The Italian's Fake Fiancée

23.

Leo looked at his uncle with his short-cropped hair and a face full of stubble and his father with his round rim glasses and protruding stomach and felt a cold sweat break out in his back.

For the last ten minutes, he had been trying to pitch a business idea to his father, but his uncle kept sabotaging him.

Was this what Alberto meant by my father and Rosa were working together.

At first, he had not believed it but seeing how Uncle Stefano kept finding loopholes in his plan. He had no choice but to lay rest to its possibilities.

He needed to do something, Leo thought at this rate, he will never be able to convince his father about introducing a wine brand with a mash-up of their local grapes and foreign ones with his uncle by his side and sabotaging him.

Leo placed the golf ball on top of the tee and swung with the concentration of one who had a lot on his mind.

When he rose to his full height, he wiped his face with his towel and turned. And in that instant, his eye caught a movement by the side, and he remembered Paige and wondered how she was fairing.

With her permission, he had left her in the field to go talk business with his father and uncle, which to his disappointment has been unsuccessful.

He turned to search for her in the green undulated field broken into parts by track roads and occupied by several bodies clad in golf apparel, and saw her with Rosa.

The first emotion that registered on his face was panic and then his face turned ugly and without even knowing it his legs moved on their own accord. And all he could think of was how he should get Paige away from there before Rosa sank her fawns into her.

He wanted to protect her. If he was to bring a gentle girl like her into this mess of a charade in the first place, it was his duty to protect her.
Leo had only taken two steps forward when he heard. "Giving up so soon. I thought you were adamant about getting to the bottom of your point."

Damn it! Damn it! Damn it! He had almost forgotten about his uncle.

Paige's wide blue eyes flashed in his mind and he steeled his heart against it as he turned to face his uncle. He would come to get her as soon as he was done with Stefano.

If anyone could hear his thoughts now. They might think he was panicking for no good reason, but it was he who had lived with Rosa, and he who knew what she can get up to.

With that, her silky evil smile. And her evil intentions. She can be up to no good.

A bitter smile crossed Leo's face as a distant memory from his past filtered through his brain, and he wondered why he was remembering it now.

It was the Christmas she had
burnt all his gifts because he had gotten more gifts than her. Rosa had been bitter. Said everything was supposed to be hers, and he had ruined it with his birth. Leo did not understand. He adored her and always followed her around with the idolization kids sometimes placed on their older siblings.

He wanted to please Rosa, to gain her attention. But she always misleads him into doing things their parents would disapprove of, but that didn't matter as long as it would bring a smile to her face and she would pat him on the head and tell him he had done well.

Then he would run off to a corner and smile sheepishly at himself. He had deluded himself on the type of relationship he thought he had with his sister. Thinking they shared a sibling likeness for one another, what he did not know was that Rosa was jealous of his very existence.
Simply because before he was born, she was treated like a princess.

Everyone doted on her, loved her, and gave her all the attention, however at Leo's birth ten years later all the attention shifted, and she felt neglected and took it out on the child who had taken everything from her.

Leo didn't know that and always tried to please her because she always wore a frown on her face, even giving her some of his gifts. Ignoring her snide looks and crude remarks until that day.

On his seventh birthday, he had heard her crying in her room when he went to ask her what was wrong she had gone hysteria upon seeing his face and then with a bitter smile looked him in the eyes and told him she wished he had never been born slamming the door in his face.

He wondered if that was why he never excelled at any of his relationships because he was always wondering if apart from his parents and cousin Alberto who loved him inexplicably, he had wondered will he ever be loved by another person especially since he was getting so much hate from his sister.

Back then he had been naïve enough to think Rosa was just going through a phase that's why she did all the things she did and that's why she was so cruel to him at times. But after hearing her say those words in so cold a voice without even flinching. Leo finally understood things were on a slightly different level than he thought.

He started to distance himself from her. And his resolve grew harder with each day. Watching her carefully and analyzing all her actions, knowing she did not have his best interest at heart.

It was as if he was always on his guard because he did not know when she would strike.
When she found out. Rosa changed tactics, and he couldn't even tell anyone then because no one would believe him.

In front of their parents, Rosa assumed the role of a white flower who could do no wrong, but in their absence, she was like a thorn in his side.

Rosa was jealous of him and wanted everything he wanted. Not because she loved them, but because she simply wanted to take them away from him. Most times she succeeded, mainly because he did not wish to fight with her, but not this time.

Because this was the first time he had truly ever wanted something, and he wasn't letting that slip from his fingers, even if it means butting head with her.

He turned to his uncle, who was still waiting for him to reply and let a cold smile steal his face.

"Uncle am not one to quit so easily." At his further stare, Leo added, "It would take more than mere words to put me off the edge."

As if noticing the coldness oozing out from him, his uncle Stefano decided not to antagonist him any further. Which was fine by Leo, as he was in a poor mood after remembering that ugly past.

He could feel his father's eyes on him. Carlo was staring at him with a curious expression and a thoughtful frown on his face, but Leo didn't let that bother him as he turned in Paige's direction.