I've never heard my father curse in my life, and it sends scared shivers down my spine, like little razor-sharp needles forcing their way into my skin.
"James, please," Mason finally says, his voice firm. "We can talk about anything."
"Yeah?" Dad looks at him, pure fury in his eyes. "Are we going to talk about the fact you turned my fucking daughter into a sex toy for your pleasure?"
My hand trembles on the stairway rail.
"Are we going to talk about you painting her," dad bellows. "Fucking naked in front of your sick damn supporters?"
"James," Mason begs him, sneaking a glance at me. "I don't know who told you about all this."
My dad laughs bitterly, saying, "Word gets around, Mason. You wouldn't even believe."
"He didn't force me to do anything," I get out in the smallest of voices.
My dad laughs, like it's the most idiotic thing he's heard in his life.
"Didn't force her," he mocks Mason. "She's fucking eighteen, you son of a bitch. She's been manipulated. You fucked up her head, you jackass. You fucking ruined her!"
"Daddy, stop!" I yell, but my words fall on deaf ears as my father lunges after Mason.
I shriek as the two men tumble to the ground, trying to make my way to the spot on the floor where they're brawling. But Filippe intercepts me, holding me back while the only two men that mean anything to me fight it out.
My father is fueled by rage, but Mason is taller, stronger. He's got the upper hand, even though I can tell he's just trying to calm dad down.
"Where are they?" dad snarls as they get up, Mason holding him at an arm's length. "Where are the fucking paintings, you son of a bitch?"
None of us says a word as my dad rips himself out of Mason's grip and runs up the stairs. He doesn't even stop when he passes me, and I feel myself crying, hot tears of humiliation falling down my cheeks.
We all race after my dad as he tears through the house. He doesn't stop until he comes to a door I don't even remember.
"In here?" he snarls at Mason. "Did you put her with all of your other whores, you sick bastard?"
I give Mason a confused look. He looks at me worriedly, before raising his arms at my father.
"Calm down, James," he begs for the last time. "Let's sit down and talk about this."
"I did not take a fucking ten-hour flight to talk," dad yells at him.
He tries the door, it's locked. Then, he lunges at it with all his might, screaming as he breaks down the door. We all stare into the Pandora's box he's just opened.
The room is big, more of a hall, really. There are four easels in the middle of it, my nakedness exposed on every one of them. I blush deeply, but then I see the rest of the room.
It's really a gallery, the walls adorned with paintings. Dozens upon dozens of them.
I walk past Filippe, past Mason, past my dad. Someone flips the light switch and I come face to face with them.
The women.
The muses.
Innocence.
Yearing.
Submission.
Domination.
Four portraits for every one of them. All of them on the walls of this room. It must be over ten women. Maybe over a dozen. And in the middle of the room, my own portraits, like a fucking mockery to everything I thought I'd experienced with Mason.
I can't even turn to face him as the hot tears start to fall. I hear them talking, shouting. I feel someone reach for me but I rip myself out of their touch and sit down on the floor in a corner. I can't keep myself up anymore.
I watch my dad head for the paintings of me, punching a hole in every one of them. Ruining them.
Someone kneels down in front of me, and makes me look into his eyes. Mason.
"How could you?" I ask him. "How could you use me?"
"I didn't," he says. "You were the last one. The most important one. My work of art. My magnum opus. My muse, cara mia..."
"Shut up!" I wipe my tears off angrily, my whole body throbbing with the lies and deceit he's fed me over the past month. "I hate you, Mason Scott. You're a jackass. I hate you, I hate you, I hate you."
“Tell her you love her, then,” my dad interrupts from behind us, and Mason clenches his fists like he’s in physical pain. “Tell her you love her, you bastard.”
Mason looks at me and his mouth opens, but there are no words. He just stares at me, begging me to understand, hoping I’ll see something I don’t believe in anymore.
“Please,” I say softly, even though I don’t want him to see how vulnerable I am. “Please, Mason.”
