Alina

I wake up in the arms of Daddy. My daddy.

I'm trying to think past when I woke up yesterday, but I'm coming up blank. I remember Mommy, Daddy, and some scary boys.

I turn my head and see Mommy snuggling into me. They surround me like a butterfly's cocoon. I let out a yawn and Daddy wakes right up with a big smile.

"Good morning princess."

"Morning daddy." I wiggle out of his arms and scoot toward mommy. "Good morning mommy. Mommy? Mommyyyyy."

She shoots up with a big gasp like a monster attacked her or something. She looks really funny and I fall back into daddy in a fit of giggles.

"Morning baby." She says with a big smile after catching her breath. "You hungry?"

"Yes!" I say through my laughs while daddy tickles my stomach. He's fun.

Daddy picks me up and we go to the kitchen. Sitting at the table eating are the boys from last night. I hide my face in Daddy's neck.

"Allie, I want you to meet some people. Can you come out please?" Daddy softly asks. I slowly turn my head to face the boys who all have gentle smiles on their faces.

"Hello." I give them a small wave.

"These are my sons, your brothers." His hold on me tightens a bit and he runs his finger up and down my arm in a soothing manner. "They're very nice and want to say hi. Is that ok?" I nod.

My brothers get up from the table and walk over to me and daddy.

"Hello Allie, I'm Alessandro. I'm your eldest brother."

"Hi princess, I'm Luca, welcome to the family." Luca gives me a kiss on the cheek and I giggle.

I like him.

"Hello Allie, I'm Damien. I'm your favorite brother, ok?" I smile and nod.

"Oh as if." Another guy says. I giggle at his response. "Hey Allie, I'm Domenico. I'm that idiot's twin." He says nodding his head towards Damien.

"Hey!" Another says, slapping the back of his head. "Watch your mouth around my sister." I laugh again. These guys are funny. "I'm Roman. Looks like you replaced my spot as the baby, cutie." He ruffles my hair.

"Hey! I'm not a baby! I'm three!" I gasp. I did it! "Mommy! Daddy! I said tree!" Nooooooo.

"Yes, you did! Good job baby!" Mommy says, kissing my cheek. "What do you want for breakfast sweetie?"

"I don't know," I say as daddy starts to walk. "Daddy stop." He freezes.

"Are you ok princess?"

"No." I point to Alessandro. "Bring me to Sandy." All of a sudden Luca and Damien start hysterically laughing.

"Sandy!" They yell literally in tears.

"Sandy come here now!" I say with a pout. Sandy walks over and I make grabby hands at him. He takes me from daddy's arms and picks me up.

"Losers!" He says over his shoulder as we walk to the dining room. I giggle.

Sandy sits down with me on his lap and a few minutes later, mommy comes in with a plate of these puffy golden things.

"Mommy, what are those?" She looks a little shocked for a second but quickly hides it.

"These are waffles, baby."

"What's the brown stuff?" She looks even more surprised now.

"It's chocolate darling."

"Is it yummy?"

"Very." Damien answers.

"Ma makes the best waffles ever," Roman says.

I nod and mommy cuts up my waffle and hands me a fork after lightly kissing my forehead.

"Mommy these are so good!"

She smiles at me while I continue to eat. Occasionally, Sandy wipes my mouth to get the chocolate away.

After breakfast is over, we all go over to a big lounge and sit down. Daddy comes to get me from Sandy. Sandy looks sad to let me go.

"Don't worry Sandy. I'll come back." He smiles at me.

"Alina," Daddy says, getting my attention. "We have some questions for you. "

"Um, ok."

"It's about your past." I freeze.

"Oh, I don't really remember much, sorry. When I woke up, my head just really hurt." They look at each other in an odd way, almost as if they're talking through their eyes.

"Have you been feeling or thinking anything weird?" Daddy asks.

"Well, I have done a few things and I don't really know why I do them. Like my head said not to cry earlier when I really wanted to."

"Do you notice yourself subconsciously moving at certain points?"

"Dad, she doesn't know what that m-"

"No, I know it Luca." He looks a little surprised. Why? "And no, not really. I mean, I thought you were going to hit me a few times for some reason so I probably did something then."

"Do you think we're going to hurt you?"

"No Daddy! Wait. Are you going to?" I begin to panic. "No no no. I'll be good! Please don't hurt me!"

"Hey hey hey. It's alright. Calm down, sweetheart. No one will ever hurt you again." Daddy says rubbing my back.

"Promise?" I hold out my pinkie.

"Promise." He intertwines his pinkie with mine and kisses it.

"When you hear certain things, does that trigger you in a way?" Sandy asks and I nod.

"Yeah actually. When Daddy, said 'father' it scared me for some reason. And when you said 'brothers' yesterday, I got really scared again. I had a dream after that."

"Can you tell us about it?"

"I was in a grey room. It was really cold too and there were no windows so it was pretty dark. I was sitting on the floor with two guys standing over me. My body hurt a lot and I was bleeding a lot and covered in a lot of bruises. Besides that I can't remember much of it, but they said that they were my brothers and that they hurt me to be stronger and I should be grateful and stuff.
One of them kept hitting me and called me a brat. I don't know what that is though. It was a really scary dream. Was that ok?" I look around and see everyone looking really sad.

Daddy hugs me really tight and mommy has tears in her eyes.

"Do you remember anything else from your old home? Maybe what someone looked like or any names?"

"No, not really. But there was something on their necks. It looked like this." I move my finger in the pattern I remember.

Antonio's POV:

Shit.

Bianca's POV:

Shit.

Alessandro's POV:

Shit.

Luca's POV:

Shit.

Damien's POV:

Shit.

Domenico's POV:

Shit.

Roman's POV:

Shit.

Alina's POV:

"That's it. Can I have more waffles now?"