directly on mine. Rosa sucks in a deep breath. “Amanda?” I startle hearing my mother’s name from a woman I’ve never met. Ares leans forward, his face filling the screen again, and all traces of lightness are gone from his tone. “You know her mother?” He sounds accusatory.
I watch Rosa’s head bob around the screen as she tries to get a better look at me. “Is she Amanda’s daughter? But that cannot be. Ares, let me see her.” Ares leans back, and he wraps his arm around the back of my neck, his fingers touching his brother’s shoulder. Dante squeezes my hand, reminding me he’s here as well.
“Dio, you look just like her,” Rosa mutters, her eyes eating up my face. “How can it be?”
“Mamma, do you know something about Laura, about her mother?” Ares's voice isn’t as harsh, and he almost sounds like he can’t believe what’s happening.
“I had no idea.” Rosa’s fingers lift to cover her mouth, and a look of absolute horror covers her face as her eyes grow glassy.
“Mamma,” Ares snaps, “do you know what’s going on, or where her mother is?”
“No, Tesoro, I haven’t seen Amanda in,” Rosa's eyes lift to the ceiling, “almost eighteen years when I helped her escape Leon.”
Her words hit like a lead weight. She helped my mother escape who? And eighteen years ago? That would have been right before I was born. It’s Ares who finally speaks. “I need you to tell me everything you know.”
“Not like this.” Rosa looks around, like someone might be listening. Both of her men are standing by her side and she reaches up, grabbing their hands. “I’ll be there soon; do not let her out of your sight.” With that ominous warning, the screen goes black. The only problem is I don’t know if she was warning them about me or warning them for me.
Ares slams the lid of the laptop down and springs up from the couch. I can sense his frustration. Now that he knows someone has information, he’s going to go crazy until he knows everything. He spins on me. “Did your mom ever mention a Leon?”
I shake my head no on instinct, but I’m trying to think back, did she? “Not that I can remember.”
Dante pulls me in close, and Ares is stomping around the hotel room like the floor personally offended him. He stalks over to the sofa and I sink into Dante. I’m unfamiliar with this side of Ares, he’s angry and maybe even a little volatile. The lights in the room dim, casting long shadows on the carpet.
Ares drops back onto the couch and opens the laptop. The left corner is a mess of black spider webs when the welcome screen pops up. “Shit,” he curses, and it looks like someone dripped paint behind the glass, but most of the screen is still visible. He enters his password quickly. Moving his fingers on the trackpad, he highlights one of the lower icons.
It pulls up another login screen. He pounds the keyboard harder than necessary. Once his information is accepted, he hits a pull-down menu with a tiny magnifying glass. He types the name Leon into the search bar before hitting enter.
Several items pop up, all with the name Leon, and he scrolls down quickly, only glancing at the information beside each name. “This is ridiculous; there are one hundred seventy-two Leons. It will take me days to run these down. By that time, they’ll be here.”
Taking a chance, I reach out and place my hand on his shoulder. Ares flinches, but relaxes under my touch. His head falls forward into his hands. “Now we have something to go on, it sounds like your mom might give us some answers.” I hope he sees that as a good thing.
Ares turns his head, looking at me. “It also means my mom might have something to do with why you’ve been living out of a fucking RV your entire life.” He says the words like they taste bad in his mouth, like he couldn’t think of a worse fate than that. I take my hand back, feeling hurt for some reason.
If Ares sees the hurt splash across my face, he ignores it, instead choosing to pace again. Even without any pants, he’s still intimidating. Coming to an abrupt halt, Ares digs his phone out of his front pocket. Putting it to his ear after hitting one button he says, “Hey, doll, I need your help.” He looks at me, but