I miss her so much. Alessandro, if you help me find her, I promise I will never ask for anything else.”
There was a long stretching silence. For a moment, I thought he considered it, but then he said, “I'm afraid I can't do that, Olivia.”
My heart sank into the depths of deepest despair. “If you care about children like you say you do, even a little bit...”
“Don't,” he snapped.
“Alessandro...”
“Olivia, I said no,” he warned softly. “End of discussion.”
I gaped in breathless disbelief, unable to understand how anybody could be so cruel and unfeeling. “She’s a lonely nine year old girl who has lost both her mother and her sister—”
“Tesoro, don’t overreact,” he interrupted in a tone filled with unexpected reassurance. “Children are very resilient. I’m sure your little sister is just fine. You worry too much.”
I shook my head, feeling miserable and defeated. “Alessandro, do you have any siblings?”
Something dark and dangerous flashed in his gaze. “No,” he said, suddenly sounding emotionless. “No, I don’t.”
“Well, if you had a little sister somewhere out there like me, you’d know why I worry,” I muttered sadly. “You'd do anything to find her and keep her safe.”
“But I don't have a little sister,” he pointed out gruffly, almost regrettably.
“But if you did—”
“I don't,” he bit out with the air of dark, relentless finality.
There was something unusual in the way he looked at me. The expression in his eyes reflected anger and...pain, but I had to be mistaken. He wasn’t capable of feeling pain; only knew how to instill it. Why the fact he had been an only child should distress Alessandro to such an extent was an enigma to me. Nevertheless, I had this strange instinctive need to say something comforting to him—something that might encourage him to see things from my perspective.
“But if you did,” I persisted. “I'm sure you would have loved her just as much as I love May.”
“I'm sure I would have,” he muttered in a strange voice. “I'm also sure I don't want us to have an argument about this.”
“Alessandro...”
“It's time to close this subject,” he instructed. “No more talk about sisters...especially ones that don’t exist.”
Once again, I thought some strong emotion quickly flashed in his eyes, but it disappeared too soon for me to realize what it was.
“Perhaps it's for the best,” I whispered, aware those words sounded so senseless.
His eyes narrowed on my face. “For the best?”
I nodded in slow motion, baffled by the infuriated grimace on Alessandro's face.
He spun me around to face him. “What exactly is for the best, Olivia?” he demanded in a terse tone.
“That you don't have a sister,” I clarified in a quiet voice, and swallowed at the sight of Alessandro's features transforming a few shades darker and infinitely more dangerous. “I...I meant because of your line of business. Her life would only be in danger and she would suffer—”
My words were cut off by an unexpected blow to my face. Too shocked to anticipate his action, I collapsed to the floor and peered up at Alessandro through a blur of tears. For a short instant, he seemed frozen. Then, his gaze traveled from the smarting flesh on my cheek all the way to the palm of his hand. When his eyes returned to mine, he seemed almost...shocked by what he had done.
“If you know what's good for you, don't mention your sister or the lack of mine ever again, Olivia,” he uttered a warning in a voice that was treacherously soft. Then, before he turned around and left, he added the expected dose of menace into his threat and gritted through his teeth. “I fucking mean it, capisci?”
I nodded in maddening haste, still disturbed by the residues of shock caused by Alessandro's unexpected blow. He exhaled as though he wanted to say something else, but then turned abruptly and stormed off, slamming the door shut behind him.
Caught in a hypnotizing spell, I stared at that door, holding onto the swollen, pulsating flesh on my face. Slowly, I forced myself back on my feet. Then, I took several heavy steps and stumbled to the mirror to assess the damage. A glaring red imprint of Alessandro's fingers stained my left cheek and a small smear of blood coated the edge of my lips. I expelled a shaky breath and swallowed the tears that shone in my eyes, ready to roll down my cheeks. I refused to cry because of what he had done. Instead, I bottled up the pain and kept the