I’d been going over the day’s recordings as I have been doing ever since the day I planted the device in the Fontane home. I’ve been making a little present to give to Felix at the most opportune time. So, imagine my surprise when I heard her voice come over the speaker.
I don’t know how I got to the house or in the door that had been left unlocked. “Oh shit!” The twins, as usual, spoke together, but I ignored them. I’ll deal with them later. “Gianna, come here.” She looked at me from where she knelt over Victoria on the floor. That one flew up as soon as Gianna released her, screaming bloody murder.
“If you touch her, I’ll finish what she started, swear to fuck. Let me see, did she hit you?” I looked Gianna over, but there wasn’t so much as a scratch on her. I pushed her behind me when Victoria kept screeching just in case she lost her damn mind and came at her again.
“I’m calling the cops; your ass is going to jail bitch.” Victoria was a mess. Her lip was bleeding, and it looked like she’d lost some hair. That swollen eye is going to be black soon. I bet my sneer didn’t help matters any.
“Go ahead, call them if you want your mother to rot.”
“You don’t scare me; go ahead. My mother can take care of herself, but how will you keep your precious slut from joining her behind bars?”
“Oh no, you don’t!” I had to grab Ali to stop her from going after her again.
“No, Gabriel, I’m not done with her yet.”
“Yes, you are. As for you, I’m not worried about my girl being locked up; it’ll never happen in this town. Just know that after you call the cops, you’ll have to find somewhere else to live.”
“What’re you talking about?” I wasn’t ready to play that card yet, so I just played with her head.
“Why don’t you call them and find out?”
The twins had been looking at their phones the whole time, and I was about to go in on them for recording before I realized that that’s not what they were doing. Then I heard the engine outside and knew what they’d done. “He can’t save you two. Let’s go. Victoria, you should go clean yourself up; you look a mess. Come along you.” I took Gianna’s hand and led her from the room with the twins following behind us while Victoria spewed venom at all of us.
We reached the door just in time to see Lance reaching for the doorbell. “Funny seeing you here. Did you know they were doing this?”
“Don’t be an ass. Would I let them come here alone? You two get in the damn car.” Okay, he’s pissed enough to convince me he hadn’t known. I wasn’t surprised when the twins walked obediently to his car. He’s about the only one outside of Pop and I who can bring them to heel.
I got my little scrapper settled in the passenger seat with her seat belt on before closing the door and walking around to get in. I was taking my time because I needed to work off the fear that still had a hold on me. “You’re mad. I knew you would be; that’s why I didn’t tell you.”
“Don’t lie. You didn’t tell me because you knew I would’ve forbidden you from coming here. I understand why you did it, but I still want to tan your ass. Are you insane?” I guess my anger is still burning hot. “What if she’d hit you? You want me to go to jail?”
“I wasn’t thinking about….”
“That’s just it; you weren’t thinking. Why didn’t you tell me you wanted to go there?”
“I didn’t know. I just got so mad because of what she said about my mom.”
“I know that I saw it too; I was going to take care of it.” Ah, shit! How could I have missed a step? She’s always so gentle, so meek even; how was I to know she’d come here like this? I should’ve known Victoria’s last attack would strike a nerve, but because I already had my plans in play, I didn’t stop to think of how Gianna would react.
I reached for her hand to let her know that I wasn’t mad at her, just pissed at the situation. I never wanted her to get her hands dirty, not with slime like that, but I understood. I lifted her hand to my lips and kissed her fingers.
“Don’t scare me like that again, baby. How did you get out of the house anyway?” She didn’t answer, and I looked at her as we pulled onto the driveway.
“I can’t tell you.”
“Say no more; my sisters helped you.”
I was about to light into them when I left the car, but it looked like Lancelot had already dealt with it. Anna had tears in her eyes, and Rosa ran into the house. “Go inside with your sister, damn fool.” Lance pointed Anna up the steps, and she obeyed without argument. What the hell?
VICTORIA
I’m going to kill her. I’m going to kill all of them. There was a wild fury building inside me, a pressure that needed release soon or I’d explode, so I screamed. It didn’t do much, but at the very least, it helped ease some of the pressure from my head and chest. The air around me thickened, making my head spin as I made my way up the stairs to my room, all the while fighting back the tears that I refused to let fall. Tears are for the weak, like Gia.
I stood in front of the mirror in my room, assessing the damage and feeling both angry and embarrassed. I can’t believe I let her do this to me and in front of Gabriel Russo, no less. Now that it was over, I thought of all the things I should’ve done to her, but I’ve never been much of a fighter; then again, neither has she. Where the hell did she learn to fight like that?
My lips were already starting to swell when I cleaned the blood away, and I could barely see out of my left eye. I had the urge to just let myself cry just this once but again fought it back. Instead, I let the anger build up inside to help fuel my rage.
This is what it feels like to be bullied I guess because that’s exactly what they’d done. Sure, no one else even said anything, only Gia, but it’s the same since they just stood around and watched. My stupid mind tried reminding me that I’d done the same and worse to her over the years, but I killed that stream of thought because she deserved it, I didn’t, and this just proves it.
She’d waited until mom wasn’t here to protect me, coward, that she is. She’d never have had the nerve had mom not been in jail right now. The reminder that I was all alone made my knees weak, and I felt a kernel of fear start to grow, followed by a play-by-play of all that had gone wrong in the last week or so.
The feeling of imminent doom that overcame me only made me want to explode, and I needed some sort of release before I went insane. I looked around the room, ready to throw something but then had a better idea. I ran from my private bathroom down the hall to Gia’s room, looking for anything to destroy.
I’d barely stepped foot in there when the phone I’d forgotten rang in my pocket. I was going to ignore it, but I can’t afford to do that these days because I have no other way of communicating with anyone since I’d been kicked off the school forum and Twitter had suspended my account for a week. Some asshole had reported me for making threats.
“Hello!”
“Get the fuck outta that room.”
“How do you…?” He hung up, and I looked around in surprise and fear. How did Gabriel Russo know I was in here? I started to ignore him, but something in my gut told me to walk away for now. Maybe this is the problem. I’ve been too rash lately, and that’s why all of this was happening.