Romeo

19| Police Records

The car was silent and everyone in it was uncomfortable. Looking down at her lap, Daniella played with the ring Romeo gave her and avoided eye contact with Julian. What a fucking liar, both of them. Here she thought Julian was a trustworthy friend. Two years, he lied for the two whole years she's known him.

"You are such a liar..." she half mumbled, "How could you?"

"Look, Danny, I'm sorry.." His apology was met with silence. 

"Here's the chocolate I got you."  He placed the box in her lap.

She looked at the box and back at him, too sick for chocolate. So she passed the box back to Nate.

 "I know what you probably think, but I am your friend Daniella. My friendship wasn't a lie."

She tried to rationalize the situation. Julian has good intentions. He's here for her protection. Even if he did lie, Julian was simply doing his job. 

Looking out the window, she watched her neighbourhood disappear. 

"I'm.. just so confused. I don't understand what's going on. I mean, I can't wrap my head around it." 

"That's totally understandable. I promise I'll answer all your questions, okay? And ill only tell you the truth from this point. Please believe me, I didn't want to lie to you."

"Okay." She tried to sort her thoughts, not even knowing where to begin. Then her thoughts moved to Nate, how would he handle all this? He was an innocent little boy. He didn't deserve this.

Daniella knew she had to protect him with everything she had.

She placed her head on the cool glass and closed her eyes.

"What about school?" She inquired.

"Leave of absence.  That's not too bad, you get to take a semester off. And your parents told Nate's school that the entire family is going out of the country for a while."

"I'm going to behind everyone else."

Julian shrugged his shoulders. "Well, the world isn't fair." He swallowed and continued. 

"Where are we going?"

"To your apartment, so you can pack."

"After that?'

"A safe house, I'll tell you the location after you're packed."

Julian kept one hand on the wheel and used the other hand to pull out a pretty thick file from a compartment in his car.

"I was going to wait and tell you, but you should know."

She grabbed the file with damp and shaky hands. The cover was a pale yellowish colour that looked like it was about to fall apart. 

Daniella opened the front page and her breath caught in her throat. There were a few papers clipped together in the front. The first one had a picture of... Romeo. Her heart started thundering and panic started to crawl up her stomach. It was a mug shot, probably a few years old since his features didn't look completely mature.  He had a bruised eye and his bottom lip was busted.

"W-what is this?" She asked.

"Everything you need to know about him. Police records... some of my own research. He's not who you thought, and you have to promise you'll never contact him ever again. If he tried to contact you, tell me, okay?"

She meekly nodded.

Right beside his picture, was his name. This was even more shocking, Rafael Romeo De La Moretti.