XLI *NOT EDITED*

Vincenzo

"What are you doing?" I ask looking to the ground, Karma slips her sunglasses down the bridge of her nose as she brings her eyes to meet mine, "Oh me? I'm just doing important business things" She replies smiling as she slides her glasses back over her eyes, "Isn't that right Hades?" She asks looking to Hades who's lying beside her. "Get off the tarmac" I sigh running my hands through my hair, "No" She smirks before laying down fully on the ground, "Leonessa we need to leave for New York" I reply in a coldish tone to get her attention.

As soon as the words leave my mouth she sits up and again and snatches her glasses off of her face staring at me with those big green eyes I adore. "First of all, you better change your damn attitude or I'm taking the plane and everyone on it down with me motherfucker, and secondly I'm not getting on that thing with that fucking asshole over there" She hisses pointing behind me, I look over my shoulder and see who shes' pointing at, and it so happens to be Stefano. I take a deep breath and bend down grabbing her up off of the tarmac throwing her over my shoulder, Hades jumps to his feet and looks at me curiously before walking to me.

"Put me down you big fucking fuck!" She screams hitting me in the back and attempting to kick my stomach, Hades starts barking at us as I walk towards the plane and the others. When I get closer Stefano looks at us with a worried expression so I give him a small nod towards the plane, he makes his way onto the plane as well as Gio and Lucas leaving Karma and I with Iggy. "Put me down before I rip your throat out with my fucking teeth" She hisses again so I gently place her back on her feet, she folds her arms in a huff and looks up to me, I try to hide my smile but I can't, she looks too adorable when she's all angry and flustered like this.

"Are you finished having a tantrum?" I ask raising an eyebrow at her, "As long as you're finished acting like a big dumbass" She smirks. My smile drops from my face as quickly as it appeared "Aww what? Have I hurt the Capo's little feelings?" She laughs throwing her head back, I go to speak but Ryan's voice cuts me off "Sorry I'm late!" He yells as he drags his bags out of the boot of a car, some of the guards go over to him collecting his items and taking them on board for him, he makes his way over to the three of us with a curious look on his face. "What's going on here? And whose dog?" He asks slightly confused looking around, "He's mine" Karma replies still staring at me. "Ryan, Iggy give us a minute, and take Hades with you".

I wait for Iggy and Ryan to get on the plane with the dog before I speak, I lean down a little and grab hold of her face and neck with one hand, my other hand goes into her hair tangling my fingers in it enough to slightly pull her head back so that she has no choice but to look at me when I speak. "You know I let you get away with more things than I damn well should but I won't let you disrespect me again in front of my workers, when they're around I am the fucking boss. Do I make myself clear Karma?" I question staring into her eyes, they widen slightly when I say her name instead of her nickname.

She remains silent staring at me, "I said do I fucking make myself clear Karma?" My voice coming out louder than before. "Don't call me that" She mumbles under her breath but loud enough for me to hear, "Then answer my fucking question or I'll keep calling you it... Karma" I smirk knowing it's getting under her skin, her lips turn into a frown and her eyes begin to glass up and now I feel like a fucking monster. "Yes Capo" She croaks and I feel like I've just stomped and killed a kitten infront of her. My neutral face drops and I can feel a frown on my lips now, "I'm sorry leonessa, I was just trying to make a point to you".

"I've always done it, why does it matter now?" She questions still looking at me with her big sad eyes, I move my hands from her face and hair and take a deep breath in. "You have always done it in front of the same 10 guards, but today all of my men are coming with us on this trip hence why there are three planes leonessa. There will be days where I can take it, there will be days where I won't put up with it. During this trip I need everyone to be on their best behaviours, we have people watching us even if we don't know they are. If the wrong person sees that you're a weakness of mine they're going to take you away from me, and I don't want them to do that. I don't want to lose you, I cant lose you".

The last sentence takes her by surprise just as much as it takes me by surprise, did I really just say that to her? Yeah, I fucking did and I mean every fucking word of it too. Her frown turns into a small smirk, "You don't want to lose me huh? Does someone like meeeeeeee?" She coos, and here we go. "Yes leonessa, I actually like you, I have a big fat middle school crush on you, is that what you want to hear?" I ask folding my arms over my chest. I watch as her face lights up like a Christmas tree, "Yeah basically" She smiles before skipping over to the entrance of the jet.

I walk in after her and head towards the bedroom at the end of the plane as she sits down next to Ryan and Hades. The jet begins to take off as I'm closing the door behind me, I throw my briefcase onto the ground and fall onto the bed letting out a loud muffled groan, she's so up and down some days I can't keep up, she's like a fucking yo-yo. I continue to lay on the bed for a few more minuetes until I talk myself into getting up and finalising paperwork that needs to be done before we get to New York.

