Double Betrayal, Broken Donna Chapter 08
I couldn’t move. Couldn’t look away from him. Couldn’t even process what he’d just said.
“What do you mean – you care too much?”
“All that time together – every day, every night – I fell for you. I just didn’t know that’s what I was feeling. Not
until you left.”
“I care about you too much to be objective. That’s dangerous for someone in your position. My colleague is
better for you – from a clinical standpoint.”
“I’m not saying this to put that weight on you. And I’m not abandoning you – I need you to understand that.
This is me trying to do right by you – the only way I know how.”
My mouth opened. Nothing came out.
Victor- of all people. Victor.
He’d seen me at my absolute worst – dissociative episodes, self-harm, the whole horror show. To anyone
looking in from the outside, I was a lost cause.
Who falls for someone like that? I didn’t know. And I was too afraid to ask.
So I pretended I hadn’t heard it. Victor never brought it up again.
Whenever his colleague came in for my sessions, Victor was always there. Not hovering – just there. Steady.
With him in the room, the panic stayed manageable. I could breathe.
Days passed. Then weeks.
Nothing between us changed – and everything between us did.
At dinner, he’d pull my chair out without even thinking about it. On the couch, shoulder to shoulder in front of some movie, he’d slide his arm along the back of the cushions, letting his fingers graze my shoulder like it
was the most natural thing in the world.
–
I was getting better. I could feel it in my head, in my body. And I could feel it in the way my pulse picked up
every time he got close.
–
I was almost ready to say something to put a name to what was happening between us.
And then Rocco showed up.
He looked like he’d been hollowed out. Gaunt, dark-eyed, stripped down to bone and grief.
He was standing on the other side of Victor’s wrought-iron security gates, tears running down his face.
“Camelia – thank God. I’ve been looking everywhere. Do you have any idea how scared I was?”
I folded my arms. “How did you find me?”
He held up his phone.
[Your Amex Black card was used for a purchase at…]
It was a transaction alert. My stomach dropped.
Three days ago, I’d run to the pharmacy for a few basics and used the wrong card – his, still linked to my digital wallet.
I pinched the bridge of my nose. Stupid. One careless mistake and he’d tracked me across state lines.
“I signed those divorce papers, Rocco. We’re done. Stop showing up where you’re not wanted.”
There was ice in every syllable. He didn’t seem to hear it.
“I burned them. A piece of paper doesn’t change who you belong to.”
“Camelia, I know the truth now. About everything.”
He held up his wrist. Where the tattoo had been, there was nothing now but a raw, ugly scar.
His voice kept breaking.
“I had no idea what that tattoo meant. The second I found out, I took a blowtorch to it.”
“I was wrong about everything. Teresa is dead to me. Completely.”
“She destroyed you. She set you up, lied about all of it, and then had the nerve to come after me too. I could
kill her for what she did.”
He spat every word like poison. Like if he hated Teresa hard enough, it would undo what he’d done.
I watched him rage and felt nothing but disgust.
“Teresa’s a sick psychopath, Rocco. But so are you.”
My voice was flat. Detached. Like I was reading someone else’s story out loud.
“You knew she was my best friend. And you slept with her anyway.”
“She’s disgusting – but you? You came running the second she spread her legs for you. That makes you
worse.”
Shame hit his face like a slap.
I laughed cold, empty. “Leave. I don’t want to look at you anymore.”