Page 17 of Sin of Innocence

Liam stared down at Jason behind a widened gaze with his hand profusely shaking. I swiftly took the time to elbow him in his face just before gripping the gun.

“Fuck!” Liam groaned as he grasped his bleeding nose.

Christina screamed out as she was trying to run over to her father, but I was blocking her way. I needed her to stay as far away from Liam as possible. The last thing I needed was to see her lying in a pool of blood.

“You okay, Jason?” I questioned, praying to get some response from him to put an end to Christina’s panicked state.

“It hurts, but I… I’ll be… fine…” he stammered out.

Sirens quickly pounded through my ears as the lights of blue and red flicked from the windows. Police were fast to move in and take in the scene in front of them. Some looked surprised to be seeing two millionaires in a small suburban home, one with blood covering every ounce of their face, and the other with a gun.

“Drop the weapon!” A cop shouted before a huge flash blinded my vision. I slowly set the gun down on the floor before raising my hands.

Christina quickly got off the bed and walked over to me where she embraced me in a hug. Tears fell from her eyes as she held me. The cops dispersed around the room and quickly gathered Liam in handcuffs.

“I thought I was going to lose you,” she cried.

“Never. You would never lose me”.

7

CHRISTINA

“So, let me get this straight… youknew?” I asked my dad with a slight part to my lips.

The beeping of the heart monitor managed to fill the silence. A smell so clean, yet deadly was all that infiltrated my nose as I waited for his answer.

My dad held a small graze on his calf from the heroic attempt he committed. The ambulance had to get him up from the floor just to drive him down to the hospital where he had to rest for a few hours as they treated him.

“I told you this a million times already. Yes, I knew. I knew from the moment I came home to find his car parked in our driveway many weeks ago. For you both to be sneaking around, you guys sure do a terrible job of it,” my dad laughed out before grimacing in pain.

My shoulders fell in disbelief.

I was grateful for all the weight that suddenly trickled from my shoulders, but I was disappointed that I spent so much time trying to keep Emanuel a secret, that I missed out on so many opportunities. On the days we could’ve gone out, we didn’t. On the nights I could have been in his bed instead of the office couch, I told him no. I was too scared my father would see I was gone at night and he would question me about it. I thought he would be more upset.

“So, youaren’tmad at me?” I asked.

“Why would I be mad at you? I have worked for Mr. Mariano for a very long time. He is a really great person, and very loyal, might I add. I would rather you end up with a man like him than some dipshit like Liam Franco,” my father explained.

I couldn’t help but smile as I wrapped my arms around him, careful to avoid all of the tubes and wires connected to his body. He had no clue how much his blessing meant to me. It felt like the world was no longer forcing me to be something that I wasn’t. I was no longer a daisy that hoped the world loved her for who she was, but a rose who no longer cared.

The door quickly barged open as Hazel practically sprinted in with Emanuel following in right behind her. “Oh, Jason! Are you okay?”

My dad tried to smile, but I could see the pain in his eyes. She walked over to him and sat down on the side of his bed. I could only watch as she looked over his body for any other evidence of physical pain. It had been so long since I had seen someone actually care for my father. It was a sight that I truly missed.

I craned my neck up to look at Emanuel when he wrapped his arm around my waist protectively.

“I’m fine, really,” my dad said.

“I’m just glad no one got hurt.I saw Liam being carried out by the police on the news.They have him under arrest for not only stalking and the attempted kidnapping of you, Christina, but also for forty-three other kidnapping and stalking charges,” Hazel informed us. “He has been tracking down women, taking them, and then selling them to whoever would buy since he was eighteen years old. So far, the police have found twenty of those women, and the count is only rising as Liam tells them where to find the girls. They even found a girl who had gone missing recently, Stephanie Hearse. Christina… you, Emanuel, and even Jason probably just saved forty-three lives.”

I smiled as I looked up at the man who had every piece of my heart. It was crazy to think about. No one would’ve guessed that a man like Liam, who had absolutely everything, would choose to do something so cruel.

At least lives were saved and differences were made. Girls who I could have ended up just like, were now home and back with the people who loved them.

“Thank you, Emanuel. Thank you, Dad. It was you both that saved me and kept me from being number forty-four. Now, there will be zero of Liam’s victims out there,” I spoke softly before rage began to lace into my words, “but that’s just Liam’s. What about the rest of the people out there? What about my future child, or someone else’s future child, who has to live with the worry that maybe one daytheywould become someone’s forty-fourth or sixty-seventh?”

Everyone in the room was staring at me like I was crazy, but they knew I was right. I was scared out of my mind when Liam grabbed me, I could imagine having him succeed. Those girls and boys who live in fear because they were taken for no reason other than breathing was what made guilt course through me. They deserved someone to fight for them the way Emanuel and my dad fought for me.

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