A Lifetime With You by Athrhteera

Alena

When you were in love, you were bound to risk your life. In every love story, there were going to have two different endings: the good and the bad. None of us knew what were bound to happen when we fell in love, we were just too stuck on the high, we overlooked the

risks.

I had fallen in love twice. The first time was a lesson.

Yet, the second time, brought me peace.

It gave me the real meaning of true love. The love that came unexpectedly but showed me how perfect my life could be-l never experienced that kind of love before and I was very grateful for experiencing it now. Matteo was my knight in shining armour. Instead of prince charmning riding a white horse, he was the mafia driving a black Aston Martin.

When I first met him, I thought it was a life sentence of death. I had surrendered my future to an unknown man, to uncertainty. Yet, the moment I married him, the moment we were pronounced as husband and wife, it began to be the best moment of my life. I loved Matteo, with all of my heart. Forever.

If I was given a chance to get to know someone better, I just knew there wasn't going to be anyone better.

As I packed through my clothes and throwing them in the luggage, I had grown eager to leave this house. Two weeks ago, I wanted to be here more than anywhere else but now, I wanted to be in my husband's arms.

The two weeks were dreadful, I just didn't realise that until now.

When I saw Matteo during his press conference, my heart was stabbed and broken into a million pieces. I had expected him to suffer but I couldn't believe what I saw. As he was suffering on his own, I had began to heal and unknowingly, it was a selfish act. Why did I do that?

How could I do that?

Those questions kept replaying in my head and I didn't have the answer to them.

I was reaching out for my clothes in the wardrobe when I heard the doorbell ring.

It was late and I wasn't expecting any visitors, neith

Mama or Alexei. My dearest brother had left in a hurry when I asked him to, he wasn't going to come back for the next few days. As for Mama, she was always here early in the morning Never late at night.

The doorbell rang twice and I slowly made my way down the stairs, glancing at the security screen on the wall. The camera would've showed me the figure but the front door was empty, showing no one. My eyebrows furrowed, assuming there was something

I went to the front door, grabbing onto the doorknob but I was immediately being thrown backwards as someone pushed the door. I had fallen onto the ground with a loud thud and it took me awhile to regain my composure.

The unknown figure continued to stand in front of me, covering his face with a scary mask.

I blinked a few times as I tried to increase the distance between us, my hands reaching out for anything I could grab but to

my disappointment, nothing

Only Mama and Alexei knew about my location to ensure I was safe.

"Who are you?!" I screamed, crawling backwards.

A groan had left my lips when I felt the stinging pain on my left rib, knowing it was going to leave a dark bruise in the morning. I had taken quite an impact but I only had myself to blame-it didn't take me long to realise I had forgotten to lock the front door when I went inside earlier. I knew better than to forget but I had forgotten.

"Alena Lerclerc... it took me awhile to find you." The figure spoke, his voice deep and slightly husky. It was not a surprise that the person standing above me was

man.

"Who the hell are you?"

"Nobody you need to know but you're a very curious one, aren't you?"

I could imagine his sinister smile as he stared down at me.

For once in my life, I felt helpless. I felt as if I was going to die tonight and there was no one out there to save me even if I screamed as loud as I could-the villa was further away from anyone, we were practically in the middle of nowhere.

I had regretted my decision on coming here. I had regretted on running away from Matteo because if he was here, he would've kept me safe. At least, if he knew about my location, he would've sent out Angelo to protect me.

This was the reason why. He knew someone was out there running after me, to torture him, to destroy the mafia and even the Bratva. He knew that I was priceless.

"I'm not alone." I panicked, continuing to move further away from the man.

"Yet, you've been here all by yourself for the past two weeks."

I glanced down at his hand, seeing him holding a knife. My body began to shudder at the thought of him slicing me up as he

to taunt me, he was doing it on purpose. watched me bleed but I knew he was holding onto the knife

The man wanted to scare me. To terrify me.

Well, to say the least, it was working the way he planned.

"How do you know who I am?" I asked, trying to catch a glimpse of his face but he was doing a really good job at hiding it.

"You're quite the princess, Alena. You worth more than you think," he replied.

Within seconds, he was already lurging towards me which caused me to let out a scream. He immediately slapped me across the face before shutting my mouth shut with his hand. My eyes began to water, trying to endure the stinging pain on my face; that motherfucker really did slap me hard.

"Shut the fuck up!" He said through gritted teeth, gripping hard onto my face.

He went to pull my hair, making me let out another

Cream.

Then, when I thought he was going to pull away, he decided to prove me otherwise. His rough hand slapped across my face once more, not once but twice. I felt the stinging pain began to spread as my lips were busted.

I licked my lower lip and tasted blood.

I held my face away from him as I kicked my legs out, trying to free myself but he was stronger and bigger, nothing seemed

w

to work.

"Get the hell away from me!" I shouted, as loud as I could.

Yet, he began to punch my stomach, causing me to lose my breath for a few seconds. The pain was too much and I slowly started to cry-I didn't want to let the tears fall and prove him that he was winning but I couldn't hold them back anymore.

My father had trained me to fight back, to defend myself whenever I was in danger but I couldn't do anything against this man. My body had grown weak from his punches, leaving me to groan and surrender in pain.

"Please... stop," I muttered.

"You want me to stop?"

I nodded, laying on the floor.

"I can't hear you. Do you want me to stop?"

This time, it was straight to my lower rib which

When he didn't get the respond he wanted, he began to punch me a caused me to let out a scream. I cried as hard as I could, silently beggining for this torture to end.

"Please, stop hurting me!" I cried, putting my hands up.

It wasn't a surprise to understand the fact that my family had a lot of enemies. My father and Alexei had killed a lot of men and those men had families, they could hunt us down whenever they wanted; that was why Alexei had planted a good security system. He knew he could protect himself but he knew I could never protect myself.

As for my father, he wanted me to master the art of defending myself. Incase I was stuck in a situation like this but I guess should've paid more attention to him. Now, everything came down to me in regrets, wishing I could've acted differently.

I should've brought a gun with me but even if I did, I wasn't going to carry it around.

The man continued to hurt me by punching my face and kicking my body. Eventually, the pain had gotten too intense that i began to shut down-I had stopped begging for him to stop. I only cried out, my eyes staring blankly at the ceiling, hoping someone was going to come and save me.

"Please..." I muttered which came out more like a whisper. "Stop..."

I could feel my body burning up as I shut my eyes, tryin

to make the pain go away.

When the man had stopped hurting me, he took a few steps back to admire his work of art. The bruises, the blood and the fractured bones, he did a very good job at creating a masterpiece. I had laid flat on the ground because the moment I tried to move, the stabbing pain was excruciating.

Glimpses of Matteo began to cloud my vision and all I wanted now was him.

My husband was there to protect me. He was there to always protect me but I had went against him, pretended as if I never needed him. Now, I was suffering in this pit of hopelessness.

"Matteo..." I breathed, spitting out the blood.

"Your husband isn't going to come and save you,"

I ignored his words as I stared at the ceiling, imagining him walking in the front door to save me. That could happen and it was going to be one hell of a plot twist but the front door remained opened, unintended. While I suffered, endlessly.