Damian slams the door shut. He mumbles something under his breath, and it sounds like he is complaining about something. He throws his leather jacket on the couch. He looks around the living room and notices the quietness.
“Welcome home, sir,” the butler bowed his head.
“Where is everyone?”
“Everyone just doing their task. While Mrs. Melody…” the butler seems to hesitate to speak. Seeing his boss arches his eyebrows, he gulps. “Uh… she’s in the kitchen.”
Damian narrows his eyes, “And what is she doing in the kitchen?”
“She… She said she wanted to cook dinner-”
“Where is the hell our chef?” He said through his gritted teeth.
“We try to convince her, sir. Including the chef. They try everything to stop her from cooking, but… she just kicked us out,” the butler explained.
Damian lets out a heavy sigh. He should have known this would happen, knowing how stubborn that woman is.
“Is she cooking dinner for everyone or what?” He pinches the bridge of his nose.
“Thank goodness, she didn’t. Just for her,” the butler answers.
Damian nods. He moves his legs to bring himself to the kitchen. He could hear the sound of people working in the kitchen. As the kitchen door opened slowly, Melody’s figure appeared in his sight.
She is wearing an adorable apron with her hair tied in a messy bun. The chef, who is supposed to be cooking right now, is standing at the corner watching Melody’s every move. Their expression is enough to tell Damian how worried and panicky they are.
“What the use of me hiring a chef if they didn’t do anything?” Damian speaks up.
She turns around, “Oh, you are home. I give them a break time.”
He glances at the chef, who looks concerned and nervous. “Yeah… I don’t think they appreciate the break time you gave.”
Melody focuses on her cooking. He steps closer and looks at the food she cooking right now.
“You know I will scold you when you do this?” Damian inquired.
“I know. But I crave something I want to eat,” she speaks up.
“Why don’t you just ask the chef to do it?” He frowns.
Melody smiles, “I crave myself to cook something I crave for.”
He rolls his eyes. “So complicated.”
She put the food on the plate. Damian couldn’t help but watch her every move. His hand twitched as if ready to act if something happened. As she poured it all onto the plate, he quickly grabbed the pan from her.
“What the-”
“Enough. Just sit down. You have your food already,” he put the hot pan in the sink. “I can’t believe I’m dealing with stubborn pregnant women.”
“Well, this stubborn pregnant woman cooks dinner for you,” she grins as she shows the two plates.
“You don’t have to-but thanks anyway. The frustration made me hungry,” he took the plate from her and took a seat.
Melody arches her eyebrows, “What’s wrong? Let me guess. Matthew did something dumb?”
Damian huffs.
“No. It’s about Riccardo. He call me for a meet and guess what? He didn’t show up and tell me to go home when he had some urgent business!”
“I was waiting for him for half an hour!!”
She shakes her head slightly not knowing what to say. She knows how their friendship is, but if it were not for Riccardo, she wouldn’t be here. Damian wouldn’t see her face if it was not because of him.
“You shouldn’t hate him that much. He is your friend after all,” Melody states.
“He is not… my friend,” he mumbles.
Melody remembers the time when Riccardo was about to talk about the past between him and Damian. But, he seems to hesitate about it.
“If you don’t mind me asking… is something happened between you and Riccardo?”
His movement halted. “Why are you asking this out of sudden?”
“Just… curious,” she shrugs her shoulder.
“You are always curious. Is there a time you are never curious?” Damian rolls his eyes.
“It’s normal to be curious. It’s not a bad thing. Besides, it’s Riccardo’s fault,” she huffs, aggressively taking a bite of her food.
He looks at her with confusion. “What do you mean it’s his fault?”
“He cares about you until he begs me to stay with you for him,” she confesses. “Well, he convinced me a lot about you.”
“Like… he tries to tell me that you try so hard on everything and try to understand you even more.”
Melody leans on her chair, “So, basically if it’s not because of Riccardo, I wouldn’t be here.”
“What do you mean?” He frowns.
“When we’re about to get divorced, Riccardo tries to convince me, and that’s how I’m still here. You are lucky to have him as your friend,” Melody added.
Damian just sits there and listens to her explanation. How did he didn’t know about this? Does that mean, during their argument about the divorce, Riccardo has been helping him quietly?
