CHAPTER TWENTY THREE
"GIOVANNI TAKES A BULLET"
SCARLETT DEL GATO
They lied to me.
They lied to me after all.
I was sitting beside Giovanni in the passenger seat in his Maserati when he turns to look at me. He doesn't look at me for long before his gaze shifts back to the road in front of him. I think he contemplated whether he wanted to say something to me or not.
Vito was sitting right behind me, typing away on his phone.
"Are you okay?" Giovanni finally asks, releasing a deep breath.
"I'm fine." I snap.
I turn my head, focusing on the sun that started to disappear behind the trees as we drove past them.
I couldn't look at them right now. They lied about my house being burnt down to my face just because they wanted to keep me in their mansion.
Giovanni sighs, hesitating. "I'm sorry we lied to you about the house." He finally says and I see his grip around the steering wheel tightening just a little bit. "I wanted to tell you the truth but it was too late."
I shake my head, still looking out of the window because I still couldn't look at him. "It's just a house now." I tell him. "It's not a home anymore."
I swallow hard, remembering the police tape and the spatter of my brother's blood still lying on the kitchen floor like they didn't even care about cleaning it.
I close my eyes, trying to rid my mind of that image: the fact that my brother's blood was still lying in a pool on the kitchen floor and that the living room was the way we left it, completely ransacked.
"That's not my home anymore."
My home was where my brother was but he isn't here anymore. All that was left inside that house was the remnants of that night when it all went to shit. I don't even remember the good times me and my brother had because all I can ever think about when thinking back at the house is how he was murdered and how his blood wasn't even cleaned up after his death.
I open my eyes again, looking at Giovanni and wasn't even surprised that his eyes were already on me.
His eyes were filled with regret.
It was ironic really. A few months ago if you would've asked me if Giovanni Castiglione had a regret bone in his body, I would laughed in your face. But now, looking inside those blue eyes of his, I saw the regret in those eyes of his. I saw it clearly.
"I am upset that you lied to me about my house and that you used it to threaten Eden if I ever returned to it." I tuck a strand of my hair behind my ear. "But the two of you could've just told me the truth because I wouldn't have returned to it anyways."
Giovanni knits his eyebrows together in a confused frown.
"I wouldn't have returned because there wasn't anything left for me there." I explain. "My house isn't a home without my brother being there to give it some life and some brightness. The police tape... The evidence cards... The blood... It's not a home anymore. It's a crime scene. I went there today to find some kind of closure, but I found none."
Giovanni nods slowly, swallowing hard.
"The only thing I managed to find was more heartbreak."
"I'm sorry I lied." Giovanni says, his words barely above a whisper. "I just wanted to keep you safe from the dangers of this world."
"I am eighteen years old, Giovanni. I don't need you to protect me."
My stomach would've been filled with butterflies if I wasn't so angry at him for lying to me. But he lied to me and I felt nothing else other than anger toward him right now.
"The White Pistols are after you now." Vito was the one to say. He looked up from his phone, looking at me in the rear-view mirror and speaking for the first time since we left my house. "I think we need to protect you now more than ever seeing that we dragged you into this mess."
"I can take care of myself." I tell him. "But if you're so worried... Giovanni did say that he would teach me how to fight. Didn't you, Giovanni?"
Giovanni ignores my question.
I tilt my head to look at him. I don't think he even heard what I was saying because he was too busy looking at something in the rear-view mirror.
When I glanced back, I noticed a white SUV tailgating us from behind.
The SUV speeds up and he was next to us in an instant. I couldn't see who the driver was because the windows were completely tinted, but when he rolled the driver's side window down, I noticed the same guy from the house who attacked me lifting his hand up so he could point a gun at us.
"Scarlett, get down!" Giovanni yells, taking his hand off of the steering wheel so he could push me down by the shoulder.
My head was in between my knees when the window's glass shattered from the bullet. The glass falls to my feet and in my hair, but I stayed down.
I tilt my head to the side, seeing Giovanni taking something out from the glove compartment of his Maserati. He reloads the gun with both of his hands and started to shoot at the car driving beside us.
The loud, piercing gunshot made both of my ears ring, I had to clamp my palms against my ear just to keep my eardrums intact.
I didn't know I was crying until I felt my cheeks completely wet with tears.
Bullet casings dropped to the floor alongside the shattered glass.
Vito, from what I could see over my shoulder, was shooting too. His seat was also completely covered with shards of glass from his window.
Giovanni's Maserati comes to an abrupt halt. If I didn't have the seatbelt over my body, I would've been through the windshield right about now.
