes.
"Kashera, you're scarring me. What happened that we're here and you keep pulling away from me without giving me a chance to be there for you?"
"They told me that the chances of me having kids were low, Matteo," She said in harsh whisper.
My face dropped along with my heart at the life changing confession. Still, refusing to leave her in this space I pressed forward. I just wanted to be there for her, because hearing the words from her caused a pulsing ache in my chest. I couldn't even begin to imagine how that news must've felt for her in that moment at twenty-four years old with her entire life ahead of her. I got how she was gutted, but I couldn't see why she was looking at me as if our end was on the horizon of her eyes when the beginning was just starting to rise in my own.
"Tesoro, I'm so sorry about everything. I can't say I understand exactly how you feel, but you know that I can relate to your pain. You didn't deserve any of the hell that man put you through, and you certainly didn't deserve to lose that child. But bambina you have to tell me why this is making you pull away from me -"
"What is there to not get?" She exploded with a sob, "My chances of having kids are low Matteo! Meaning I don't know if I can have yours! We spent weeks fantasying about a life that may never happen, and I let you! I let you dream like that knowing damn well that it'll be impossible. A family is all that you've wanted!
My father was right. I'm worthless, and I can't even give you the most humanistic thing you could want. What's more is that here I am proving you wrong. I am just like that bitch Lilly more than I gave myself credit for. Here I've been, being just like her, selfishly lying and taking away the things you want most right in your face," She said harshly.
The minute the words left her mouth I snatched her into my embrace. I took her into my arms as she fought against me. Once I captured her face in my hand strongly but carefully as the other wrapped firmly around her torso, she stopped fighting as she collapsed forward into me with a muffled scream from the back of her throat. I held her as tightly as I could to my shaking body. My eyes were stinging with angry and hurt tears that I was fighting like hell, but valiantly failing, to keep back.
I don't know what I was expecting this morning when I woke up to the empty bed, but it surely wasn't this. I was angry because she dared to compare herself to the devil itself over something that wasn't remotely her fault to begin with. It also didn't help that her own father had reinforced the seeds like the bastard that he was. I hated when she talked down onto herself, but this was another level of self sabotage that I was never going to stand for no matter how hard things were in this moment. She was so much better than that.
I was hurt because she was everything to me. She was so far from worthless it wasn't even fathomable. She was the most beautiful women in the world that I didn't deserve, but damnit to hell she was mine. For her to think that she was along the likes of that woman because some son of a bitch abused her nearly to death, and then to think I wouldn't want her for it hurt like hell. She was not entertaining the impossible, and I wasn't mad at her in the slightest.
With or without the abuse there could've always been a possibility that we'd have problems conceiving: like it or not pregnancy complications were normal and could happen to anybody. For her to think I would leave her because of that killed me inside and made me doubt how good my efforts to show her how unwavering my love for her were. I was trying to remember her predicament, but in order for us to walk out this moment without being completely wrecked I was going to have to reprimand her harsh notions before I soothed her crippling fears.
"Don't you ever in your life compare yourself to her, Kashera and I mean that. Not ever!" I said firmly as I brought her face from my chest to look at me. When she saw my pained face, she shook her head as she looked away from me again. "Look at me," I demanded but softer than before. It took her a moment, but with a sigh she brought her puffy red eyes to mine and did all that I needed: which was to stay with me.
"Kashera Marie Daniels you will never in your darkest nightmare be Lilly. You are the light of my life, and most importantly you didn't let me fantasize about something that was impossible. I'm not telling you your fears were invalid, but I am telling you that you're going to have to let them go, bambina because so long as that doctor said something was possible, then guess what? It's possible. You let me dream because that dream can become a reality and you know it as well as I do.
Even if he hadn't caused that miscarriage, Kashera anything could've happened to cause us to have fertility issues. Anything, and even if that doctor said without a doubt that you couldn't carry my child you want to know something?" I asked pressingly. She bit her lip and nodded, "It wouldn't have mattered because when I said I'd love you through anything I meant it. Do you not get all the ways in which you have saved my life? I am nothing with out you. Majority of the things worth salvation in me is brought about from you, and for as heavy as that is I find so much weightless peace in it.
Bambina, we'll have kids one day when the time is right. It won't matter if we get it right on the first try, the tenth, through treatments, or adoption. No matter what or how, you are going to be the mother of my kids. You are going to be at the forefront of any dreams that I now have because they only began to exist when I got you.
I was living in bleak, pitch-black darkness until I met you. Then suddenly I had a life to live where I could dream about being a man worthy of love, and not a monster only worth the blood on his hands. Please don't push me away because your scarred la mia vita. That's why I'm here. So that when you are scarred you don't have to brave that fear alone," I told her honestly my voice almost pleading with her to hear me. To see me and how much I absolutely loved her with no bars or limitations.
She searched my eyes for a moment before she let out a sob that shook her body as she clung to me for dear life and I her after I sighed in a silent relief. Her cries broke my heart, but I preferred it broke on me so I could collect every piece before I put them back together in my loving hands.
She was so much more than I could've ever prayed for, and for her to be here as she was, having gone through everything she had, was only a further testament to that fact. Her doubts and reservations of us clicked more than ever. The way she held me when I poured my heart at her feet about Lilly now made perfect sense as well. She handled us with such intentional love and dutiful care because it was what she needed but never had.
For as put-together as we'd made ourselves out to be, we were two fairly broken people coasting through the world off the hope that something would work. Thankfully by God's graces that coasting brought us together. She was a mirror of the best parts of me and every good dream I'd ever had, and starting now in this moment as she used me to heal herself I prayed she'd see that.
"Marcus didn't kill him, but he did shoot him. He got off on defense of course, but Christopher is in jail. Because the baby died, he got fifteen years, but he'll be eligible for parole after ten. I'm sorry for spazzing like that it's just that you're right. I was scarred-"
"Shh," I whispered, "Don't apologize to me for any of this. Please-" I broke off clearing my throat as I tried to get myself together, " just like I laid down all of my life and trust in you, lay down that same trust in me. Trust that when I say I have you I mean that I have you, and when I say I'll love you through anything I mean that I'll love you through anything, Kashera. It won't always be easy, but it'll always be worth it in the end for us. Can you do that for me?" I asked looking down at her looking up at me. She blinked before reaching and taking a hand bringing it to my face. Her gentle fingers ran gently over my face before she nodded her head. I kissed her palm while my eyes never left hers.
"I can do that. I love you so much," She said thickly and I let my lips linger on her hands a while more before I responded in a soft earnest.
"Non devi ringraziarmi per amarti. Dovrei ringraziarti per avermi permesso di amarti. Tu sei tutto per me, e ti amo di più. (You don't have to thank me for loving you. I should thank you for letting me love you. You are everything to me, and I love you more)" I told her softly. Finally with a small glimmer of a smile she wrapped herself into me, and we sat in the rising morning sun silently holding onto the only real love we'd each had ever known.