In Your Arms.

Chapter two.

Leon’s POV:

“I heard every word Marcel said. I don’t know who she is but I will surely help you find her” she hesitatingly answered me, but she’s lying to me about something. I recognized that band around her finger, my grandmother gifted it to me for my wife to be, I was sixteen at the time, with no interest in matters as such. I desired nothing to do with the empire my father and grandparents worked so hard to build, or the arranged marriage to the Cortez family’s last born daughter at the time. I wanted to join the army and so I did. It took a lot of convincing, but I was enlisted in the fall season of that very year. A stormy evening three years later changed my life and all I knew about it. I had just come back from training when I found out about the seizure of my home, no one left alive and my younger brother Eduardo gone missing, no answers, no explanations, just ashes. My mind finds its way back to her, the faint trail of blood following her as she rushes out of my presence, her muffled cries in the next room, her lowly toned conversations and lastly, the loud slam of a door all at once didn’t go past me. I am too exhausted for this. The sunrays come through the curtains, the house is awfully quiet, I try to lay my head back down, I drift into a slumber. Her voice, a whisper, is so gentle as she caresses where I’ve been hurt, I let her, she leans in to kiss me, her breath an inch away from mine--I am stirred out of my dream by this same oddly charming lady from earlier. Her eyebrows are creased in concern?-or am I still dreaming? “Are you okay Leon?” there is something about her tone that has me shift uncomfortably, “you are drenched in sweat and you were groaning in what seemed like pain, plus you haven’t opened your fist, your sheets must be distraught, let them go cara mia” I cannot really tell if the last bit was meant to be a joke but I notice that she is no longer meeting my eyes. I felt my heart flutter at the endearing name, I feel almost drawn to this lady before me, nonetheless I brush off the nagging feeling and let out a laugh. “for a woman whose name I do not know, you surely do have a lot to say”, I wince as I try to get back on my feet, she was right though, I am drenched in sweat and my heart is thundering against my ribcage. I try to mask how I am feeling as she reaches for a cloth to dab me, I melt into her touch, I hear her breathing hitch, there isn’t any distance between us now, who is this woman that has this much control over me?

Alessia’s POV:

I wince in pain as the nurse finishes the last stitches, she looks at me with what I can only perceive as deep concern, I can hardly blame her, I haven’t been able to sleep for weeks since that night, it is always the same nightmares from when I was much younger, sixteen, seventeen maybe. The night that Leon’s family and mine were murdered, I was with the maids at the parlor helping them with their duties which happened to be right above their family’s living room, meaning I saw everything. Eduardo-the gunshots, the pleas of agony, pain, the smoke, the fire-a shudder goes through my body thinking of it as I trace my scars , the burns left on my arm that I sustained trying to save either one of our parents. The thing here is, Leon never discovered the truth of that night, neither does he know the entire truth behind my nightmares or scars, but I do. I promised myself that night that if I happened to survive that attack, I would spend the rest of my life protecting Leon with my life from his enemies, from his cunning brother Eduardo, but even more that i’d seek my revenge. I hear nurse Maria calling out for me which seems to have been the umpteenth time but she knows me more than I assume to know myself, she has cared for me from that night, she is used to it all now even in her evening years. “Alessia dear, it is very important that you come by more often for your therapy sessions!-you surely look a mess and I couldn’t be more worried” she finishes as she takes her surgical gloves off and disposes of them. “I hear you nana” it’s been my nickname for her for the last eight years, she is almost family to me “I am getting better though, it is only that today, after realizing that my husband could not recognize me, it took quite a toll nana, I had to get out of there.” I can feel her gaze on me as I play around with the ring on my finger, the Russo’s family heirloom, “thank you nana for everything” I say to avoid more painful conversations, I hear her frustrated sigh, she is used to this by now, before another word is uttered out by her, I am out of the room and soon in the parking lot heading home. I hear an almost painful groan and hurry to his room, I find him soaked in sweat with a pained expression on his face, but he’s asleep. I call his name repeatedly until he finally awakes, “are you okay Leon?” I ask and try to hide the panic in my voice, but my tone betrays me because I notice him shift uncomfortably. I look away from him and focus on his hands and how tightly they clutch the sheets, almost like his life depends on it, “you are drenched in sweat and you were groaning in what seemed like pain, plus you haven’t opened your fist, your sheets must be distraught, let them go cara mia”. I mentally slap myself for that last part of my sentence, I think he finds it funny though because he laughs, I feel my pulse race “for a woman whose name I do not know, you surely do have a lot to say” he retorts back. I reach out for a cloth to dab him and lower his temperature, he melts into my hands, my breathing hitches, there isn’t any distance between us now-