Sacrificed To The Don They Now Regret novel · Chapter 16 of 24

Chapter 16: The Gate

My mother stood at the iron gate in her black cardigan, with the black dress folded over her arm.

Eight of Lorenzo's men stood on the other side of the bars.

Ilaria had come out on a maid's arm, and the cook, the gardener and two housemaids had come out behind her.

Nobody had told them to.

My mother saw me get out of the car, and her face crumpled.

"Livia."

I walked toward the gate and stopped three feet from it.

"My baby," she said. "Thank God. They have been so cruel to me."

"You killed Papa."

"I never touched your father."

"You put the gun in Paolo's hand."

Her mouth opened and shut.

Then she dropped to her knees on the pavement, right there in the road, with the dress crushed against her chest.

"Please," she said. "I am your mother. I carried you for nine months. Look at me, Livia."

I looked.

She was fifty-four years old, with silver in her hair and a pearl earring missing.

For the first time in my life, she looked small.

"Do you remember what you said to me in that bedroom?" I asked.

"I was frightened."

"You said, Livia is tough."

"You are!"

"I am," I said. "That's why I'm standing here and Paolo is in a cell, and I'm not the one crying on my knees in the road."

"Livia, I begged for you in front of the whole street. I begged them not to start a war."

"You begged me to go."

"I did it to protect Fiorella!"

"I know," I said. "You always did."

She stopped.

Her eyes went to the men, one by one, and I watched her change her mind about what to do next.

She got to her feet.

Her whole body straightened, and she turned to face the guards and the servants and the gardener with his hat in his hand.

"Listen to me, all of you," she said, and her voice carried. "I am a widow. I buried my husband, and now my son sits in a cell. And this woman, my own daughter, has been lying to you."

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