The Slave of Pleasure
Chapter 128

Rachel

The silence was so heavy that it seemed material, as if it could be touched. The air was charged with tension after Veronica's words. Her eyes, normally icy and full of control, were watery, reflecting a mixture of pain and determination. She kept one arm firmly around me, while in the other hand she held the gun with which she pointed at the ground, but always ready to intimidate.

My legs were weak, and my heart felt like an incessant drum inside my chest. Vincenzo, standing a few meters away, looked at me with an expression that I could not decipher. The man who was always so confident seemed to have been hit by a revelation that had left him completely shaken.

Veronica's gaze did not leave his. When she spoke again, her voice seemed distant, choked with contradictory emotions:

"I only wanted one thing, Vincenzo. Something simple. But it seems that simplicity was never allowed for me."

She took a deep breath, struggling to maintain her composure. It was as if the words had been buried for years and were now coming out all at once.

"All I ever wanted was to have a family, a home where I could feel safe. But that was taken away from me so soon..."

I felt the grip on my arm loosen slightly, but I didn't dare move. I didn't know if it was an oversight or a strategy to disarm us emotionally. Vincenzo, on the other side, seemed equally caught between disbelief and the need to act. Veronica let out a short laugh, but there was something bitter in it.

"Do you remember, Vincenzo? The times when we were invincible? The times when nothing and no one could stop us? I thought that would be forever."

Vincenzo narrowed his eyes, but didn't answer. It was obvious that he was trying to understand where she was going with this.

Veronica continued, her voice deeper now, full of resentment:

"But then you decided you wanted something else. That you wanted to be someone different. And what did I get in return?" Nothing but abandonment.

The weight of her words was evident. Even the police officers, who had surrounded the place and were ready to intervene, seemed to hesitate. There was something in Veronica's confession that struck us all, a vulnerability that contrasted with her threatening posture.

It was then that Veronica said something that froze the world around me:

"Do you think you can just leave, Vincenzo? That you can erase what happened? Well, let me tell you something. I got pregnant."

Those words seemed to echo endlessly. The impact was immediate and universal. Even the police officers exchanged surprised glances. Vincenzo stood completely still, his eyes wide as he tried to process what he had heard. "What?" he finally managed to say, his voice hoarse, as if the words had hit him square in the chest.

I felt the ground disappear beneath my feet. Pregnant? Vincenzo, father? The idea was as absurd as it was disturbing. I looked at him, expecting a stronger reaction, but all I saw was shock.

"Yes, Vincenzo. That night, years ago, when we accomplished the greatest work of our lives... I got pregnant. And you had no idea, because you were too busy betraying everything we were. Betraying me."

She took a step forward, as if to make sure her words were heard clearly.

"I raised the child alone. I never told anyone, because I knew it would be used against me. Against us. But now I see that you chose someone else..."

Veronica looked at me, her eyes filled with a mixture of contempt and envy.

"And for her? For this ordinary girl? Is that why you decided to change?"

I didn't know what to say or do. Part of me wanted to scream, to assert my own worth, but another part knew that would only fuel Veronica's hatred.

Vincenzo didn't answer right away. He looked conflicted, as if unsure whether to believe her or not. Finally, he stepped forward, his hands raised in a conciliatory gesture. "Veronica, if this is true... If there really is a child, we need to talk. We need to work this out."

There was something genuine in his voice, an attempt to reach out to the woman he obviously knew so well. But Veronica just laughed again, a hollow sound that held no joy. "Work it out? Do you think you can work it out, Vincenzo? After everything you've done?"

I could see in her eyes that there would be no easy resolution. Veronica was a broken woman, someone who had lost so much that all she could hold on to was the past. The Circle Closes In

Meanwhile, the police officers around us seemed to grow increasingly tense. They were waiting for the right moment to act, but they knew that any false move could put my life at risk.

I felt a wave of despair wash over me. No matter how hard Vincenzo tried to talk to Veronica, it seemed impossible to reach her. She was trapped in her own world, unable to see anything beyond her own. his pain and resentment.

I wondered how Vincenzo was dealing with all of this. Veronica wasn't just a physical threat; she was a living reminder of a past he was trying to leave behind. And now, with the revelation of a possible child, his entire world seemed to be falling apart.

As for me, I felt a mix of fear, anger, and confusion. Fear because my life was literally at stake. Anger because Veronica seemed to want to destroy me just by existing. And confusion because I didn't know how to process the idea of Vincenzo having a child.

While I was lost in my thoughts, Veronica took another step forward, now closer to Vincenzo than ever. Her voice, although still thick with emotion, seemed a little calmer:

"Vincenzo, you have a choice to make. You can keep pretending to be a different person, or you can accept who you really are."

The silence that followed was almost deafening. Everyone was waiting for the next move, the next word that would define what would happen next.

And that's how the chapter ended, with the tension reaching its peak and all of us caught in a web of revelations and impossible choices.