Rooted from Betrayal

Chapter 4: *Watching eyes.*

Standing in front of a black Range Rover, with a black private jet striped in gold that belonged to a mafia family behind me and said family around me, it had taken everything I'd had in me to stay upright and hide the terror plaguing my mind.

Although I had managed to remain calm throughout the flight, that had changed the moment Antonio had sat in front of me. His presence and proximity for the last few minutes of the flight along with his cold and unfeeling gaze had suffocated me and nearly pushed me into having a panic attack but I had been saved by the jet landing and his older brother requesting his presence.

My memories of that day are still clear as day, the feelings as well. I remember I had turned around to look at the jet miserably, just as one of the triplets came out with Antonio right behind him.

My eyes had met Dante's—the youngest triplet's—light brown ones and I had seen a spark of something I could not name then ignite in his eyes right before my eyes had been drawn to the unfeeling hazel brown eyes of Antonio. His eyes had showed no emotion other than dark and savage glee, which had sent a shiver down my spine, more so when the corners of his lips had twitched as if he could see my discomfort from where he had stood.

I had known he was toying with me and yet I had not been able stop myself falling right into it.

I had averted my eyes unable to hold his gaze and watched their oldest brother throw a leather duffle bag into the back seat of the leading car before climbing into the front passenger seat with the two women following the duffle bag into the back seat. And just like that they had been gone.

Soon, everyone else was getting inside the four cars and I had watched as each triplet entered one of the four cars with two guards entering the same car which—I had quickly deduced—meant I were to ride in the same car as Rosy and Antonio. Just when I thought my heart could not sink any lower, it had burrowed further down.

Though I knew I had to get inside the car I had been reluctant and I had watched as Antonio opened the front passenger door, just as Rosy closed the right door at the back, and he had looked at me with unflinching eyes before he had spoken.

"Get inside the car or I'll put you inside." He'd said.

Whether from his words or the look in his eyes, my heart had stuttered and without delay I had opened the door and entered. However before I had, I saw the satisfied smile that had brushed the corner of his lips.

The inside of the expensive car was coated in black which when coupled with the dimmed windows, made it darker than was legally allowed while the air-conditioning had made it colder than was necessary.

Although it had been nighttime and the dimming on the windows had not allowed most of the full moons light to enter the car's interior, it had been bright enough for me to see Rosy's calculative gaze on me, it was as if she was connecting dots in her head and none of them could provide the desired link and so other patterns had to be formulated; she had looked at me as if I were a paradox.

I had tried to ignore the look in her eyes along with Antonio's unwavering gaze but had failed because he had made me like prey being observed by a hungry and savage beast. In the end I had settled my eyes on the driver's on the mirror and found his eyes already watching me. Unlike Rosy's scrutinizing gaze and Antonio's cold and unfeeling stare, the look in the driver's eyes had been filled with apathy and slight amusement as though something about me had amused him for reasons unknown to me.

The look he had been giving me turned out to be just as unnerving as the others and so I had chosen to rest my mind by looking out the window but before that, as if on instinct of a scared critter, my eyes had bounded to Antonio and saw his eyes cold and sharp with a hint of something dark I would only learn months later to be bloodlust bubbling in them.

Fortunately, they had not been focused on me.