Page 127 of Vicious Behaviors
When I hear Izzie slowly moving toward me, I fall back on my palms and use them and the heels of my feet to crawl away from her.
“Don’t,bella.Please. Don’t get any closer. Please. I can’t bear it,” I supplicate with agitated urgency and then make the mistake of glancing over at her neck, red and tender from myunworthy hands. “You should have killed me. You should have never let me in. He won’t rest until he kills you. He won’t rest until I have nothing left to live for. If he took you from me…. if you had died…”
“Stop it, Marcello,” she says with utter resolve. “You have let that thing rule your life long enough. I will not let it rule us. You deserve to be loved. I will not let anyone make you believe differently. Because I love you. Me,” she presses her hand to her chest where her heart still beats. “I refuse to let any fucking alter take you away from me.”
She calls the voice an alter, unaware I’ve seen the devil’s true face tonight. It’s the same face she is looking at with longing and unconditional love.
“You don’t understand.” I shake my head, pounding at it with my closed fists. “You don’t know.”
I’m not sure how long I’m in this anguished state. All I know is that it subsides the second Izzie wraps her arms around me, preventing me from hitting myself just in case I end up hurting her.
“Izzie,” I choke through my tears, burying my head in her hair.
“Is everything alright down there?” I hear my brother Jude call out from upstairs. I open my mouth to reply, to tell him that Izzie is not safe as long as I’m near her, but Izzie covers it with her hand, preventing me from saying a word.
“Everything is fine, Jude. You can go back to sleep. Marcello just had a nightmare, that’s all. I promise you, I’ll never let him drink again.”
“Yeah, good idea,” I hear Jude say, but I can hear the hesitation in his voice. Like the true champion he is, he wants to fight all my demons for me, even the ones living in my head.
“Goodnight,” Izzie says, her voice overtly sweet, her own way of saying there is nothing to see here.
“Good night, Izzie. Good night, little brother.” And with that, I hear his footsteps return to the guest room.
“You should have told him,” I mumble once he’s gone. “Jude could protect you.”
“I can protect myself, thank you very much.”
I lean my heavy head back and look her straight in the eye. “But you didn’t. You didn’t protect yourself against me. Why?”
“You really want to know?”
“Yes.” I nod, feeling suddenly too exhausted to even do that.
“Because I have faith. Faith in us. Faith in you. Faith that you would fight him with everything you have, and protect me.”
“That was a big gamble.”
“You’re worth betting on.” She smiles meekly. “I meant it when I said I loved you. I’ll fight for us with everything I have. But in the end, it all comes to you. Is what we have worth fighting for? Or are you going to let him win?”
As her words take root in my soul—her love healing parts in me that have been broken for so long—I don’t need to think too long about my answer. “I’ve never wanted anything in my life. Not until you came along. All I want is you,bella.That’s all I’ll ever want.”
“So fight for me. Fight, Marcello.”
“How?” I ask, tormented.
“I have a few ideas on how we can tackle your alter problem,” she says, surprising me. “I just want you to be open to it when I discuss it with you. Tonight has been one whirlwind after another. I would rather have this conversation once you’re clear-headed. Which probably won’t be tomorrow since I’m pretty sure you’ll have the worst hangover known to mankind.”
I know the last part of her speech was meant to lighten the mood, but I don’t have it in me even to smile.
“What else?” I ask instead, wanting at least the bullet points on her thoughts to beat this thing.
“I think it’s time you sit down with your family and tell them what you’ve been living with. After attending some lectures and reading on the topic, I truly believe that hiding your condition only ends up exacerbating it. No more secrets, Marcello. They’re killing you, my love. Your family needs to know everything. The trauma…the guilt…the pain you endured. They need to know it all.Ineed to know. Everything.”
“Anything else?” I ask, feeling too mentally and emotionally exhausted to put up much of a fight.
“Just one more thing,” she says, before leaning in and pressing the sweetest kiss on my lips. My soul finds peace in her kiss, and before I know it, my hand rests gently at the back of her head, letting me savor the moment a little longer. When our lips part, Izzie presses her temple on mine while draping her arms around my neck. “Don’t you ever beg me to kill you again, Marcello Romano. There’s no world I’d want to live without you in it.”
“Izzie?” I whisper, running my thumb over her cheek.
