How was he supposed to be a man when she'd just paddled him like a disobedient child?

Marco needed to get out of this guest suite and get away from the woman in the bedroom. Run away...

Angelina had hoped her words a little while ago had helped Marc feel less guilty about one or both of his mothers, but he'd only grown more agitated.

Emiliana must have loved him if he had so many regrets over failing her. Good. Children shouldn't suffer because of the sins of the parents. She would have hated that Emiliana had blamed Marco because his father couldn't keep it in his pants or his mother couldn't say no to her brother-in-law.

Marc opened his eyes, but she could tell he wasn't actually looking at her as Angelina. "Mama, may I ask you something?"

"Of course, cara."

"Gino said my real mama isn't dead like his. Is that true?"

Angelina gasped before regaining some composure. Gino had told him that at such a young age? Could she blame him, though? Gino was only six when his mother died. He wouldn't have been able to process such a profound loss any more than Marc had been. Marc had blocked out that memory all these years, until Melissa had opened a can of worms New Year's weekend.

What should she say? Angelina didn't know the truth about his birth any more than Marc did. She needed to keep her words vague enough not to skew his beliefs if and when the truth ever came to light.

"Marco, you are a gift from God to me and Papa. So is Gino. I love you both equally." She hoped he'd tip her off as to which of his mamas he was speaking with now and that her vague response would satisfy him.

Marc remained silent before his face broke out in a sweet smile. "I love you, too, Mama."

His entire body relaxed into the mattress. Angelina's did so, too, albeit on the hard floor next to the mattress. Perhaps he could put the demons to rest now and sleep. Again, the urge to wrap him in her arms was so great she shook with the effort to obey Adam's order not to touch him.

"No!" Without warning, Marc's body stiffened before he began to wriggle away from her. "I heard her. She talked to me, Gino! She's not dead. She's just sleeping!"

Damn. He'd heard her as Emiliana, not Natalia. What now?

Marc's eyes remained closed, but his eyelids darted as if in REM sleep. "Get Papa!"

She spoke to him in Italian. "Marco? Can you hear me?"

He responded in his native tongue, as well. "Mamma? Gino keeps saying you're dead. Tell him I'm not lying."

Her talking with him as the mama he lost was messing with the way the memories were playing out in his head. She prayed she wasn't doing any psychological damage by continuing this scene as the first mama he'd ever known. "Tell me what is happening, Marco."

"Gino found me in my lair and made me come home. He keeps saying you're dead. But you aren't. He lied. Gino isn't always the good one."

Marc's head turned as if someone had entered the scene in his head. "No, Gino! Stop lying!"

"What did Gino say?" Gino's voice seemed to come through loud and clear in Marc's head. She wished she knew what he was saying.

"He said Papa left us, too." What? Angelina wanted to explode with fury. What kind of bastard would leave a dying wife with two young boys, much less abandon the boys after her death?

Marc's labored breathing and leg movements indicated to Angelina he was running. Again. After a while, he shrank into the mattress, his back to her. He fisted his hands. Slowly, his breathing returned to normal.

"Where are you now, Marco?"

"Hiding." He gasped for breath. "In my lair."

He confused her jumping between hiding in the closet and hiding in the woods. Both seemed to be his safe places as the memories played out in his head. Angelina stroked his forehead. "There, there. You're safe now."

Too late, she remembered Adam's dictate. She looked over at Adam and saw he looked ready to send her packing, but she no longer cared and turned away, ignoring him. Marc was alone and afraid and needed human contact right now. "Marco, I must leave you now and go to heaven. But I'll always watch over you."

"No, mamma! Don't leave me again! I don't want you to be dead anymore! I'm sorry I wanted Mrs. Milanesi to be my mama."

Oh, Dio. She closed her eyes and absorbed some of the pain and guilt Marc had felt as a little boy. She opened her eyes again to find tears streaming down his anguished face.

He whispered, "It hurts. I don't want to remember. I'm sorry I made you go away, Mama."

"I was sick, Marco. There was nothing you could do to save me or keep me here. It wasn't your fault."

The veins in his neck bulged as he fought against unseen resistance. "No, Gino! I won't go back there!"