“I…” he swallows. “I’m sorry, cara mia.”
I push past him and start running. I can barely see through the tears clouding my vision. I don't stop until my bare feet hit the ground. I don't stop until I reach the secret garden.
Once I'm there, I tear through it. I want to hurt him by damaging something that means a lot to him. Even though the garden is overgrown, there is still a certain kind of beauty to it. And I tear through it like a banshee.
I pull out roots, break down branches. I dig up the soil, kick the flowers, I do my fucking best to destroy the beauty of the place.
I don't stop until someone drags me away. My feet drag on the ground as I get taken away, feeling like a lifeless doll. I realize it's my father talking to me as he sits me down into a taxi. I'm still only wearing the silk robe over my PJs, the fabric now stained with blood. I look down at my hands and find them cut up. Probably from the rose bushes in the garden, I think absentmindedly.
Someone slams a fist on the window and the taxi driver starts chattering in Italian.
"Don't fucking take her."
The voice is muffled. I look up at Mason, his eyes pleading with me, with my father.
Don't. Go.
I want to say something back, but my mouth has dried up.
Surely all this wasn't fake. Surely he felt something for me, even though he painted so many other women in the same manner. But what we had... It was real. Maybe just for me. Maybe not for Mason.
Fresh tears spill from my eyes as I look at him through the window. He's desperate, he's reaching for the door, but we're locked inside. A part of me wants to tell my father to let me out, another part wants me to stay put and leave it all behind. The pain, the heartache. The love, the intensity of the man I spent my summer with.
"Drive," my dad orders the taxi driver. "Marco Polo airport. Now."
The driver hesitates and Mason slams a fist on the window again.
"NOW!" my dad demands, and the driver steps on the gas.
I stare outside of the window feeling numb as the car drives off. Mason's figure gets smaller and smaller and smaller. And then it disappears, and I don't feel anything anymore.
"It's okay, honey," my dad tells me, his voice shaky and pent-up. "You're okay now. I'm taking you home now. Don't worry, you never have to see him again."
I always thought I would break with a scream, go down in flames, come apart loudly. But as I fall apart in that car, I don't make a single sound.
Eighteen
Mason
After James leaves with his daughter, I'm a wreck. I don't know how I get back inside the house, don't know how I rip my knuckles open and make them bleed down my fist. The red mist finally starts to back away when Filippe patches me up in the kitchen.
I lost her, just like that. Because I was a fucking prick and couldn't tell her how I really felt. What she made me feel, what kind of man she made me become. Cara had changed me for the better, and I hated myself for not telling her that when I had the chance.
Filippe's calming words are coming in through a dark cloud of anger.
"I want you to leave for the night," I tell him roughly, as he's putting away the first aid kit.
"I don't think that's wise," Filippe says hesitantly, but one look from me has him too scared to say another word.
He nods one, packs up his stuff and leaves, letting me wallow in my sadness by myself. As soon as he is gone,
I get up and walk to the bar in the dining room. I go through the numerous bottles in the bar and finally find an 18-year-old Scotch in the bar. I stare at it for a long time, letting it bring back all the memories from the day I received it.
"She's pregnant! She's fucking pregnant!"
I grin at my friend's words, clapping him on the back and giving him a big hug.
"Man, I can't believe it," he keeps saying. "Can't fucking believe I'm going to be a father."
James Newton is a few years older to me, but he's still a huge fucking kid. We've been working at the same company for a few years now, me just as the delivery guy and him as one of the newest partners. His wife Corinne and he have been trying to have a baby for a while now, and it looks like the time is finally here. Looking at my buddy's eyes and the pure joy displayed in them makes me wonder if I'll ever be this excited about the prospect of having a child.
I don't think so.
"Congratulations, man," I say as we sit down at the bar. "Can't believe this is actually happening. I'm going to be uncle fucking Mason!"
