For a split second, my mind went back to the days of my tiny hands stroking my father. I inhaled deeply, smelling only Giano, and remembered who I was with. Then I wrapped my hand around him more firmly and rubbed my thumb over the head as his pre-cum moistened his tip. I wanted more, and I didn’t want to give him any opportunity to stop me.
“A man can take only so much, angel,” he whispered.
“Don’t hold back.”
Without another word, he scooped me up and carried me to my room, allowing his pants to slide off where he stood. The bed creaked as he laid me down, his lips crashing onto mine and his hands sliding down my sides. He climbed over me and lay to my side as his hand cupped my sex, teasing me.
His fingers parted me, and he circled my clit before sliding them inside my core. I arched up at his invasion. For a moment, I had a flash, and my body tensed, going back in time. The burn was real. The ache still filled me, but my hesitation didn’t waver. For only a moment, I was lost and back to the little girl
He broke our kiss, dropping his head to my lace-covered breasts where he sucked through the material, bringing me back to the here and now. The sensations overwhelmed me. I was a ball of knots, feeling like I could die from the pleasure while I waited for it to erupt.
I rocked into his finger, and he added another, stretching me, preparing me. I was no longer tense or afraid; I was wanton and lost in the moment. Instead of my past invading as I had feared, the touch and the sensations consumed me, leaving no room for anything else.
Leaning over, I slid his shirt over his head, exposing his glorious body to me. The sprinkling of chest hair felt rough against me, his muscles flexing with every movement while his eyes were lost in lust. Then I paused, letting his fingers fill me as I burst around his digits. The aftershocks washed through me as I became overly sensitive.
I could only moan incoherently as Giano would whisper or groan. I was so lost in the sensations I couldn’t give my attention to his words. I was terrified, if he stopped—if we stopped—I would combust. I didn’t want to say the wrong thing or move the wrong way and chance giving up this ecstasy.
He pulled out of me and slid over me as he slid my lingerie up then kissed his way down my belly. He gently nipped at my inner thighs before swiping his tongue over my tingling pussy lips. As he lapped and licked and set me on fire, I came alive again, needing more.
Reaching down, I pulled his face to my own and kissed him, tasting myself on his lips. I slid my hands down to his boxers then pushed them down, freeing him. Gripping his length, I slid my hand up and down his shaft, feeling it throb with each stroke.
He was huge, and for a second, I paused, wondering how he would fit. Then I imagined the feel of him inside my slick heat, and I was ready to push him in myself.
I guided him to where I wanted him, but before I could line us up, he moved my hand away and took control. He slid the head through my lips then rubbed my clit, and I arched into him as the tip then slid inside me. I was so wet he glided right in as I stretched to fit him.
I tensed as I felt the burn, and he paused as he hit my virginal barrier. Then with a surge, he broke through, and I cried out as the pain mixed with pleasure, and I saw lights behind my eyelids.
I had wanted this man from the moment I realized what men and women were really meant to do together. It was everything I had ever imagined it to be and then some. He turned something once so bad and horrifying into something almost magical. Love filled me, passion burned from inside me, and I couldn’t let go as I craved more and more. This was a high I felt like I could die from if it crashed down around me.
He thrust into me, grunting as my body instinctively milked him. His arm supported his weight as his free hand tweaked my hard nipple.
Needing to hold him close, I wrapped my legs around him and kept him locked to me with only enough room to slide in and out of my tight, wet heat. With each move of his shaft, I felt fuller and fuller as my orgasm continued to climb once again.
“Geee-aaaaaahhhhh-nnnnoooo,” I cried out hoarsely, never wanting it to end.
He pounded into me a few more times before he stilled, and warm liquid filled me.
“I love you,” I whispered as his eyes met mine. I smiled up at him as peace washed over me.
Sated, I closed my eyes as he pulled out of me. It wasn’t long before I drifted to sleep, and for the first time, not one nightmare came to haunt my dreams.
