Chapter 23: TWENTY THREE

CELESTIA

Lila and I stayed in the garden for God knows how long. We decided to sit back for another while, as we watched the sunset together. I was completely awed how simple things like flowers and sunsets excited Lila. Even after being subjected to such harsh realities, the innocent mould around her was unbreakable in a way that had provided her with the strength to move on in the first place.

Raffaele was a bad guy, but for one piece of kindness that he and his family has extended to Lila, I respected him.

“No matter how many times I have seen the sun going down, I will never get bored of the view,” she told me.

Honestly, the view was breath-taking. Vibrant hues of purple, pinks, oranges and crimsons rioted across the sky, painting a timeless existence. We both sat cross-legged and gazed the sun setting across the mauve sky with the semblance of a smile on our lips.

I turned to look at her serene face, prominent even under twilight. “Is that why you love the garden? The sunset?”

We were sprawled on the ground now, cradled by the grass beneath us. Oddly, it was a feeling I wouldn’t trade for anything else.

“That, and those lilies.” She pointed a little far away. “I didn’t know the name of the flowers back then, but someone always used to come and change the bouquet for Cesar’s room. It was the only thing of colour in his room.”

“You stayed with Cesar?”

“I stayed in his room. He shifted to somewhere else until they arranged for a place for me,” she explained.

I nodded and returned my gaze to the sky. Soon the dusk overwhelmed, filling the sky in darkest of colours like a dense canopy. It was not a star-speckled atmosphere, but nevertheless beautiful.

“We should go back now,” she said as we slowly sat upright. “I will have to knead and proof the bread for tomorrow. I am making French baguette for breakfast.”

Her pretty eyes twinkled as a soft flush painted her cheeks in excitement. “I would love that, you know,” I told her, but it dampened my spirits a little as I realized that I have to go back to my isolated self. Her friendship was the only thing that made me forget that I was a captive here. “Let’s go.”

It was a long walk, from the garden to the villa, and that’s just one section of the property. The entirety of the place is another thing of brilliance. By the time we got up and made our way towards the villa, it was already dark and barely illuminated with the effervescent lights around the place.

Halfway across the garden, a sound stopped us dead in the tracks. It rang in the air once, then twice and thrice in rapid succession, piercing through the air.

Gunshots.

Lila and I stared at each other in horror as our senses sharpened with adrenaline.

“What is happening?” I asked as we looked around for cover. There was still some distance to cover between the garden and villa, and with successive gunshots in the air, it was not a good idea to cross the path.

“Come back!” Lila tugged my hand and dashed back towards the fountain. “I know of hiding shed.”

“Why can’t we go back into the house? What is going on, Lila?” I wheezed and panted through the panic.

We returned back to the inky darkness of the garden and concealed ourselves behind a hedge structure of a man-made rock wall and squatted down. While I kept incessantly blabbering, Lila had gone completely pale in her colour. The tight grip of her nibble fingers clutching my forearm was enough an indication of her fright.

There were muffled shouts and yelling that could be heard, but we were cut out from everything. Perhaps, hiding here was a good sign that raging head-on against the danger.

“A few of the guards...they know we are here,” Lila whispered in a clogged voice. “Someone would definitely come for us.”

I held her hands in mine, squeezing in encouragement. “It’s okay, Lila. No one would harm us here. Whatever it is, this place is well-guarded.” I could really say that from my experience.

“We never heard gunshots in the compound before,” she gasped.

I was a little surprised. Practically, every guard carried a gun, and some even assault rifles. But until everything blew over, it didn’t feel safe.

“It’s okay, Lila. It’s probably nothing. Let’s wait out here. Once everything is calmed down, I am sure someone would come looking for us,” I soothed, even though my own blood chilled my heart.

I didn’t remember how long we were hiding behind the three-foot hedge wall, but suddenly there were heavy sounds of approaching footsteps. Maybe, the danger has passed away, right?

“Someone’s here. We got it,” a gruff voice boomed, thick with accent.

The next thing we know was blinding torchlight raining down upon us. Lila and I held each other’s hand as tightly as possible, trying to block the glare with the other hand.

There were two men, covered in dark clothes, masked and armed.

“This one,” one of them said and pulled me up by the hair. “I got her. Let’s go!”

The hand that held Lila’s was forcibly snatched away, separating us while she let out a symphony of war cry and screamed my name. The two men began to drag me out of the garden– one by my hair, other by my hand. But pain overtook the survival instinct as I began to thrash and frail against the wall of muscles.

Admittedly, I wasn’t a match for any one of them, let alone two, but my struggle slowed them down. It bought enough time for Lila to attack one of them while I was pushed to the ground on my back.

“Cut her loose,” one of them ordered, while the other approached Lila with a knife.

Even though my body was riddled with painful pangs, adrenaline sluiced through my veins like addicted substance as I leapt from the ground and closed my fists over his ankles. In a flash, he toppled to the ground.

“You little bitch!” he roared, making me scrambled back on the ground.

These men were so much stronger, and time was definitely running against us. I managed to drag their attention away from Lila, and both of these animals were on me now.

“We have to leave. NOW!”

One of them came at me, hooked his meaty paw into the neckline of my dress and ripping it in half to immobilize me. As I rolled over to stomach to clutch onto the fabric, there was a shift in the darkness.

Everything that happened next was a passing blur.

A figure moved, almost like a shadow, in the inky blackness of the garden. It suddenly appeared in its form as if the God of the underworld was breaching the veil of darkness and coming down on the ground.

Raffaele strode into the garden in giant strides, with one of his hands raised in the air and armed. He took two clean targets – two exact bullets at their heads and everything came to a halt.

Except for the echo of gunshots, the air was saturated with thick, metallic silence.

Amadeo was right behind him as he ran past a short distance behind me, probably over to Lila. I wanted to crane my neck and see, but the aftermath of the horror had broken me in body and spirit.

What I could do was simply lying down and pushing my face into the dampen grass of the garden. I wept like a helpless child, letting wrecking sobs tremor down to my bones.

Something warm was laid over my back, followed by two strong hands cupping my shoulders, urging me off the ground.

“Celestia, it’s okay. It’s over,” Raffaele kept soothing in his soft, calming tone.

I slowly stood on my feet, clutching his jacket to my chest because that was the only shred of modesty I could afford. The rest of my dress was in tatters, barely hanging there. Raffaele quickly wrapped his hands around me, bracketing them like armour, as we slowly made our way back.

At that moment, in my fragile and broken state, my feelings for him changed.

Raffaele Roselli wasn’t perhaps the real monster in the jungle.

There were monsters far worse than him, and I knew that he would protect me from them.