When the gunshots stopped, I took a chance to lift my head over the dashboard. The white SUV was completely filled with bullet holes, but the driver however was still alive.
Vito opens his door and gets out, crouching behind the door so that he was behind cover. He was busy reloading his gun and I noticed more bullet casings dropping to the tar road.
Giovanni takes off his seatbelt but I wrapped my hand around his wrist. "Where are you going?" I ask him, feeling more tears running down my cheeks. "Please don't go out there."
I look to the front, seeing the white SUV reversing away. I thought he was backing away for good, but when he steps on his gas after he was a few yards away from us, he drives toward us fast and without stopping.
Giovanni unclicks my seatbelt, pulling me out of the driver side of the car just in time because the white SUV crashes into Giovanni's Maserati, completely totalling it in the process.
Giovanni falls on his back against the hard tar road. His hands were still holding mine, so he actually pulled me to the ground with him, but my landing was soft, I landed on him and not the tar road.
I smell smoke and when I glanced backward, Giovanni's Maserati caught flame, and so did the white SUV along with its driver.
Vito was wiping the sweat away from his forehead.
At least he was okay.
I swallow hard, looking at Giovanni still lying beneath me.
There was a small gash on his temple and a tiny droplet of blood ran down his face. He looks back at me, worry etched onto his features.
"Are you okay?" He asks.
His warm breath fans my face and his hands were wrapped around my torso, keeping me flush against his body protectively.
A popping sound made us look at his Maserati.
His car was completely covered in flames now. His Maserati was definitely un-saveable and the white SUV was completely damaged from the front end where he drove straight into us, with the driver shot and killed.
Vito probably didn't want to take any chances, putting a bullet in him just to make sure that he was dead. Vito was inspecting the white SUV now, searching for clues to why he attacked me here and back at my house earlier.
Giovanni grunts from beneath me.
I quickly shoot up, extending my hand so that I could help him up too.
"Are you okay?" I ask him when he was standing right in front of me.
I wanted to inspect the cut on his temple, but wetness coming from his suit jacket made my gaze flicker to there instead.
It was blood.
It was Giovanni's blood.
He was bleeding.
He was shot.
"Giovanni, you're bleeding!"
I couldn't hide the shock in my tone.
His entire suit's jacket was soaked in blood by the shoulder, and there was a small bullet hole evident through the material of his suit jacket.
"I'm fine, Scarlett. This isn't the first time I've been shot." He assures me but I still press my hand against the wound, trying to stop the bleeding.
He winces out in pain, his hand flying to where my hand was pressed.
I knit my eyebrows together. "That's what I thought." I frown, trying to stop the bleeding but it seeped through my fingers. The sight alone made me want to pass out right then and there. "Don't always act so damn tough, you're still human."
Vito sees me trying to cover Giovanni's shoulder and rushes towards us. "I just messaged Mikael to pick us up." He says, jerking his head towards his phone. "But for now we need to get cover, out of sight." Vito says before he flings his brother's one arm around his shoulders.
At least there were no pedestrians around, but someone in the area might've heard the shots by now and called the cops on us.
It won't be long before they notice the smoke and the totalled cars.
We had to get away from the scene, and quick.
We take cover in the nearest and emptiest alleyway, out of anyone's sight, and Vito and I let Giovanni sit down on the ground, with me beside him to try and stop the bleeding as much as I can.
But as more blood seeped through my fingers, I started to doubt that he was going to be okay or not. He was pale. His suit jacket was completely covered in blood.
• • •
Giovanni's head was resting in my lap. My hand was still pressed against his bullet wound, trying to stop the bleeding. It has stopped a few minutes ago, but he was even paler than before and he got paler by the second.
My hands were trembling against his wound and my hands were completely wet with blood, wet with his blood.
It was my fault. If I didn't go back home, they wouldn't have attacked us. Giovanni wouldn't have been shot and we wouldn't have been hiding in an alleyway waiting for one of their guards to come pick us up to go to hospital.
Even though he was shot and on the verge of dying with every second that passed, he still looked into my eyes with a smile on his face.
"This isn't funny." I frown at him, swallowing hard.
"I can add it to my 'how many times I got shot' section." He smiles.
"You lost a lot of blood." I tell him, ignoring the sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. "Just stop talking and try to relax and stop smiling. You're worrying me even more than I already am."
Giovanni ignores me of course and lifts his shirt up to reveal his beautifully toned stomach. He had even more tattoos on his stomach but I was too upset to care about them right now, I only focused on where he was pointing with his forefinger.
There were ten lines tattooed on the side of his stomach, nearly on his hip.