Chapter Nineteen
The light from the window peeked in, waking me. I rolled over, gloriously sore, to find the bed was empty, and my heart sunk as I blinked. Gazing around the room, panic filled me until I lay my eyes on him.
He was sitting in my chair, his head in his hands, looking down at the ground. He was in a button-up white shirt and black dress pants.
“Giano,” I called out, not understanding why he was in the chair, dressed, and not naked in bed with me.
He looked up at me, the red rim of his eyes full of anguish. He was in pain. My lover was hurting.
I climbed out of the bed naked and went to him, standing in front of him as he continued to sit in the chair, unmoving, just staring at me.
“Talk to me,” I pled.
“It’s over.”
Those two words brought my entire world crashing down. The safety of everything we had built together was gone in an instant.
“No, stay with me. Please stay with me,” I whined as emotions filled me.
“I crossed a line with you last night. I shouldn’t have done that, angel.”
Feeling like I had nothing to lose, I asked the one question that had bothered me for years. “Why take me then if only to deny me now?”
He dropped his head again. “I went there that night, the day I buried my wife, the day I silently buried my daughter. I went there with the intention of taking from James Valencia what he had stolen from me. However, when I reached your mother, she was alone, so I took her out swiftly then went to your room, and anger consumed me when I saw him with you. He was hurting you.
“When I grabbed him, your eyes met mine, the kind eyes of an innocent child. They were the same dark brown, wide eyes that my wife had the day she gave herself to me. Only, behind yours was fear and pain. The same innocent eyes of the woman I promised to love and cherish were looking at me in pain and anguish. I vowed to protect her, and seeing you there, I vowed to protect you since I had failed her. In your eyes, I saw my angel.”
I gasped. “It was you, but … but you said it wasn’t.” The weight of the killer in front of me hit me like a sledgehammer. Everything had been a lie.
“No, I asked how you were so sure. I said I acquired you because I did.”
Tears filled my eyes as I tried to follow him, but mentally I was back in that moment with my father’s fingers inside me and his blood covering me.
“I didn’t know what kind of man your father was at home. I only knew that, in business, he had his own father killed to grow his fortune. In the process, any liabilities were to be removed. He thought he had me killed, not my family. He wasn’t expecting me that night. He thought he was off scot-free. He wasn’t. I was going to make him pay. Only, there you were, helpless and in pain. In that moment, I could see the young girl, much like my Angelina, looking up at me … with … hope.”
I shook as I remembered feeling like I’d had hope as he sliced my father’s neck wide open.
“You had hope, Fallyn, in me. You saw hope to escape. I couldn’t take that from you.”
“Why let me become Angelina?”
“In my line of work, you never show all your cards. I let people first think it was me who died. Then, when the story was leaked to the press about my wife, I never reported my daughter’s death. I buried her below her mother in a private ceremony with no one around. Her friends and what little family we had all thought she was in the hospital, recovering from injuries. If word was to get back to your father or any of my other enemies, I wanted it to be my version of the truth, not what rea
lly happened. When I took you that night, I had this option wide open to us both, so I took it.”
“Why?”
“Redemption.”
I cupped his face in my hand, forcing him to look up at me.
“I’m a very bad man, Fallyn. I have done very bad things. Saving you was the only redeeming thing I have ever done in my entire life, a life that has cost me everything.”
“You have good inside of you. Don’t say you are bad. Look at me—look at us—Giano. Look at what we could have.”
“There is a packet of information for you on the dresser. Everything is set up to take care of you, no matter what you decide for your future. I wanted better for you than you had in your past, my angel.” Tears filled the grown man’s eyes. “I touched you. I touched innocence that wasn’t mine to touch.”
I couldn’t understand what he was telling me. Inside, I was dying a slow, torturous death, hoping he would stay with me.
Before I could take in his movements, he reached out to touch me with one hand and reached behind him with the other to pull a small hand gun.
