I AM YOUR DOWNFALL, KING!

BRIA

"Don't you fucking dare to touch them!" Benji got punched in the face when he tried to fight with Mancini's men to reach the kids.

I was held back by Cameron and Gabriel and it was impossible for me to get free.

"Oh don't worry, Mr Lachat. I will not hurt them just now. The show has just begun... there are a lot of surprises yet to come. Right King?"

"Enough!"My head snapped in the devil's way as his commanding voice resonated in the place. "Let go of everyone and deal with me only. They are innocents and have nothing to do with me"

Mancini laughed again, dryly. "Everyone, look who is talking about killing the innocents! Does that mean Evelyn was not innocent as you killed her?"

My heart again picked up the pace. "Who is Evelyn? What are you talking about?"

"Oh, little girl. Your boyfriend didn't tell you about her? è triste(That's sad). But it's ok. Today I am feeling too generous to reveal all the secrets and let people free of their burden." Mancini winked, looking my way.

"Come to the point already" I rose my voice, getting impatient.

He grinned cunningly, looking at the devil."Evelyn... Evelyn Alexander King. Your dear boyfriend's mother whom he killed with his own hands."

"ANGELO!" Devil roared loudly, ready to go for the man's blood, but I held him back quickly.

"Just shut your dirty mouth and stop with these mind games. I know what he did to his mother. And it doesn't matter what her name was. So STOP!" I threw daggers at Mancini for poking his nose where it didn't belong at all.

Kyle clapped his hands with a daunting smirk plastered on his face. "Has he ever told you why he killed his mother?"

"Kyle. Don't bring that up and cross your line." For the first time, Paulo opened his mouth since this shit began. He slowly stood up, took the support of the wall and stood beside us.

"Paulo?" Kyle and Benjamin said his name at the same time.

"Benji, you know him?"

What the hell was going on here?

"Of course they know each other. You know why?" Finochi decided to put his efforts into the drama.

"Finochi... NO"! Devil's warning was ignored by Finochi, and what he told next dropped on my head like a nuclear bomb!

"Bria Maxwell... daughter of Alfred and Marry Maxwell. Your boyfriend Hayden King killed his own mother, Evelyn King on the command of his father Alexander King. Because of your parents!"

I froze at my spot, holding my breath. I sensed how agitated the devil was, but nothing made sense to me at that time.

"Alexander King murdered both of your parents, Bria Maxwell. You are in love with a person who is the son of your parents' murderer!"

My hands that held onto the devil slipped down as my brain went numb.

How... how could it be possible?

I replayed those words again and again in my mind, but my heart was not ready to accept them. I glanced at Benji's panicked face and Paulo's head hanging in shame through my teary eyes, but I couldn't make myself look at the very person in question. I wanted it to be a lie, but I also knew that if I saw in his eyes, I would only discover the bitter, cruel truth. I felt like someone has sucked the life out of me as I stood there immobile.

"Shocked? There's more sweetheart" Mancini's eyes glinted with ugly satisfaction. "Everyone knew about this including your dear Gabriel Wilson."

I sucked a breath, trying to control my emotions.

I heard everyone telling me to don't believe Mancini and that they would tell me everything. I blocked their voices and focused on the three men standing there with smirking faces. "I asked everyone about the truth again and again. But every time I was fed with lies and only lies. Every one of you manipulated me, played me like a puppet for your own agendas." Tears ran down my face as my cracking voice sounded foreign to my own ears.

"I accepted the shit you fed me because I trusted all of you. I thought you all wanted my happiness and care for me. But I was wrong... so wrong. I spent my whole life thinking about my parents. I spent my whole life craving a family with them. And all of you knew it very well.

But still, you people chose to keep me in dark. I never thought that I would learn the truth from the people who I considered evil. Now I want to know fucking thing from them." I was too livid to spare anyone.

No." My head snapped to Paulo. "I will tell you everything that I know."

"Paulo" Benji dared to warn him to stop even after hearing me. Something broke inside me when I looked at his stoic face as he warned Paulo to not say anything.

"Enough of this Lachat. She is right. You all kept her in the dark for all of her life. It's her right to know the truth. I have been living with this guilt for the past sixteen years. I don't want to carry it anymore. I will tell you everything, Bria." Paulo's breath came ragged.

I glanced in the devil's way, but he stood rooted to his spot, his eyes glaring at the ground with a deep scowl. He didn't spare me even a single glance or even a word.

"Your father, Alfred Maxwell was a... mafia boss." Paulo began.

I gulped down the lump that formed in my throat.

"He and King's father, Alexander King, were both friends from childhood. But their bond drifted apart as they grew into two powerful competitors. Alexander King was a cunning man with an obsession with power and wealth. He always treated your father with respect in front of the world because he knew that he was no match for Alfred Maxwell when it comes to the final battle.

Alfred Maxwell was a well-feared man with no weaknesses. But one day... Sir King found about Marry Maxwell, your mother and you." Paulo gave me a sombre look.

Paulo continued. "Your father secretly married to your mother, love of his life, as he wanted to protect her from his dangerous world. She agreed to this as she was also not ready to accept the life of bloodshed and deaths. They always met in secret and kept their relationship secret from everyone."

"Benjamin was your father's close friend from their college days. Hence your father attended our wedding where he first laid his eyes on my cousin Mary, my bridesmaid." Aunt Caroline added while wiping her tears.

"You were around four years old when your father came to meet you and your mother that night. I was appointed as a bodyguard of little King. Alexander King made a plan to finish your whole family but he was not aware that Benjamin and Caroline were also there to visit you all. Your parents were happy to have you Bria, especially your father." Paulo looked at me with sad eyes.

