Chapter 4 Lorenzo?!
Elodie's POV
"Lorenzo?" I opened my mouth, trembling.
I practically stumbled forward, wanting to grab him, wanting to confirm that everything before my eyes wasn't a hallucination before death. But before I could get close, the muscle-bound guy next to him grabbed me again, lifting me like I weighed nothing, his arm locked around me like a steel trap.
"Let me go! Lorenzo, is that you?" I struggled desperately, my eyes fixed on the man on the sofa, afraid that if I blinked, he would disappear again like he did five years ago.
However, the man called "Mr. Nelson" just looked at me coldly, those deep blue eyes showing not a ripple of emotion, as if looking at a stranger talking nonsense.
"I don't know any Lorenzo," he said. "You've got the wrong person."
In an instant, all my movements froze.
Don't know him? How could he not know? This face, this voice... I couldn't possibly be mistaken.
And that familiar scent of cedar was still lingering at my nose, exactly the same as what I smelled on that man last night.
"Impossible!" I shouted. "You are Lorenzo! Why won't you recognize me? Is it because I saw something I shouldn't have, so now you don't want me either?"
The black-suited men around all looked at me like I was crazy, the atmosphere growing more tense.
The man holding me had clearly lost his patience. He roughly yanked me backward and asked the man on the sofa for instructions, "Mr. Nelson, this woman's not right in the head. Should we just..." He made a throat-slitting gesture, his eyes vicious.
My heart jumped to my throat, but I still stubbornly stared at that man.
The man raised his hand, stopping his subordinate's action. He stubbed out the cigar between his fingers in the ashtray, then slowly stood up.
He was even taller than I'd imagined, his shadow nearly engulfing me completely. An invisible sense of oppression hit me head-on, making me involuntarily hold my breath.
He walked toward me step by step.
"I'll say this one more time," he said slowly. "I don't know you, and my name isn't Lo-ren-zo."
He deliberately broke the name apart, his tone mocking.
I stared at him blankly, my heart growing colder inch by inch.
Could it be... they really just looked alike? Could there really be two people so similar in this world?
Even with the same scent?
"What happened here today, you'd better not say a word about it," he leaned down slightly, getting close to my ear. "Otherwise, I don't mind adding one more unidentified female corpse to New York. Understand?"
The threat of death was right there, yet all I felt was the emptiness and despair of being denied and abandoned again.
Yeah, so what if he really was Lorenzo? He was no longer the boy who would wipe sweat off my face at the hockey rink.
Now he was a ruthless mobster, the "Mr. Nelson" others spoke of. Between us, there was already a chasm paved with corpses.
Seeing me silent and lost, the man seemed somewhat impatient. He frowned slightly, then reached out his right hand and tapped his left wrist twice with his index and middle fingers, neither too light nor too heavy.
That gesture!
My pupils contracted sharply, as if struck by an electric current.
When we were young, Lorenzo was always quiet. Whenever I pestered him with questions and he got annoyed but didn't want to lose his temper with me, he would gently tap his left wrist twice with his right index and middle fingers. This was his unique gesture, meaning "stop talking" and "that's enough."
This habit—no one else but me could possibly know about it!
All confusion and uncertainty vanished in that moment.
He was Lorenzo!
He hadn't lost his memory, he remembered me!
He just didn't want to, or rather, couldn't admit it.
Why?
I suddenly looked up, meeting those ice-blue eyes again. This time, I didn't cry out, just stared at him with an almost obsessive gaze, as if trying to see through to his soul beneath this cold, hard shell.
My stare seemed to displease him slightly.
He turned his face away, avoiding my gaze, and coldly said to the burly man behind him holding me, his subordinate, "Deal with her."
"Yes, Mr. Nelson." The subordinate responded and began dragging me out without hesitation.
I looked at the man's back in disbelief. He didn't even look back at me once.
My world collapsed instantly, all hope and struggle turning to nothing.
So he really was heartless enough to watch me die.
Just as I was being dragged to the door, thinking I was surely going to die, thick black smoke accompanied by a pungent burning smell came rolling from the other end of the hallway. "Fire! Fire!"
Panicked screams came from outside.
The man holding me paused, instinctively looking outside.
Taking advantage of this gap, I used all my strength to break free from his grip and rushed back into the room regardless of everything, blocking Nelson's path again.
"You started that fire, didn't you?" I pointed at the smoke. "Wasn't killing people enough? Now you have to burn down my home too?!"
Lorenzo, or rather Mr. Nelson, finally looked at me directly, those deep blue eyes devoid of any warmth, as if the fire before him had nothing to do with him. "That's your home?"
My heart went cold.
He knew perfectly well it was my only shelter, yet he still destroyed it without hesitation.
"You burned down my apartment to make me homeless, to make it easier to silence me, right?" I questioned him.
The apartment held my few belongings, and more importantly, the tuition and living expenses I'd saved up over the years.
Now it was all gone.
Lorenzo looked at me. His subordinates behind him were already getting impatient, the burly man stepping forward again, seemingly ready to drag me out at any moment.
The smoke was getting more suffocating, the fire spreading faster than imaginable.
If we didn't leave now, we'd all be trapped here to die.
Nelson walked through the choking smoke toward me step by step, his tall figure completely engulfing me.
"I'll give you two choices." He looked down at me. "Either you come with me right now, or I'll send you straight to hell to hang out with your landlord."
I was terrified. Fire blazed all around, the crackling of burning wood constant, like a countdown to death.
I didn't want to die.
At least, not at his hands.
"I'll go with you." I made my choice almost immediately.