“I may have been safe,” I leaned forward, “from whatever was after you, but I wasn’t from everything else.”
“I chose the lesser of two evils,” she quickly dried her eyes and sat straight again, “and what good did that even do?” She looked over my head.
Suddenly, his hand slipped over my shoulder. It was as though I was thrown a lifeline, and it felt wonderful as it rested there on the curve of my collarbone. Elenora’s eyes widened for a split second, but she quickly pulled her mask back down.
“Are you two together?”
“If we were?”
“That would pose a problem.”
“What does that mean?” What was her damn hang-up with the Capri family, anyway?
“These people are murderers, Sienna. Stone cold killers.”
“I disagree,” I stated simply.
“You need to trust me on this, Sienna.”
I snorted as I shook my head at her words. “I have no trust. Not for anyone.” Elio flinched, and Elenora caught it. I could see it as her eyes narrowed in on him. To my surprise, he made no comment, and she let it go and directed her attention back to me.
“I want to earn it back.” She placed a hand on mine and stared into my eyes. “I know it needs to be earned, and I’m willing to do that.”
My knee-jerk reaction was to say no, but she was my mother, the person who had given me life. I needed more from her, and I knew she could fill in the gaps of where I came from and who I was.
“It’ll take time.” I wasn’t going to give in easy.
“I know.”
Andrea arrived and passed us each a frosted glass of bubbly water. She settled into a chair next to Elenora.
I waited a moment and took a sip, then turned to Elenora.
“You need to accept that the Capris are in my life too.”
Her neck contracted as she swallowed hard. “I’ll have to work on that.”
“You can’t disappear on me again.”
“I won’t.”
“I want answers. I deserve them.”
“You do, and I’ll do my best to tell you whatever I can.”
“All right.” I felt unsure, but what other choice did I have? “What now?”
“Come to our party tomorrow night,” Elio suddenly said. “See for yourself that we’re not who you think we are. My cousin, Vinni, turned twenty-seven today. We’re hosting a party for him. It would be a chance for you both to relax and get to know one another in a less formal setting.”
I noticed Elenora looked unsure, but when she caught my expression, daring her to say no, she slowly started to nod. “All right. If it’s acceptable to the rest of your family, I think that can be arranged.”
“Any family of Sienna’s is family of ours. We’d love to have you,” Andrea said. “The party starts at eight up in the main house.” She pointed to the Hill House behind us.
“I guess we’ll see you tomorrow.” She smiled politely at me while I digested the little progress we had made. While we walked them back to their cars, I couldn’t help but notice Oscar was watching me intently. It could be that he was actually watching Elio, who had become my shadow lately. Either way, I felt strange and a little uneasy around him, and wondered just who he was to my mother.
“Thanks,” I said over my shoulder once our guests’ cars were all headed down the driveway. “You didn’t need to do that.”
“Yeah,” Elio came into my view, “I really did.”