"Rylie, I'm telling you the truth! It's all a lie. The men are not as dangerous as they are told to us!"

Rylie gave me a bored look and continued folding clothes.

"You don't believe me, do you?"

She mouthed, "No."

I snatched the clothes from her. "And why the hell are you folding my clothes?! I can clean my own room!"

She gave me a look which clearly said, "Oh really?"

I laughed nervously. Of course I can't clean my own room. I have never done it even when I was with Rylie or before I was brought here. My clothes had gained the glorious name of 'stink villa' by me.

"Okay fine! I can't clean my room. There, I said it. Happy?" I huffed. Rylie giggled and playfully slapped my shoulder then dropped on my bed. I joined her and started tickling her.

She screamed, grabbing my pillow and covering her mouth as she muffled her laugh and struggled to push me away.

"Someone's in a good mood today!" I continued tickling her and she squirmed. "Or maybe you're just feeling ticklish!"

The pillow slipped from her hands and the most beautiful sound of her laugh boomed in my room.

Rylie laughs very rarely and when she does, she always covers her mouth. But now, seeing her laughing so freely made my heart swell with pride, my tickle attacks more quicker and a huge smile on my face.

When I was finally stopped tickling her, I dropped beside her and saw her lashes wet as her laughter slowly died down to small giggles.

This is exactly what happens when Amelia and Rylie get a day off together.

Both of us were panting heavily when suddenly I felt a sharp jab on my stomach.

"Oof! Goddammit woman! Do you sharpen your elbow with a knife?!" I winced touching the area she hit.

She laughed again and ruffled my hair playfully.

"Gosh, you are such a cutie today. I could just pull your chubby cheeks!" She screamed again when I pulled her soft cheeks.

"Okay, so I guess I'm done for the hour." I giggled and stopped pulling her cheeks. Her face had turned into a beautiful shade of red and small hiccups were escaping from her lips. "So do tell me, what's going on with you?"

She rubbed her face and shrugged casually.

"Oh come on! There has to be something. I have seen that the new chef is a hottie." She looked at me as if I had grown two heads, but I did notice her face getting a more brighter shade of red. "You wanna tell me about that?" I asked, wiggling my eyebrows.

Like an obedient puppy, she shook her head.

"Rylie." I whined, stretching the 'e'. "Anything? A teeny tiny bit of crush?"

She shook her head again and sighed in defeat. The smile on her face was slowly disappearing.

"Ry..." I hugged her. "It's okay. You can still talk to me, you know? About everything."

She gave me a small reassuring smile and squeezed my hand.

I closed my eyes and nodded. "Fine. I won't bother you anymore, but promise me that you will never, ever, ever hide that beautiful laugh from me or else..." She raised a perfect eyebrow and slowly grabbed a pillow as a cruel smirk appeared on my face. "...I HAVE TO TICKLE YOU AGAIN!"

I launched on her again and she screamed, shielding herself from me with a pillow, squirming and laughing as I kept tickling her.

Then we heard a door knock in a very strange tune.

I froze. There's only one person who knocks doors like that.

Adrian. Shit.

Rylie tugged the sleeves of my dress and her lips twisted downwards when she heard the door knock again, so she got up from the bed, arranged herself while my dumbstruck self has lost the ability to think fast and she opened the door.

Silence lingered in the air and I got up from the bed, covering my face, unable to react to this situation.

I was supposed to be prepared for this encounter then why the hell was I acting like a scaredy cat?

Very slowly, I peeked through my fingers and saw Adrian standing on my doorstep, surprised and red in shame. I couldn't see Rylie. Her back was facing me. No signs of trembling or shaking or crying.

"Rylie?" I whispered hoarsely and took a few steps ahead. My eyes widened and I could clearly see why Adrian was surprised. I rubbed my eyes to see if I was dreaming or not. I wasn't dreaming this.

Oh no. It can't be, can it? This has to be some hallucination shit.

Rylie is...smiling? As in total full show of her frontal teeth? Smiling is okay. It's absolutely okay, but it's not okay if Rylie is actually smiling to the man who had attempted to harass her and took away her ability to speak properly!

Not to forget that she actually went into shock and screamed at their first eye-to-eye contact.

"Rylie?" I touched her shoulder and she saw me with that same smile on her face. "Is everything all right?"

She shrugged as if seeing Adrian after weeks was no big deal to her.

"I...I...I..." Adrian kept opening and closing his mouth like a goldfish, gawking at the woman who was smiling at him.

"Adrian?" Jesus, this is getting out of hand. Adrian was supposed to stay away from Rylie till she decides for herself, but this is unexpectedly unbelievable.

Rylie opened the door wider for him to enter and stepped aside, gesturing him to come in. Adrian couldn't help but step into my room, still in shock.

"I...I...I..."

"Fratello, I have been searching for you. Come, we have—oh fanculo!"

I shot a glare to the man who appeared behind Adrian. This is absolutely ridiculous! Today was supposed to be a happy morning with Rylie and studious afternoon with my classes then again a happy evening with Rylie followed by a nice peaceful sleepy night in my super fluffy queen size bed.

My happy morning is now officially in ruins.

