I couldn’t give a fuck if he kills her right in front of us. I just want answers. I want to know what could possibly make a mother leave her children. Because you’d be prying my dead, cold hands away from my son before I’d ever leave him. And I know my wife feels the same way. Daisy would never leave our son. Not for anything. So what made it so fucking easy for our mother to leave all five of us behind, as if we never existed to begin with?

Chapter Six

The past

He’s having one of his episodes again. My husband. Each morning, I wake up and pray that today will be different. Today will be the day that he comes back. The man I married. Because the one lying next to me right now… he is not the sweet, gentle man I knew.

Am I naïve? To think that he’s still in there. That there is still hope he’ll come back?

When I first met Giovanni, he was everything I could ever dream of. Handsome, caring, attentive… and, like I said, gentle. He showed me love. I’d never had anyone show me the kind of love this man used to show me.

Then something happened. It wasn’t overnight. It wasn’t instant. But he changed. And eventually, my husband became someone I didn’t recognise. Someone I feared.

I lie still. If I don’t move, he won’t wake up, and I can have a few more minutes of silence. The boys are all sleeping. The baby kept me up late last night. Vin’s fussy and very attached. More so than my other four boys ever were.

“Mummy, are you awake?” my eldest son whispers as he pops up beside my bed.

I look over at him. I don’t know how he gets in here without me noticing. Kid is like a little ninja. I place a finger over my mouth, indicating for him to be quiet, and slowly slide out of bed. Because now that Gio’s in here, I really don’t want to wake my husband.

I know I’ll pay for this later, for leaving the bed before him. But better me than my son.

I take Gio’s hand and we both tiptoe out of the room. The door creaks as I open it. Which has me wondering how the hell he sneaked in here all over again?

I look back over a shoulder and see Giovanni stir. “I’ll come find you. Go hide,” I whisper to my son and shut the door as quietly as I can.