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Lili bites her bottom lip, a gesture so reminiscent of Bella that I can’t think straight. Would our kids look like this?
When her lower lip starts to quiver, my heart pinches so hard it feels like it’s being lassoed by a crown of thorns. And every cell in my body chants, make it stop, make it stop.
I once considered myself a strong man. A torturer who could give as good as he got. And yet here I am, about to cower to two girls and beg for mercy just so I can go to the bathroom, talk openly with Father Marc, and hopefully not piss myself between here and there. “Five minutes,” I plead.
Dante removes his watch and holds it out for the girls to see. “Look, this is the time now. When the hand reaches here, what happens?”
“Enzo comes back,” Lili announces, her chest puffed up with pride at figuring it out. Sofia, however, remains unconvinced, her face a mask of doubt as she tightens her arms across her chest.
Dante leans in with a smirk. “Between her innate suspicion and impressive death glare, it’s like looking into a mirror for you, isn’t it?”
“Shut up.”
I kneel down, bringing us eye to eye. “I will never lie to you.”
She rolls her eyes, utterly underwhelmed.
I hold up my hand, spreading my fingers. “Five minutes. If I’m not back by then, you can punch my brother in the nuts.”
“I heard that,” he barks from behind me playfully.
A faint smile tugs at the corner of Sofia’s mouth. Finally. It’s enough of a pass, I take it.
Without a backward glance, I stand and bolt for the furthest bathroom.
“Enzo?” The voice crackles from the phone. “Are you still there?”
I slam the door behind me. “Two minutes.”
“You told the girls five,” Father Marc reminds me, his tone imbued with the pious indignation of Thou Shalt Not Lie.
“And I meant it. Two minutes for you, three to keep me from pissing myself. Stop wasting time. One minute, forty-five seconds left.”
“They’re in a vulnerable space, Enzo. If I had known there would be children, we would’ve had people on site.”
“What about their parents?”
His long, drawn-out sigh tells me everything I need to know. “We spoke with some of the women you rescued. Both their parents were brutally killed. Apparently, they fought to the death to protect the girls.”
Fire eats at my insides, but I stamp it out. Emotionless, I say, “One minute.”
Father Marc races through his words. “After a traumatic experience like this, tearing them away from a new bond could have catastrophic psychological impacts.”
No one needs to tell me about catastrophic impacts. After Trinity’s attack, she didn’t speak for four years. And she had us—five brothers—protecting her, tending to her every need and willing to go to hell and back for her.
I think of the two innocent faces, my heart splintering like shattered glass, and rub my temple, trying to stave off the growing headache.
Trinity had us. They have no one.
“What are you trying to say?” I ask, my patience fraying at the edges.
Father Marc’s voice softens, brimming with compassion and hope. “I’m saying they need you, Enzo. Just like Kennedy needs you.”
It takes a minute for his words to sink in, each one hitting me like tiny sledgehammers, determined to break through the empty tin shell of my heart.
With ten seconds left and my bladder about to burst, I snap. “Fine. They stay with me. For now,” I add with a steely determination.
“You’re doing God’s work, Enzo.”