“Why you didn’t tell me about this?” He inquired.
Melody scoffs.
“Do you expect me to tell you when you hate him? Riccardo cares about you a lot-like a lot. As if… that’s the only thing he can do to pay for something he did,”
He lets out a heavy sigh. Damian didn’t hate him until he wanted to kill him. He just couldn’t accept what Riccardo did to him.
The feeling of anger still fires up in his heart.
“Why do you hate him so much? Is something… happened?” She hesitated to open the conversation.
Damian closed his eyes for a moment. He put down his spoon, “You care about this, huh?”
She shrugs his shoulder nonchalantly.
“Do you remember the story I told about what happened with my twin?” He inquired.
“Yeah, what about that?”
“He is the cause of it,” Damian said firmly as he opened his eyes.
The sound of a spoon falling on the plate is heard. Melody blinked her eyes and was stunned. She couldn’t respond to that statement as it was not what she expected to hear.
“Shocked?” He smirks.
She snaps out of her thought, “You are joking?”
“Why would I be joking at this serious conversation?” He grumbles.
“You sound like it! I mean… Riccardo is a nice guy. There’s no way he did that…” Her shoulder slumps, and she seems disappointed with the new information.
“It’s true. Well, I’m not blaming you for thinking that about him. He’s the nicest person that I could have as a best friend. I admit that…” he mumbles the last words.
“But…” he clenches his fist, “It changes because of his father. Riccardo became my friend just to trap me and my family.”
“His father gave the mission to kill all of us. So, he pretends to be my best friend until he gains my trust-like, we are kids. What do you expect from an innocent kid?”
Melody could see the pain in his eyes.
“Then, he set us up. It’s not about the careless or something. Riccardo set the fire and that’s how it happened,”
“He did that when you guys were 10 years old?” She tilted her head.
“For your information, every mafia family train their daughter or son at a young age to be strong and independent. So that they know how cruel the world is,” Damian explains.
She nods slightly, “That’s the reality…”
“Of course, I felt betrayed by him. He comes back and says like he felt bad and didn’t have a choice but to do it,”
“I know he’s sincere about it. I could see it in his eyes but… the thought of my twin, my half, dead because of him. And nothing… not even a single apology could bring him back,”
His jaw clenches as he speaks. Melody can sense the tension coming from him. She felt like she could see the betrayal, revenge, anger, pain, sadness and all emotions mixed up in him.
He loves his friend.
But…
Everything went wrong.
“Wait. Is that why Riccardo seems sensitive about his last name?” She furrows her eyebrows.
“Yes. Because he hates his father.” Damian gets up and puts the dish in the sink. “You know what? When you tell me about Riccardo helping us this whole time…”
He sighs and turns around, “Maybe… just maybe… he’s not that bad.”
Melody smiles a bit when he says that. “Aww… are you starting to soften up a bit?”
“Now I change my mind,” he rolls his eyes and walks away.
She giggles and gets up before walking after him. “Oh come on! Admit it! You become soft since you’re with me!”
“If you don’t shut your mouth, I’m going to kick you out of this mansion,” Damian firmly said.
She just chuckles.
___
Riccardo pushes the door open. The guards bowed in respect. He just nodded at them before going to take a seat on the couch.
“Hello, my son. It has been a while since we met, don’t you think so?” Matthias smiles, still keeping his eyes on the newspaper.
“Why do you call me here? I told you, I don’t want to meet you anymore,” Riccardo firmly said.
“Oh, son. It’s not that wrong for you to meet your beloved father. Don’t you miss your old man here?” He chuckles.
“You are NOT my father. Don’t make me repeat that,” Riccardo said through his gritted teeth.
Matthias lets out a small laugh before putting down the newspaper. He turns to his son, who is already looking at him with a dark gaze.
“You are still the same as before and never change, aren’t you?”
Riccardo didn’t say anything. Instead, he just stared at his father.
“Well, I can’t blame you for that…” he chuckles. “Anyway, there’s reason I call you, my son.”
“And what that is?” Riccardo inquired.
“It’s about your beloved best friend. I didn’t know he had a woman in his life now,”