Just as I leaned in to his touch, he pulled back, holding the gun to his head. Before I could register what was happening, he stilled then pulled the trigger. Everything happened so fast yet in slow motion. I was helpless to stop him.
“No!” I cried out as the ringing filled my ears. His blood and brain matter splattered all over my naked body and face as I screamed, “Stay! Stay with me, Giano. Don’t leave me!”
The gun clattered to the floor, his body slumping over, knocking me to the ground as he covered me.
“You said you would never deny me. You left me. You didn’t stay!” I wailed and cried out as he laid, unmoving and bleeding out all over me.
I sobbed as I pushed his lifeless body off me, covered in a sticky mess once again. Things felt like they had come full circle as panic consumed me, swallowing all thoughts or questions I should have. My only thought was that I was covered in a mess, so it must be over.
The flash of a folder on my dresser got my attention, and somehow, I found it in me to move. Walking to it, I found a letter from Giano on top. Still naked and covered in pieces of him, I couldn’t think clearly as I picked up the packet. My blood covered fingertips left marks on the white of the letter in front of me.
My angel,
I know this will shock you, but you must remain calm. It was my time to go. I crossed a line years ago when I sought out retribution.
My business has always been just business, one contract at a time. I took it too far when I knew the consequences put those I loved in danger.
Last night, what you gave to me was beyond anything I could have ever been given in my life, and like a selfish fool, I crossed the line and took it. You were my redemption, and I tainted that.
Please know that I wanted to give you a full and safe life. In doing that, I need to let you go, something I cannot bring myself to do any other way.
Call Alanzo from my phone. He will come over and clean up the mess. Then he will make arrangements and ensure you are taken care of.
The future is yours for the taking. This is your chance at a life all your own.
There is a file inside my safe. Alanzo will give it to you. What you do with the information is yours to decide. Just remember the dangers you walk into. Don’t let all this be for nothing.
All my love,
Giano
His phone was beside the papers. I picked it up, my hands trembling as I dialed Alanzo. I was moving by Giano’s instructions alone because I felt numb. I couldn’t even think beyond making the call.
“Gio,” the man greeted.
I said nothing.
Sliding down the wall by my dresser, I sat, naked and covered in pieces of Giano, as reality crashed around me. What had been my safe place for so many years was now a cotton candy pink room covered in splattered blood.
I looked to the canopy bed in which, just hours before, I had given everything to the man who was now lifeless on the floor beside me. Blood splatter was on the comforter. My eyes moved to the picture of Angelina on the wall, and I saw the speckles of Giano’s blood on the glass. He had touched innocence. I didn’t understand how something so right had gone so horribly wrong.
“Giancarlo,” Alanzo said again.
I couldn’t speak.
“Angel?” he whispered.
Still, I said nothing.
“I’ll be there in less than five. Do not move.”
I didn’t move. I didn’t do anything. I sat still on my bedroom floor, my body aching from the previous night’s activities and my heart shattered into a million pieces as the man I loved lay lifeless on the floor in front of me.
Tears ran down my face, but I didn’t touch them, letting the room become a blur.
I had no idea how much time had gone by when I heard movement coming closer, but I still remained seated.
Alanzo entered and stopped in his tracks. Stepping past Giano, he came to me, scooping me up and carrying me down the hall to Giano’s bathroom where he sat me down to start a bath.
“Wash while I handle your room. Do not come out of here, angel, until I come to get you.”
“You know?” I asked, wondering just how much Alanzo knew about the dynamic with Giano and myself. Did he know I wasn’t really Angelina? Why didn’t he question Giano killing himself?
“I know,” he whispered, and I sobbed as he turned to leave.
“Stay!” I cried out. “Everyone leaves me; please stay.”
“I’m not leaving. I have to fix this, angel. You need to get cleaned up.”
