#Chapter 47 - The Walk

Layla I found solace out on the rear balcony, in a quiet corner of the night. Free of Marco’s smile and Aldo’s steadfast presence, I felt suddenly shaky, my chest too tight. The champagne in my fingers did little to calm me. The cool air caressed my skin, a welcome reprieve from the suffocating tension inside. I pulled deep breaths through my nose, forcing my racing thoughts to steady. Marco’s presence wasn’t the problem—it was how easily I’d remembered him as Marco the doctor, not Marco the kidnapper or Marco the deranged gunman. That was what unsettled me. How easily he’d made me laugh. How easily, I feared, he could make me trust him again. When in all these months, I still hadn’t come to trust Aldo. I knew, in my head and in my heart, that Marco was a bad man. Certainly, he’d more than proved as much. More than proved his unworthiness. But he made it so easy to forget. He was just so damned likable. Like a serial killer, I reminded myself, which he almost certainly was