"I don't think you would be able to handle that." She shifted away from me, feeling uncomfortable.

"It doesn't matter what I feel. What matters is that you're here now. That I will never let anything happen to you." I paused, hoped that she'd speak and when she didn't, I carried on. "I wake up screaming at night from nightmares. They are all twisted and dark and in all of them, you're screaming out for me, to save you."

When she didn't say anything and couldn't meet my eyes, I knew. The nightmares were fucking true. "You screamed for me didn't you." My voice broke. Clearing my throat, I carried on. It's not about me, it's about her. "I am so sorry, I didn't protect you."

"You didn't know-" She shook her head, trying to comfort me.

"No." I stopped her. "You have the right to be mad at me." I wanted to stand up and pace but I didn't want to break her focus. "I should have known you were alive. I should have dug deeper."

"I think you have already tortured yourself enough. From the shrine on the mantle, it looks like you've been stuck in a time that doesn't exist anymore." The sun was gone, like the shine that used to live in her eyes. They were now large, dead and beady.

I wanted to bring that shine back.

"Santiago, I've killed people, I've seen things, done things that are beyond anyone's imagination." She tried to soothe me again.

"Tell me, I want to know."

"Why, because you want to torture yourself again?" She asked.

"No..." I whispered. "It's better to know than not know." I tried to hint that it was better to know that she was alive so that I was looking for rather than not knowing about her at all. I felt like the universe was playing a trick on me. It was as if life had played paused 14 years ago and now it pressed played and sent me my sister but the older version who was a different person all together.

"I don't remember much. Gabe told me that I supressed those memories because it's too traumatic and I don't want those memories to come back but it also meant that I forgot what my family looked like. I guess it was better to think that being Elena Capone was my life instead of thinking I had a better life." She shrugged.

"As time went by, I just stayed because I didn't know what was out there. I just, I don't know. I lost the fight I had when I was younger."

I wanted to howl in pain but kept my shit together.

"I guess the older you got, the farther you were away from your life prior to being taken." My voice sounded strained. Looking up, she nodded.

The night was dark, a random dog barked somewhere in one of the houses scattered down the valley. There were hardly any stars in the sky but the grid of city lights blinked for them. We sat there in silence, absorbing the night in.

"I think I had Stockholm syndrome." She confessed. "Gabe once took me out on a date. I could have ran away then but I didn't. I honestly don't know why I didn't."

That's because she didn't know anyone who'd help her in this world. But Gabe did and I'd be forever indebted to him. Instead of commenting on her confession, I took her hand in mine and just held on to her. I wanted to show her support.

"It wasn't always so bad. When I was around 11 or 12, I'm not sure. Jude killed someone and he was on trial. He fled the country and after that. His..." My hand tightened in hers. "...assaults stopped." My ears and eyes were burning but I just held onto her. Not letting go. My heart was pounding in my chest.

"Mason Capone hired a lady called Daniella, she was an escort who's client was Mason and when she's come over, she was always kind to me. Usually, people just ignored me. When she found out about why I was there and what was done to me, she tried to escape but she died. She gave her life for me. She made life a bit easier for me and after her death, I found ways to live on. When I stopped trying to commit suicides..." I nearly puked but I held on, for her. "...People just left me alone. Mason's mother, she was old but stern. She always made sure I had what I needed. She was the one who got me into art and gave me everything I needed.

"It was a twisted world but it was all I'd known. I know the way I speak about it sounds like it was normal and I knew it wasn't normal but when Jude was gone after two years, things weren't so hard afterwards. It was... all I knew." She said sadly.

"You shouldn't have had to go through that." I spoke. I sounded like I was being strangled, my jaw hurt from clamping them so hard. "You... You shouldn't have." I was shaking, I just couldn't handle it.

I'm only listening, she lived through it.

I reminded myself again. Leaning, back, I pulled her chair closer to me and wrapped me arm around shoulder. "I'll never let anything happen to you. Even if it kills me, I'll never let you be captured again."

She hugged me back. Even though there weren't emotion in her eyes or voice, her grip on me told me otherwise. Her hands were shaking, arms tightened around me. I tried not to shake but it was impossible. When we came apart, she just rested her head on my shoulder, her hands hung onto my arm tightly. A feeling of nostalgia hit me. She used to hold my hand when she was young and her holding onto me like that gave me a sense of responsibility.

I breathed in, feeling my chest puff up. My eyes burned thinking about what those two years for her were like. The exact two years that I was drinking and using as many women I could to forget about the people I lost.

I wanted to bang my head against the wall. While she was being abused by a bastard, I was living it up, partying, trying to ruin my life.

I hated myself in that moment.

"Sometimes, I wonder what is harder. Living outside of the walls or inside. When Jude left, he wanted to take me with him but his mother stopped it. Lydia wasn't too involved in the beginning but I don't know why she started keeping him away from me. After she moved in, no one every touched me every again. I think she was the reason behind why Jude had to leave. I think she paid off the witness. He was taken into the feds but again, she was getting too old and was killed by Dex. The guy who killed Daniella." A sad sigh left her.