"And you won't be able to curse around her," he warns me.
"Her?" I lift my brows in wonder. "Didn't know they could find out the gender so early on."
"It's just a feeling." James is smiling wide as he orders a round of drinks for us. Scotch. "That reminds me, I brought you something."
"Now you're making me look bad," I joke. "I haven't got anything for you. Making me feel like a prick."
James laugh and pulls a bottle from a paper bag.
"Got this from the in-laws. I want you to hold on to it for me," he tells me, emotion getting the better of him as he hands the bottle over. "It's Scotch. I want you to keep it until the kid turns eighteen. Then, we can have some together."
"You know I should be the one giving you a bottle, right?" I remind him, and we both laugh. Truth be told, I'm kind of touched he thought of me as the keeper for this bottle. "Of course, man, I'll hold on to it. To your baby girl!"
We drank ourselves into a stupor that night, and coincidentally, it was one of the last nights I spent with James for a long time after that.
I got promotion after promotion, and ended up getting offered a job to handle the Italian branch of the company, while James moved up north with his family. By the time his wife gave birth, we'd grown so far apart he never even called me. I found out about the little girl, Cara, from another co-worker.
We stayed in touch sporadically over the years. A birthday message here and there, a Christmas card once in a while. No phone calls or texts. The odd Facebook message.
When I was in town, James found out through a mutual friend. His invitation to his daughter's birthday party seemed more of a chore than an exciting occasion. But I'd heard of James' wife passing, knew he was having a hard time, and I decided to pay a visit to my old friend.
It had been good catching up with him, and we had fun remembering moments from all those years ago. He even asked me about the Scotch, and I promised him I was still keeping it safe.
I don't remember whether I told him about Luca or just-about-to-be ex-wife. I forgot every fucking detail of that day after I set my eyes on Cara for the first time. And then everything else went out of the fucking window, my only intention getting Cara into my life. And it worked like a damn charm.
I open the Scotch and drain it down my throat. One sip, two, three, four, five. It burns my throat and I keep drinking until the pain takes over my broken heart. At least this one's fucking temporary.
Hours later, I drag myself from the dining room table and head upstairs. The door to the gallery mocks me, hanging wide open. The faces of all the women I've painted laugh at me from the walls, becoming my downfall in the very end.
I walk inside the room, barely able to stand on my feet. My fingers graze the surface of the paintings Cara's father has ruined. The only ones that really mean anything to me. Ruined.
I head for the ones on the wall, looking at the women Cara thought were her competition. The women she thinks I betrayed her with.
All of them, all eleven, were for practice.
All of them knew what was going to happen.
That I was in love with someone else, waiting for her. Even then, I loved her. I just didn't fucking know it.
I look at the portraits on the walls, remembering each and every woman fondly. The very first one only two weeks after Cara's sixteen birthday. She taught me how to turn punishments into unbearable pleasure.
I go through all the muses this way, thinking about what each one of them has taught me. All in preparation for Cara, so I could be the best master she could wish for. So I could be the right man for her. To lessen the blow to her dad, to make her fall in love with me more - because I was so fucking paranoid about losing her, even then, when she wasn't in my arms yet.
I start picking at the surface of the paintings, getting my hands dirty with the dried-up paint. When I can't destroy them sufficiently that way, I take matters into my own hands, just like James did. I punch a hole in every one of the canvases until there's nothing left of the paintings on the walls. I break the frames, smash them on my knee, break them on the ground. I don't stop until the whole gallery is ruined.
I don't need it anymore. It was all for Cara, but Cara is fucking gone.
I pull out my cellphone and dial James' number, even though I know they're on the plane back right now and there's no chance he'll see my call. I let it ring repeatedly, over and over again until the shrill dial town is making me lose my mind.
I feel the loss of Cara everywhere, my head, my heart, my fucking limbs. I miss the weight of her on top of me, the way her head fit into the crook of my arm. She's been gone a mere few hours and already, I'm losing my damn mind.