An hour or so goes by and I'm so busy with the paperwork I must not have heard the door open or shut, I feel a weight next to me so I stop what I'm doing to look to see Karma sitting beside me with Hades laying on the ground next to the bed. "Can I help you satan?" I ask as I go back to going over the paperwork, "His name was Angelo" She hums tracing her fingers over one of my legs "And his name suited him, he was an angel". I stop and look to her trying to figure out what shes talking about now until it dawns on me, our conversation from yesterday that we never got to finish.

She smiles and begins to speak again "The nurses knew it was one of the guards, that's why they let me keep him throughout the pregnancy and for those few short days" Her smile slowly falling to a frown again, "He was born blind" Ahe sighs looking to me, I drop the paperwork out of my hands and pull her onto my lap holding her close to my chest, I wont say anything until she needs me to say something, that's if I can find the words to say anything. "After they figured out I was pregnant they didn't stop their abusive treatments with me, if anything they got worse, the electric shocks were higher voltage, I was made it sit in ice cold bathtubs for hours, they still knocked me unconscious after every damn thing they put me through. In reality, he shouldn't have even been born alive, in theory, I should have miscarried, but he was real and he was perfect, blindness and all".

"I remember seeing his eyes for the first time, they were white all over with millions if not billions of beautiful coloured specks throughout them, every time I looked into his eyes it was like staring into another universe, I was mesmerised by them, I was mesmerised by him. And then one-day Sister Jude came into my room and informed me that a family was coming to adopt him, I didn't want to give him up but I knew he would have a better life outside of that hell hole so I agreed. I got him dressed into he white gown she had given me and prepared him for his new family... or so I thought, instead of a family walking through my room door it was two of the guards, they told me I also needed to dress in white so I put on the dress they brought in with them. I was made to get changed in front of them too".

"Once I was dressed I asked where his new family was and they began laughing, one of them took him from his bassinette while the other held me down on my bed forcing me to look in the direction of the guard and my son" Tears fall down her face but I'm too scared to move or speak while she's like this, i don't want to disrupt her but I can't look at her and do nothing while she's hurting. Hades climbs onto the bed and rests himself as close to her as he can putting his paw on her legs and arms trying to get her attention, her hand reaches out soflty petting him and he seems somewhat content with that.

So I hold her tighter and begin to wipe away her tears with my shirt, "He looked me in the eyes and told me my son would never be leaving St. Marys, I thought he ment because I was never going to leave, it wasn't until he pulled out a small machette that I understood what he meant. I remember trying to scream and fight my way out of the seconds guards grip but he easily overpowered me, I was only a child and he was a full grown adult. The first guard taunted me, I remember it as clear as day 'Say goodbye to your abomination' He smirked before... before he hit my baby with the knife... his screams... they fill my head at night, they fill in the silence in my life. He just kept hitting, and hitting, and hitting his tiny defenceless body. Every time I close my eyes I can still see it as clear as day, that's why I don't like sleeping because it's a constant nightmare" She sobs even harder, nausea and anger flow throughout my body, I need Lucas and Gio to hurry up and find these cunts.

"When he was finished everything was red and the smell of iron was so strong it made dizzy, I remember throwing up over and over again as he turned my child into a pile of meat and bone, I finally understood why they wanted me to wear white once they left the room. It was already on my dress from the blood splatter but once they locked my door I crawled off my bed and onto the floor in an attempt to hold him one more time, now that I look back at it, it was a stupid choice, my son didn't know I was saying goodbye or grieving, he was just a pile of blood and bone. But I still scooped up as much of him as I could and held him tight. They kept me in there with his remains for 5 days until someone brought me out for a shower, they drugged me and took me back to my room, I was expecting it to be covered in blood with the foul smell of decay and blood but it was scrubbed clean and doused in chemicals to erase any trace that he was ever there, any evidence of what had happened was gone, my son's remains were gone, everything gone".

"Some days I wonder what they did with him but I try not to overthink it, I hope they buried him on the property at least so he could have a final resting place, but I know they most likely didn't, they probably threw him in the bin our out of the wildlife to eat. Somedays I also wonder what would have become if I still had him, would he be a happy little boy? Would he love me? Would he be happy to be my son?" She asks looking up to me for the first time. "He would be the luckiest and the most loved boy out there in the world baby, you would have been the perfect mother for him I know it and you know it too, you still love him more than anything and I know he would have absolutely adored and loved you with his whole heart too leonessa" I coo tucking her hair behind her ear and out of her face, her eyes meet mine again and they sparkle from her tears but it makes her look even more precious.

"Everyone does".