I was still reeling from the comment about no one touching her. The fact that she had been touched, brutalised in the first place made me want to go back in time and hunt him down, even if it meant I had to go to jail for getting caught.

"I painted, watched tv and just lived my life. I wasn't like in chains or anything. I was okay. Now that I am out, I don't know what to do. There so much, I don't know how to adjust. I've lived like that longer than I was free. That was my normal and I know it freaks people out when I say that but you growing up in a Cartel wasn't normal. People don't learn to kill but you did. That was life for me. Now, I don't know what to do." She confessed.

She was right but it didn't mean I liked that idea.

"I still would have liked it if you were with us. If I didn't lose my family." I confessed. We were living in two different mind-set. She's blocked it out whereas I can't forget.

"You have a family now, you have Mariana." She smiled which was contagious.

"You like her, huh?"

"Adore her. She's really cool." She was smiling from ear to ear. "It's nice to have a friend." Her bright smile transformed into a rueful one.

"Sometimes, I wished that all that crap didn't happen. I wish that I could introduce Mariana to my parents. My family. I know all the tias and my mom would have loved her." My eyes burned but I blinked quickly and it was gone. "The family gatherings we had, were some of the best moments of my life. She would have fitted right in."

"Of course but that's not what happened. We're here now. You need to stop living in the past. You have a beautiful wife, an amazing house. You need to move on."

"How the FUCK can I move on when I know the monster who took you, is after you again? Do you think I'd ever just let that go and move on with my life?" I was freaking pissed. I wanted to break something.

"Then use me. Use me as bait."

"NO!" I jumped up, roaring out.

"I'm sick of this." She didn't shout but she got up too. I rounded the chair, coming behind it so she'd follow. I didn't want her near the edge even if I knew she's be fine. Protecting her was a habit I couldn't let go.

"We'll find a way." I paced, trying to calm down.

"WHEN?" She followed me, thank god and flailed her arms around by her side in frustration. "It's been nearly a month and nothing's been done. Don't you get it. I can't move on until he's dead. I can't..." Her voice strained when she said 'can't'. "...move on unless I see him suffer. I can't move on until I hear him beg for mercy like I did. I need to hear him scream stop, LIKE I DID!" She was furious, her rage and anger manifested into tears were pouring out. Her body was vibrating with energy and I was paralyzed.

"But you know what." She growled. "I won't stop. Like he never did." My stomach flipped. "Every SINGLE time he made me want to die, I want him to feel the same fucking way. I NEED him to suffer like I did. Don't you understand? I can't LIVE until I've felt his blood on my hands." She was heaving, having a break down and I didn't have any words to comfort her.

Rushing forward I pulled into a hug. I nearly crushed her bones from the pressure I put on her.

"I will give you all that. Even if it kills me, I will give you that." I promised her and that was a promise I was willing to keep. Even if it meant using her as a fucking bait. My sister need to move on and having him dead would full fill that aim. "Fine. We'll use you as bait but you have to promise me that you'll do everything I tell you. I need to keep you safe. Promise me that."

"I promise." She mumbled in my shoulder and I released the pressure from her slightly. I ran my hand down the back of her head trying to comfort her. It took her some time to calm down and once she did, we made our way down. The ground lights lit up from the motion sensors as we made our way back into the house.

Don't think. Don't think about what she said.

I kept chanting my head, just to hold it together in front of her. She was a whole different person. An adult with different personality. I was getting to know my sister all over again and there was no way I was going to let anyone take that away from me again.

When we entered back through kitchen area, Gabe was sitting on the dining table, looking at something on his phone and Mariana was nowhere to be found. Seeing Lucia, he stood.

"Should we get going." There was a stiffness in his voice, his body language was tense. "Mariana is in her room. I think she said she had to shower or something." He shrugged. Lucia looked at me and I wanted to tell her to wait but I could see it in her big eyes. She wanted to go, pleading for me to let her go. For now.

"Go, I'll see you tomorrow to figure out what to do." Kissing the top of her head, I walked them out. Lucia got dropped off by one of my men. I told him to leave the keys in the car and go. Gabe got into the driver's seat and I opened the door for Lucia. "You'll be okay?" I had to ask before I closed the door.

"Yes. See you tomorrow."

As I watched her drive away, I started to feel all the emotions I supressed. Going inside, I nearly ran to my closet only to find Mariana sitting on the floor of hers, wiping her tears. Concern swallowed me.

"Baby, what's wrong?" I knelt down beside her. The blotchiness of her face told me she'd been crying for a while. Shaking her head, she got up her on knees and jumped on me. "Baby."

My sister had already put my emotions on fire and seeing my wife this way, it felt like they were both trying to kill me. It FUCKING wasn't about me. Picking her up, I took her into the bedroom and sat on the bed with her arms and legs wrapped around me.

"It's just..." She pulled back. "...When she was talking about how... how... she was hurt." Her face crumbled. "I just couldn't keep it in. She didn't deserve that."

