The Unexpected Love

Ch3- Alessio

The party was still going on in the hall. Aunt Fina was talking to Aria and rest of the Scuderi sisters with Leona and Fabiano. Savio was close to Remo probably keeping an eye on him. Which by the way reminded me that Nevio was not here. I could not be worried about that in this moment, he cannot be that stupid to do something now.

We looked around the room. I found Isabella going upstairs with two boys, if I remember correctly, they were her cousins. She certainly looked calmer and more relaxed with them. Valerio said something and she laughed, looking way more at ease than I have ever seen her.

"There", Massimo said tearing me from my thoughts, pointing at the staircase on the other side of the hall where Mom and Dad were going, probably to retire for the night. We headed towards them, and they stopped on the stairs when they saw us approaching.

"Dad, can we talk to you for minute" I had a feeling mom knew more about this but if I cannot be sure then we wouldn't bother her.

A look passed between them making our suspicion even greater. We didn't had secrets in our family, Dad definitely didn't like lying to us, even when we were kids instead of building any stories about things like, 'why do star twinkle' or 'why does the moon follows us', he just gave us simpler explanations of those phenomenon. Though a part of it was mainly because he just didn't believe in anything supernatural or mythical.

"Go to our room, I'll join you later", Dad said to mom, handing her the key. She looked as us worryingly as she took the key and went upstairs.

Dad came down to us, "What is it?"

Massimo and I exchanged a look and he spoke first.

"Something is weird, we know something happened at your and mom's wedding but the way people were looking at her right now, it has to do something with her right."

Something in Dad's expression changed, he became more guarded. Their effort in trying to hide this was making it even more strange.

"We know you killed someone but was that really all. Everyone seems to know something about it even Nevio but not us. What is it." I said quietly not wanting anyone else to hear us although everyone was still engaged in their party.

Dad regarded us for a moment then nodded towards the stairs, "You'll have to talk to your mother about it but let me have a word with her first."

We followed dad to their room and waited outside when he went to talk to mom. The door opened after a while and we entered the room. Mom was perched on the edge of bed with an expression I couldn't read. I glanced at Massimo and he looked just as confused as I did. Dad left closing the door behind him.

I couldn't imagine what could this be and why was this a secret in the first place. Everyone else seemed to know about this, why Just us.

"Mom?" I said when she didn't say anything, I assume dad had told her about what we wanted to talk about but the way Mom looked at us right now if she didn't want us to know we wouldn't bother her.

"Sit here". We sat on beside her on each side. "Your dad told me what you wanted to know about." She took a deep breath, looking at the floor. A haunted look in her eyes when she continued, "An uncle of mine abused me as a child, I hid it from everyone for years in fear of my reputation. When you father and I got married, I told him about this on our wedding night, that is when they tortured him to death."

I couldn't believe what I was hearing, from all the things I could have thought about what was going on, this certainly wasn't one of them. Massimo looked just as shocked as me but looking at mom and how even remembering that man made her feel, I wouldn't ask more.