"Your nightmares... they are the snippets from your memory of that time. Your parents were shot by Alexander's men that night." Benji's voice came thick with emotions as Aunt Caroline put her hand on her husband's shoulder.

I clutched my eyes closed, remembering those dreadful nightmares.

"King heard his father talking on the phone, giving orders to his men. King was always very fond of your father. He was Eleven at that time. He cried to me to stop his father, but I was powerless. When Sir King decided to go to see your parents' dead bodies, I took King there before him.

When we sneaked inside the house, I told King to wait outside in the car. Your father was dead on the spot, but your mother was alive with a faint heartbeat. I took your mother outside to put her in the car. I found you under a table. Probably your mother hid you there during the firing. I then came back for you." Paulo paused to breathe when he came short of it.

"I knew that if Sir King ever found out that you and your mother were alive then he would have definitely not let you live. So I... I set the place on fire so that he would never find the dead bodies. These burn marks are from that night. I somehow managed to get your mother to the hospital and informed Benjamin Lachat about it."

My lips trembled as fresh tears ran out of my eyes. My hands instinctively reach to my bare neck again, and I suddenly missed my necklace.

"Paulo handed you to me, and your mother took a promise from me that I would never let the shadow of your father's life befall you. She died when she heard about your father's tragic death. I managed all the documents and killed every person, who was aware of your true identity.

I made sure to make Alexander King believe that he achieved his goal of killing all three of you. But Paulo never told me how he got you and your mother at the right time or about King being present there." Benji completed the next part of the story.

"I was worried about King's safety. So I kept it as a secret." Paulo explained.

"What happened to... Evelyn King?" I whispered audibly.

Paulo continued in a strained voice.

"After some days, when I got recovered, I again joined Sir King because I couldn't leave little King alone. From that night, he became more distant and quiet. Sir King was frustrated with his behaviour as he was not acting as per his expectation from his son. King had to face punishments from his father for this on many occasions and that made his mother, Madam Evelyn, worried about him. Bria, when she got to know the truth about your parent's death, she was hurt and scared for her son's life.

Sir King had already started training King to become his successor from a very young age. He wanted his son to become stronger and cruel than him so that the whole world would fear hearing his name alone. If Sir King had gotten a whiff of his son's involvement in failing his plan, then he wouldn't have spared him. Madam was worried about her son's future, so she took a big step and made the worst mistake of her life." Paulo visibly shuddered. I waited anxiously to listen further.

"She somehow gathered evidence against her husband including links about your parents' murder. But Alexander King found out about it one day and guess who told him about it? It was your father Kyle." Paulo threw a heated glare at Kyle.

Kyle's eyes went wide in shock as he was not aware of that news.

"Sir King was too furious at his wife for betraying him. He was livid and had gone crazy in rage. Madam pleaded for mercy again and again but he was too mad to think rationally. When he got to knew that Madam did that to save her son's life he made little King kill his own mother. He put a gun in his hand and... pulled the trigger."

I felt like my head was about to explode. I heard the dogs barking at the devil, taunting him, but I didn't pay attention to it as I had so much grief in my chest that I thought it would crumble me under its weight.

He knew it all the time. He knew all of it, but still, he kept quiet. He planned everything thoughtfully and in detail. He saw my parents dying. He was there to witness everything. He killed his own mother. He knew how sadistic his father was, but he still chose to become what he wanted his son to be.

And me? I fell in love with him, the son of my parents' murderer.'

Kyle pulled out a gun to finish this game, but Mancini stopped him.

"Wait, Kyle. I think someone else deserves to put a bullet through his heart. The person for whom this monster's heart beats." Mancini had something up his sleeves.

"He is right, Princess. Take that gun and kill him. He is the reason for your pain. Finish him with your own hands and avenge your parents' death!" Samuel encouraged me.

I looked at the black metal thing as breathing became more difficult. I was torn between my feelings and my anger and pain. I closed my eyes, remembering my parents, their love, and their sacrifices for each other and me. And when I opened them after a minute, I knew what I had to do!

I picked up the gun and turned to face the devil. The devil was my worst nightmare... the man who was like a cool breeze on my open wounds. The devil who destroyed my life... the man that gathered the broken pieces of mine and put them together. The devil that hurt not only my loved ones but annihilated numerous lives without giving a thought to it... the man who gave the direction to my aimless life.

His face was blank as a clean slate without a trace of any emotion. And his eyes... they were staring right back at me with such intensity as if they were trying to rummage through my mind and get their way with it.

"So that's the reason why you wanted to fit all the pieces of the puzzle together and ruin it for no one else to solve it again. Congratulations Hayden... you have succeeded in it!" I said coldly in a shaking voice.

I heard Cameron and Gabriel shouting at me to put the gun down, but I was not ready to do it. I was blinded by the rage and his face reminded me of his obnoxious father and the sins he had committed.

"Butterfly, he didn't know about all of this from the beginning. He got to know all of it a few hours before you flew here to Italy. Just hear him once, please!"

"NO! His cruel father killed my parents. And he is no better than his father!" I screamed in frustration.

My chest heaved up and down as I started hyperventilating, my hands shook profusely, sweat broke down on my forehead and I staggered a bit due to dizziness.

"Do you remember what Patrick Baker said to you that night? He said he could see you holding your own downfall in your arms. He was right. I AM your downfall, KING!" I spat with hatred.

His eyes widened a bit when I called him by that name for the first time.

"Bria..." This was the word he said for a long time as his eyes flashed some unpredictable emotions.

But it was too late for everything now. Too late!

"Goodbye!"

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