Leonardo Agostini made a weird hand motion to the man in front of him, took a few steps ahead and stood beside me.

"Little girl, what is going on here?" He gritted under his breath.

"I should ask you the same thing. What in the world are you guys doing here?" I whispered.

"It's my home. I can go wherever I want." He cursed under his breath when I smacked his arm and shot him another glare.

"But this is my room. Take your brother and get out of here. I'll take care of Rylie."

"I do not follow orders, signorina. I give them."

I massaged my temples. "Adrian stays away from my baby Rylie. Did you forget that?"

He gasped dramatically. "You have a baby? Oh mio Dio, you were trying to escape from my famiglia without your baby? What kind of madre are you?"

I kept looking at him in pure disgust. "What is wrong with you? We have a tongue tying situation here and you are speaking nonsense."

"Can't a man have some humor in his life?"

I gritted my teeth. "No. Not right now and you are not a man."

"Ah, si." He nodded profoundly. "I do have an amazing reputation of being a beast in bed. I have an idea. Let's kick them out and we make an actual baby. How does that sound?"

"Are you feeling ill today? Or did you take drugs which made your mind and your senses turn into mush?" I whispered, eyeing him up and down to check whether he hit himself somewhere or not because the Agostini son was talking absolute nonsense.

He came dangerously close to my ear and whispered, "Amelia, I do not shit where I eat. I am clean and ready to make some babies. Twins sound good to you?"

"Shut up Agostini!" I whisper yelled, feeling the heat crawling to my cheeks. "We have a serious issue here and I would like you to shut that trap of yours."

He smirked. "Why don't you help me in doing that? From my personal experience, I think you should also find a perfect way of shutting me up."

Oh dear God, what is wrong with him today? Is it another one of those abnormal happy days or something else? I just want to spend my day off in peace and harmony.

I gave him a stink eye. "Shut up, will you? You're annoying me."

He shrugged and bit back a huge grin. "I'm just giving you a taste of your own medicine. It's so fun."

"Well, I don't need it!" I snapped.

"Ahmie?" I heard Rylie gasp in horror as she watches us having our usual tea time catch up.

Oh shit, I totally forgot about her and Adrian standing right before us. Adrian was still embarrassed and was looking everywhere whereas Rylie was actually shocked by seeing us quarrelling with each other instead of the man standing beside her.

"Whaa... whaa..." Her mouth slightly parted open in shock but she close it quickly and pulled me to her.

This woman went into shock seeing capo and I together, but she didn't went into shock when she came face to face with Adrian. My life in this mansion is getting crazier!

"You...youu...caapo...how?"

I placed my hand on her shoulder and gave it a squeeze. "Rylie, I'll tell you everything later. First tell me how are you? I mean, I was expecting you to go...um, never mind. Do you want me to kick Adrian where sun doesn't shine or do you want me to cut the anatomy off for you? Or maybe I should just kick him out then—" I was about to take a step, but a soft palm stopped me by grabbing my arm.

I shot an incredulous look at the woman who is giving me her puppy dog eyes as she slowly shook her head, mentally begging me to stop.

What the... She's kidding, right? Those innocent brown doe eyes giving me a puppy look stopped working on me years ago, then why the hell was I was backing out now?

"Fine." I raised my arms in surrender. "Do whatever you want to do."

Adrian stays away from Rylie till she decides for herself. That's what it was so I guess she must have something in her mind now.

Rylie searched her pockets, took out a crushed piece of paper and handed it over to me.

I opened it and saw her writings in a bit faded ink. "When did you wrote this?"

I was waiting for her to take out her notepad and pen. Instead, she smiled and showed me two fingers.

Two days in which she locked herself in her room.

She has been roaming around everywhere for weeks with this note inside her pockets? Wow. That's surprising. She was already prepared for this day to come.

I raised my eyebrow. "You want me to read it?"

She nodded. I gave a last look to the men present in my room and cleared my throat.

"When I was a kid, my parents left me at the doorstep of an orphanage and never came back. Pretty amazing parents, I know. They ran away from the responsibility of raising a child and I am glad they did. I would have never brought here by some men if I hadn't run away from the orphanage in the middle of the night."

Can somebody please explain me why Rylie is preaching about her life? I already know this. Nevertheless, I continued.

"I was only eighteen when one night on my way back to my quarters, somebody grabbed me by force and took me to secluded corner. Somebody who was already naked from waist below, somebody who was forcing me to call him... Daddy."

I was burning in rage. The capo was looking outside my balcony, expressionless. Rylie was simply staring at the man who was responsible for her miseries, but I didn't glance at Adrian because if I did, I would be punching the living daylights out of him.

"I remember the stench of alcohol... the..." I swallowed hard and closed my eyes for a brief moment. "...the tip, the shouting on my face to t-take it all in, the knife, that harsh pull of my hair before—I can't read this! This is j-just too much!" 

Capo shot me one look and I shut myself up when I saw his eyes. Rylie gave me an assuring smile and motioned me to continue.