I only nodded my head as defeat washed over me then shame and disgust. I had just begged Alanzo to stay with me while I was completely naked and covered in my now dead lover’s blood. I felt seriously ill inside and disgusting.
Going through the motions, I slid into the tub, the water turning pink from the blood as it rinsed clean from my body.
Giano was dead. My mind raced, and my heart beat so loudly inside my head I thought my eardrums would explode.
Giano was dead.
I was a black widow. Everything I touched died: Papa Valencia, Father, Mama, and now Giano—all dead and all touched by me.
The rest of the day was a blur as Alanzo handled one thing after another. He kept me in Giano’s room where I let myself drown in his scent while he worked hard to dispose of the body, rip up my carpet, and clean every square inch of my room. Tirelessly, he worked to help set me up for a life all on my own.
Epilogue One
Fallyn Nicola Valencia
One Year Later
Name.
The letters on the paper mocked me. Was I really going to do this? Yes, I was.
Fallyn Nicola Valencia.
Giano had prepared for everything. In my hands, I had my birth certificate, social security number, and all the falsified documents to say I was sent away to school by my parents for the last eight years to explain my absence from the United States. Then I held an onion to my eyes to make them watery and puffy before I entered the Division of Motor Vehicles to get my New Jersey state driver’s license.
I had taken the time I needed to grieve. Then I had settled his final affairs along with some of my own. Today was my birthday and my rebirth day. Today, the world would soon have a paper trail for Fallyn Valencia once again. Today, I would become a target in a dark man’s criminal world just by being born who I was.
Bring. It. On.
Castillo had no idea what I had in store for him.
With the help of Alanzo and a few of his friends, the lady at the DMV helped me sort through the paperwork to get a new license after we had gone to the courthouse to overturn my death certificate since I was indeed alive. This process had taken a few weeks, but here I sat, ready to take back my life.
Fallyn Nicola Valencia.
I passed the test; of course I did. Angelina had been driving since before Fallyn was legal to drive. Identification in hand, I walked out with
my head held high. Hopping in my car, I looked over to the passenger seat where the sunflowers sat, ready for my next stop.
It took about two hours to get where I was going, and all the while, my mind raced, questioning if I was completely insane to go through with this. The cemetery was a little overgrown but nothing major or creepy about it. With my bag and flowers in hand, I moved through the tombstones until I found what I was looking for.
I squatted down to pull the weeds from around the cement structure as my fingers traced the letters to her name.
Nylene Diamante.
“My mother, you were not. My angel, you were. Nylene, the innocence you gave to Giano, the vows you took and kept, made him have the heart to save me. He wasn’t a cold-blooded killer, but rather a man with a job. He didn’t need to save me. No one would have cared that I was gone. No one did care that I have been gone this long. His connection to you allowed him to see beyond his vengeance into the heart of a fragile, little girl. You were the angel.”
One by one, my fingers ran through the grooves of her name. When I came to the end, I put my sunflower arrangement in the vase at the base and sat down in front of the plaque. Pulling out the small trowel and hand shovel, I dug out two small patches of grass.
Reaching into my pockets, I pulled out the two metal engravings I had brought and set them into the freshly opened topsoil.
Angelina Diamante.
“My dearest friend, you saved me. Your mother saved me. The angel inside you called out to give me a safe haven in a world full of darkness, secrets, and dangers. Every moment of every day, you have been with me. You are as much me as I am you. Today, I am giving you back yourself. Your grave has a marker. You are a secret no more,” I whispered to the air around me. Tracing the letters of the smooth metal that was a contrast to the rough patches in the concrete of her mother’s headstone.
I sighed as I touched the metal of the other name plate. “My Giano, my only lover by choice, my savior, and my greatest loss, you taught me how to live again, how to breathe, and you gave me the only safety I have ever had. Then you left me. You told me you would never deny me, but you didn’t stay.” I traced the letters of his name. “You gave me a new home, new name, and a new life.
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