"That's how many times I got shot, stabbed, or both."
I gasp. "You can't be serious. There's like ten lines there!"
"Soon to be eleven." He gushes, pulling his shirt back down and lying with his head in my lap again.
His hair was wet, completely covered in sweat and there was a trail of sweat above his eyebrow too. He was losing too much blood with every second that passed.
This isn't good.
"It's going to be eleven if I make it out alive, that is."
I swat his good arm. "Now is not the time to make jokes like that." I glare at him. "You're going to make it out alive. Just stop talking right now."
Vito sees a set of headlights nearing us and gets up from the ground. "There's Mikael, let's go." He says, helping me lift his brother up from the ground.
Giovanni was awake, but the limp told me that he was on the verge of passing out. He would have passed out if it wasn't for Vito and my arms keeping him upward as we walked toward the SUV.
Mikael gets out of the black SUV and opens the back seat for us.
Vito lifts his brother into the car and waits for me to get in beside Giovanni before he closes the door.
Vito gets in at the front and tells Mikael to step on it.
Once we were driving again, I notice Giovanni's eyes start to flutter.
"Stay with me, Giovanni. Don't pass out on me now." I tell him.
A loose strand of his hair was stuck to his forehead, so I brushed it away with my thumb, earning a smile coming from him.
He closes his eyes fully. "I'm just resting my eyes."
"That's the exact thing you shouldn't be doing right now!" I nearly yell. "Open your eyes, Giovanni."
By now I was a trembling mess.
I was staring out of the window frantically every second to see how far we were from the mansion.
We needed to get him some urgent help because it won't be long before he passes out on us.
Giovanni bursts out laughing and throws his hand over mine, giving it a squeeze. "I was just joking; I just wanted to see how you would react."
I glare at him and 'accidentally' press my hand harder against his shoulder, making him hiss loudly. Vito chuckles from the front seat, but I still noticed the panic washing over his face when he saw how pale his brother was.
"I'm sorry." Giovanni mutters lazily.
"For what?" I ask him only to get him to talk to me without passing out on me. "Joking when you're supposed to be in pain?"
"No," Giovanni says, shaking his head, "for being a total ass with you. For aiming a gun at you. For possibly everything I ever did to upset you..." he sighs, opening his eyes to look at me again.
I swallow hard, feeling my throat start to close up. "Don't do that." I tell him while I feel the tears start to collect at the bottom of my eyelids.
"Do what?" He asks softly.
His voice was barely above a whisper.
"Don't talk like you're going to die. I still have a lot of anger I need to get rid of and you're the best punching bag here," he chuckles, and I do too right when I feel the first of the tears running down my cheeks, "so stay with me Giovanni, please."
Giovanni shuts his eyes again but I don't think it was a joke this time, so I did the only logical thing to keep him awake.
I leaned down and pressed my lips against his. I kept them there for a few seconds before I pulled away from him.
When I pulled away from him, his eyes were slightly open and there was a fraction of a smile on his lips.
"Did you just kiss me?"
His question went unanswered when we arrived at the mansion.
I frown at Vito even though he couldn't see me. "Why are we here and not at the hospital like a normal person?"
"He has been shot, Scarlett. If we go to the hospital now, they're going to know he was involved in the shooting." Vito says, opening the door before he gets out.
He opens my door and helps me lift Giovanni out of the car.
Giovanni's breathing was slow and heavy, his eyelids drooped and he leaned onto Vito and my shoulder for support.
"What the hell are we going to do? Kallie won't be able to get the bullet out!"
"Calm down, Scarlett. She's a much better doctor than any I've ever come across." Vito says, rushing towards the front door with Giovanni.
I open the front door and see their dad immediately.
"Get him to the infirmary." He just orders.
More guards come into view and helps Vito and me to carry Giovanni, but their dad reaches for my arm and pulls me back.
I just stare at them taking Giovanni away.
"You caused this." He says, his blue eyes boring into mine.
"How did I cause this? I didn't even know that the White Pistols existed unt-"
"You're in the middle of it all." He says before he disappears up the stairs.
All I did was stare at his retreating back with my mouth opening and closing like a damn fish.
I wanted to argue with him. Ask him why he thought it was my fault, but then I remembered my brother and what he did to this family.
But the question is still unanswered; how am I in the middle of it all?
I was practically kidnapped from my own house and was brought here without consent. It wasn't my fault the White Pistols attacked us in the streets. And it surely wasn't my fault that my own brother betrayed them because I didn't know about him being a part of them.
So why did he say it was my fault?