"I'm skipping a line." I muttered and took a deep breath, gathering up all my strength and exhaled slowly. "I thought I was going to die that night. When I was first brought here, I thought I had a chance to do something in life. Little did I know, the men in this house were... monsters and I had crossed the path of one. The price was my speech, my tongue. I saw that same monster sitting with Amelia and I got scared. Broke a rule again and paid the price again by seeing his face, revisiting that night."

I heard a sniff, but I didn't had the courage to look at the person.

"There's a saying; per...perdo... what's the meaning of this?" I showed the paper to capo.

He did a quick read of the sentence. "Forgive and forget."

"Oh, okay." I mumbled, not having a good feeling of what Rylie had written next. "There's a saying; Forgive and forget, but what had happened to me was neither forgiving nor forgetting. I won't be forgiving and forgetting. I don't care how different that monster says he is. I don't care about how sorry he is for ruining my life. I'll never get to experience the saltiness of pretzels and chips and the sweetness of sugary foods. I'll never get to experience..."

My heart broke into million pieces when I read the next word. "My first kiss b-because nobody will actually want to kiss a woman with a destroyed tongue. I may not get to experience any of these things, but I do know that next time, when I see that... Adrian, I was going to greet him with the biggest smile on my face, welcome him with open arms and make his life a living hell by rubbing what he did to me on his face."

Rylie, my darling cutie baby. I love her so much. I was grinning like a fool as I continued to read the last few lines she wrote.

"And while I'll be busy doing that, here are some words of wisdom for you so that you would never repeat what you did to me..." I turned the page and my face fell when I saw it blank.

Wait, what? It's blank! Did she forget to write the remaining part or something? I checked, double checked, triple checked, quadruple checked and checked again to see if I missed anything or not.

Then I looked up and my mouth formed an 'o' when I saw Rylie dangerously close, face to face with Adrian, who was quivering in fear and guilt.

She was still having that bright smile on her face, but her eyes... This is not the Rylie I know! My baby is innocent and adorable and this woman was far from innocent and adorable.

She is angry. Very, very angry.

I kept waiting for her to do something, hit him or slap him or anything, but then I heard the strongest voice I had ever heard.

"Fuck you."

*****

I knew Rylie could speak a few words properly. Simple words like I, me, you, we, he, she, how, why and bigger words which didn't require much of tongue rolling. She is still working on my name. She calls me Ah-mie instead of A-me.

But this was unexpected. I had no idea that two words from her mouth could actually make a grown man cry.

Adrian Agostini was crying his heart out on his brother's shoulders.

"Welcome to my team, Ry. I can't handle these two men alone."

Rylie looked at me as if I had gone crazy and when I realised that she wasn't going to shake my hand, I pulled back awkwardly.

"La mia vita è finita! Dillo al mio pigiama..." Adrian started mumbling something incoherent, blew his nose on his brother's shirt and kept crying.

And for the first time, I actually feel pity for capo... capo's shirt to be exact. That man was more concerned about his shirt than his brother. True brotherhood, right?

"You have no idea how much I am enjoying watching this." I giggled. "It's like a live TV show."

Rylie gave me a stink eye, took out her notepad and pen and scribbled, 'You owe me an explanation about you and capo.'

"I know, darling. I know." I whispered excitedly. "For now, just sit back, relax and watch. By the way, I am so proud of you."

She shook her head in amusement and watched the capo try to calm his weeping elder brother.

"Ahmie?" I hummed in response and took the notepad and pen from her hands. 'Won't capo harm me for this?'

I scribbled, 'No. Trust me, he won't even touch your hair.'

Her lips twisted downwards. 'Are you sure?'

'Positive.' I scribbled back and smiled.

"Get me my lawyer! Oh wait, don't! I am lawyer, so I'll write my own will and fratello, please make sure that you fulfill each of it!" Adrian cried.

Rylie poked my shoulder. 'Brother?'

"Adrian's adopted. Elder brother." I explained.

She nodded in understanding. 'Does he always cry like that? Isn't that too much?'

"I don't really know, but I do think that this is too much. You'd be surprised by Adrian's behaviour though."

"That's it!" I jumped in shock when heard the Agostini son shout. "You are coming with me to the company. We are already late!"

The capo grabbed Adrian by his collar and pulled him up then dragged him out of my room, not forgetting to give me a last look.

I stick my tongue out and winked at him.

He gritted his teeth and stormed out of my room with Adrian screaming and begging for forgiveness.

I released a shaky breath, feeling light and I heard a sniff. I turned around and saw Rylie, teary eyed and fragile, her eyes still focused on the door.

"Rylie, it's okay. You did it." I hugged her and gently rubbed her back. "It's okay."

She finally broke down in my arms and wet my nightgown with her tears. She kept crying for her lost voice and ruined taste buds while I kept whispering soothing words in her ears, how strongly she had faced the situation and how amazing she is.

For what it felt like hours, Rylie's cries turned into small sniffs and whimpers. I realised that I had to uplift her mood and lighten up the sad atmosphere looming around us.

"Hey, Rylie?"

She hummed in response.

"You feeling all right?"

She showed me her two fingers joined together.

"Hmm, little bit?"

She nodded, resting her head on my shoulder.

"You wanna hear a crazy thing?"

She nodded again.

"I kissed capo twice."

And she screamed again.

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