My wife was trying to kill me.

"I just keep imagining the little girl in the picture..." My chest hurt. She brought the tissue to her face and shook her head again before burying her face in my shoulder.

"I'm sorry." I put her down on the bed and walked out of the room, across the living room, parast the garage, to the gym. Without putting on the gloves, I started punching at the bag as hard as I could and as long as I could until my mind and my body went numb.

Mariana

When Santiago and Lucia went upstairs, I didn't want to impose to I suggested to Gabe that we close the sliding doors but him being so nosy, he talked me down from doing so. Now, I wished that I would have slapped him across the head and closed it.

However, when she spoke about me, I couldn't stop smiling. She genuinely liked me and I was over the moon to hear that. She was such a sweet heart. When she fell asleep with her head on my lap all I could think about was my brother. Not the bad days but the good ones. Even though he four years younger than me, he was mature as I was. Maybe even more understanding that me.

He used to study, a lot. He wanted to become a businessman and buy us a big house to live in where our parents would never have to work. He 15 when I died and he carried such burden on his skinny shoulders that I sometimes wondered how he kept his head up and a smile on his face. The protective feeling I felt for him, somehow, deflected them on to Lucia.

When she spoke about Gabe and her not wanting babies, he looked at me, tried to justify his reasons.

"They cry and poop on you." He shivered in pure disgust and horror.

I had laughed out loud and immediately clamped a hand over my mouth. When they continued, I realised they didn't hear and we carried on eavesdropping. The mood suddenly changed when she spoke about how Jude had raped her for two years.

Gabe looked like he wanted to break something or punch someone. Probably himself for deciding to eavesdrop. I wanted to punch him too.

I couldn't hold back my tears when I stared at the image of laughing Lucia on the wall over the fireplace mantle. An unwanted image of her screaming no in a painful position under Jude popped into my head and I couldn't hold it in any longer. I started crying.

My heart aching for the child who just wanted her father to save her. Her brother, who protected her all those years, to come and rescue her. What hurt even more was when she called it normal. She had forgotten her family.

Wanting to know more, I whispered to Gabe with tears streaming down my face.

"How much did she forget."

He looked at me, pained. "When I first met her, she called herself Elena. I don't think she remembered anything. I think I triggered a lot of her memories." He whispered.

"How do you listen to her and stay so still." I wondered.

"She wouldn't open up to someone who shows a lot of emotions when she talks so if I don't, who will?" When he gave me that rueful smile, I cried a little bit harder. "Also, I was a foster kid. I've seen things."

He kept his mouth open as if to say something more but stopped. I silently prayed that he wasn't abused as well.

I knew I had a horrible childhood but I was never physically hurt. Santiago lost nearly everyone but he wasn't physically hurt. Not being able to handle anymore, I ran to the closet, sat on the floor and cried. That's how Tiago found me and when he left me on the bed, I knew he wasn't handling her past well.

I wasn't related to her and I was in pieces. He was a man who'd seen cry only once when and that was when he saw Lucia for the first time in 14 years. Men bottled up emotions and they expressed that pent up energy in many different ways.

Pulling myself together, I went over to the Gym to see how he was doing. The heave thuds of his punches grew louder as I got closer. Opening the door, I halted in place in shock. Blood was dripping down the black punching back, pooling into watery red puddles on the floor. He wasn't wearing gloves or did he tape his hands.

When he sensed me, I stopped. I watched his knuckles bleed. Going back into the kitchen, I took out the first aid kit and entered the room again. Neither of us looked at each other when I held him by his elbow and forced him to sit on the bench press. When he did, I poured some water on his knuckled to wash off the excess blood and sweat. He flinched but didn't pull back. I carried on tending to his wounds, putting alcohol cotton pads on his cuts which made him wince. After I spread some ointment on the lesions on his hands and then wrapped them in white bandages.

We said there, his battered hands in mine, for a while before he spoke.

"Thank you."

When I looked up, the man I saw wasn't the dominant man who knew exactly what he wanted and was in total control of his emotions. He looked, broken, lost and guilt ridden.

"I'm here for you." He looked down in shame and it hurt my heart to see him like that. "You'll get him, Tiago." I carried on. "You have to find him and let Lucia kill him. Like you did for me." He finally looked up, his hazy eyes finally came into focus. "I know it's painful to hear about your sister's sufferings but she's moved on. She only needs one thing from you, that is him. His blood. You need to give that to her, then maybe your guilt will lessen. Even if it just a little but you need to do whatever it is to give her the freedom she needs to move on."

"I'm trying." He whispered, brokenly.

"My any means possible. If you use her as bait, you're afraid to lose her. You won't because you're not 19 anymore. You're a successful businessman and a Mafia leader. You will protect her. Gabe will protect her. That boy would take a bullet for her. He fought a whole army for her."

The man I knew was coming back slowly, his spine straightened and a bit of confidence came back.

"You will not fail." I hoped that the vehemence in my voiced pushed through.

"No, I will not." He promised.