"What's going on?"
I turn towards the source of the voice, for a moment certain that I'm imagining the figure standing in the doorway. But as my eyes come into focus I realize it really is him.
"Get the fuck out," I snarl at him. "I can't deal with your shit right now."
Luca hesitates before approaching me slowly. I collapse against the wall, my back sliding down until my ass hits the ground. I cover my face in my hands and Luca sits down in front of me.
"What happened?" he asks simply.
"She's gone," I tell him.
It's all he needs to know. It's all that matters, really. Cara is gone and she isn't coming back.
"Shit, I'm sorry." Luca does sound genuinely sorry, and I'm surprised he's actually capable of any kind of emotion.
I look up at him and find him staring at me with bloodshot eyes. He's not drunk though, not like I am.
"What happened to you?" I ask him.
I choose to overlook the fact that he technically shouldn't be back at the house after I kicked him out a few weeks ago. I didn't care where he ended up that night, after treating Cara the way he did. But now that he's back, I'm almost relieved that he's in one piece.
"I found her," he tells me simply, and I give him a blank stare.
"Found who?" He looks into my eyes and I see the pain in his gaze, the answer so obvious it makes me sigh out loud, saying, "Oh, Luca."
"I was surprised she lives so close by," he says conversationally, but a single look at him explains how hurt he is by this knowledge. "Did you know she was only an hour's drive away from us?"
I hesitate for a second before nodding. I can see my admission has hurt the young man even more.
"How did you find her?" I ask him, and he runs a hand through his dark hair.
We really do look alike, even though we're not related. I wasn't much of a father figure for Luca either, and I never gave a shit about it. But seeing him so vulnerable now makes me wonder how much of his fucked up personality is really on me.
"I've been looking for a while now," he admits. "I just... I guess I wanted to see if she had any interest in seeing me. Maybe making things right."
"I'm sorry, Luca," I say roughly.
I don't tell him he co
uld've asked me. Don't tell him she stopped paying for him ages ago, that she never even responded to my calls when I wanted to talk about him. She's written us both off, for good.
"It's okay," he says. "I guess we've both messed up, haven't we?"
I laugh bitterly at his words, wondering how much he actually knows. He must've figured out Cara was special to me - it was why he was picking on her, after all. Maybe it was to get my attention as well, I don't know.
"You really shouldn't be here," I tell him coolly. "Not after what you did to Cara."
"I know." His voice is weak, for once. "I wanted to apologize to her. I know I can't really say or d anything that would make it better. I never meant to hurt her, I swear."
I look up at him, realizing I don't even know him after all these years. But I think he's telling the truth.
"Okay," I say quietly. "We need to talk, anyway. But I need to get to bed first."
We both know I'm lying, that I'll spend the next few hours tossing and turning. I also know I'll be dialling James' number the whole time, hoping and begging that he'll pick up. That he'll change his mind.
Luca gets up from the floor and gives me a small smile.
"Goodnight, old man," he says. His voice is tired.
"Good night, Luca."
I don't move from the floor I've collapsed on, and he doesn't make a move to help me, either.
Nineteen
Cara
The flight back and the first few days at home are a blur. I barely remember a thing from that time, and I sleep for hours and hours, day and night blending into one another and making me forget about my whereabouts.
Dad doesn't pry. He makes sure I'm fed and that I take care of myself, but I've switched on autopilot. I'm barely aware of what's going on as the days start to pass.
On the fifth day, I ask dad for my phone, and he refuses. I realize he's taken it away from me, worried Mason will try to make contact. My computer is gone as well, and I've never felt more isolated.
"I'm not going to call him," I tell dad.
He refuses to acknowledge Mason, hasn't said his name or anything about him since we got back. Now, his hands form fists at his sides and he looks away, like he can't bear looking at me anymore.
His Muse: A Dark Alpha Bad Boy Romance Page 12
