CHAPTER 67: THEY ARE NEVER LEAVING US

"Does it not feel too cold?" I breathed out, it felt like the heat didn’t do much and the fireplace didn’t help either.

"I will have someone get it fixed," Luca stated, he didn’t look any happier, he had been like that all morning, I didn’t budge on it because I felt it was because of the situation.

"Are you finally going to tell me what’s wrong, I gave you all day," I added, his eyes met mine as they softened, he settled beside me before he handed me a glass of water which I took instantly.

"I can’t find anything about your friend Natalie, the only Natalie that has her surname and face, she is dead, she has been dead for the last last ten years, there is no documentation of her school or college, which means she didn’t go to any, and there is a hospital report, it showed that, her mom died when she gave brith to her and there is no trace of her father." He explained and my breath hitches.

"What do you mean died ten years ago?"

"According to the documents, do you recall the man you saw her with?" He asked and I nodded, his face is perfectly imprinted inside of my mind, it terrified me even the thought of him.

Luca placed his hand on mine, warm and soft as he stared at me.

"She is never going to hurt you, she is never going to come any close to you and she would not even think about it, whoever is working for her, whoever is protecting her, they will stop," Luca added.

"Uhm, the first time I saw him was at the fair, he only stared at me, he had glasses on, he seemed very powerful even from far like he didn’t care who anyone is and he didn’t speak to anyone, he asked like he has authority and someone like him, he had to be only there for a reason," I explained. "His face, is smooth and he had only one scar, and his eyes, I saw his eyes that day, its brown, he didn’t look like Natalie but yet, she seemed oddly close to him, like she knew him from somewhere," I explained. "And the message on her phone, I have a feeling she is working with him."

"We need to find him, he is in hiding and he has never tried to have a conversation with you, yet he knows that you have seen him, and Natalie is aware of that, and not only that, I have a feeling your friend Sebastine knows about him too."

"You know he is not my friend." I smiled and Luca rolled his eyes at me, he only wanted to make fun of me, even if I didn’t want it, well Sebastine is the past, and he never meant anything to me, I didn’t care for him and I would never ever care for him.

I turned to look at Luca.

"What do we do?" I asked. "We can’t go back to the apartment and they know where we are, and who is to say they don’t always have people keeping an eye from us; we are in the middle of now here Luca, and you don’t have your men here, they will all get here tomorrow, I know the last time I said we should not leave but right now we don’t even know what we are dealing with, we should go home; where you know every crook of your city, where we have your men stationed all around the place and where we don’t have to worry about anything, even if they come for us, we would be where we are meant to be, we would be safer." I breathed out.

I don’t mind leaving, I don’t care that I came here to find myself, I don’t care that I came here because of the fact that I wanted to leave and find some sort of happiness but I don’t care, there is no happiness without Luca and I need to be with Luca.

"I think- no we are leaving, I don’t care what your therapists said but I want to leave, they don’t want us to be here," I said cutting him off, he glanced at me, without saying a word.

There is no way I would be able to stay here, I didn’t want to be here, especially when we have no idea what is happening and it didn’t make sense if we stayed, we have to find our home.

"We leave tomorrow morning Luca, it’s better to be home than bring Ares and the others here, risk their lives in a town we don’t know you can have two of your men stay here under disguise so no one would be able to figure out that are one of yours and they will secretly keep an eye for you here and maybe they can work for Sebastine or work for any of his properties," I suggested and he nodded.

To my surprise; he didn’t argue, I wanted him to yet he didn’t, I have a feeling he is aware of the fact that I am right, he has to.

I placed my other hand on his and I rested my head on my shoulder.

"Did you make any changes in the house?" I asked and he shook his head. "How about Aria?"

"She is still there, I am surprised I have not killed her yet, you make me do things I never thought I would do, you make me do things even my men would be shocked if they found out, she has learnt to stay away from me." He added.

That didn’t sound right, I am sure she didn’t, and now that I will be coming back, I want her gone before this gets ugly, I want her to find a place; leave the city if possible and she can choose to do whatever she wants, I still have some money I can give to her.

——

Luca fell asleep in no time, I can tell he has being tired, I wasted no time in heading toward the other side of the living room to close the window; all I wanted is to feel a bit better but I can’t seem to shake off this unfamiliar feeling that filled my body, I can’t seem to shake off the feeling like something is about to go horribly wrong and I need to stop it.

But what?

I glanced at Luca, I didn’t tell him about it because I didn’t need him to be worried, I wanted him to be fine, I remained beside the window, staring out of it, my eyes filled with emotion as I scanned through the trees and the wind that whistled through them.

A breath falls out of my lips when I heard a noise, like a tree has snapped, it sounded unreal; maybe I made it up in my mind, maybe it’s just an animal, or a wolf, I heard the noise again, and this time even more louder and it was not the single one I heard, two snaps at a time.

I realized that something is wrong, there are no animals at this time except the wolves, the wolves always find themselves preying on other animals.

I moved closer to Luca and I started to shake him softly, when his eye opened, I covered my hand above his lips and his eye met mine and, I leaned further toward him to whisper the words.

"Someone is coming Luca, I can hear them, I know that they are coming and I am sure of it." I breathed out when he held my hand, I heard the snap again, this time even louder and closer, did they think we were sleeping

Maybe they thought we were, I glanced at Luca when we heard a noise coming from the back door, this time we realized one of them had arrived, Luca pulled us toward the front door when we walked out of it.

"We need to run, they are going to know that we are gone and they are coming for us, they would not want us to leave the forest because it’s easier to get to us but we have to make sure they don’t," Luca said, and my breath hitches

My heart pounding against my chest rapidly, my mind filled with anger for Natalie, how could she do this to me, she made me think that she truly cared for me; I stepped out into the cold, my feet cold and not covered with any shoes and so was his, we didn’t have any time to do this.

Living here was a horrible idea, his guards are not here and we are not safe.

"Run," Luca yelled as we headed into the forest, it felt like they were right behind me, it felt like I could hear their breath, I could feel their presence just behind me and all they needed was to tap me, touch me and I would fall