Angelina stroked his hair. "What's happening, Marco? Where are you?"

He began sobbing uncontrollably. "No! Leave me alone!" He pulled away from her and rocked his body to comfort himself as he fought some unseen entity. "Let me go! I don't want to go!"

She reached out to touch his arm, but Adam intercepted her hand before she could make contact again. He jerked his head toward the door. She brushed Adam's hand away and glared at him, vehemently shaking her head. With a thump to her chest, she declared her intention to remain in control of this scene now. Pulling away, she took a deep breath and regained her composure. Standing up to this intimidating man rattled her to her core. But she wouldn't let him continue this scene without her.

Kneeling beside Marc but not touching him, she continued. "Marc...Marco, who tried to take you away from your hiding place?"

Silence.

"Who are you with, Marco?"

His voice sounded small, weak. "Zietta Natalia, please make Mama wake up."

He was with Mama D'Alessio now. Time to change voices. "I know you want her to wake up, Marco, but she went to heaven to be with God and all His saints."

Marc shook his head.

"She was very sick. Her body couldn't fight any longer."

"I should have helped her fight. She needed me. I was bad. I left her alone."

"Marco, what is Zietta Natalia saying?"

"She wants to take me and Gino to live with her. She says we'll be her little boys forever." He paused and cocked his head listening to voices heard only to him. "You can't love me. I'm bad!"

Again Marc's head turned as his attention was grabbed by some new player on the stage in his head. "Gino? Am I in trouble?"

Adam stepped forward. "No, Marco. You did nothing wrong."

Tears stung Angelina's eyes that Adam had stepped into the role of Gino.

When Marc spoke again, he wrinkled his brow and his voice was that of an adult again. "I never stopped loving you, Gino. I forgave you, but it was too late. I wish I'd been able to tell you I was sorry before..."

Adam cleared his throat. "You have nothing to apologize for. None of this was your fault. We were both just young and stupid to fight over a girl like that. But I needed to be in Kandahar to bring something good out of a great big mess."

"Saving Staff Sergeant Anderson?"

"Yeah."

"You may have died a hero, Gino, but you were my hero my whole life." Tears fell from his closed eyes.

Adam squeezed Marc's shoulder. "You got that hero thing down, too, little brother, after what you did for Damian and your Marines in Fallujah."

Marc shook his head in the negative but didn't say anything. After a moment, Adam took his hand away.

"Gino, I wore your mask just like you said. No one ever knew..."

She brought her fingertips to her lips to still their shaking. Gino was the one who made Marc wear a mask all these years? Why? Angelina's heart went out to her man.

He looked confused for a moment. "...except for Angelina. She's too smart for us both."

She grinned through her tears at his words.

"You'd like her, Gino." His expression grew fierce. "But if you ever try to take her away, I'll kill you."

Angelina was taken aback by the vehemence in his words, but knew it was just machismo speaking.

He continued with intense emotion. "We both wore the mask, didn't we? Neither of us was one."

One what? What were the boys trying to mask? Marc's body slumped, and his head lolled to the side. Adam reached for something that looked like a stun gun, but she held her hand out to him and shook her head.

"He's done, Adam. It's over."

Adam stared at her a long moment, sizing her up, and finally he nodded.

For the first time in months, Marc's face was free of worry. She'd accomplished what she'd set out to do. Now to get out before Marc knew she'd been here.

Angelina got to her feet and started to walk away but ran into Adam's solid chest. Before she could step around him, he wrapped his arms around her, and propelled her from the room into the weight room. No sooner had she crossed the threshold, knowing Marc wouldn't hear her, she gave in to the torrent of tears she'd been trying to shore up since she'd entered the dungeon and found Marc filthy, restrained, and helpless.

Adam handed her a clean towel from a stack in the corner and she wiped the tears from her face and eyes. She couldn't make eye contact. "Will he remember any of this?"

"Doctor McKenzie says even if he doesn't remember the specific scenes that played out down here and in his head, he'll remember the feelings and possibly some of the memories we triggered."

"I don't know what he was seeing, but I don't want him to wonder about the past anymore. He needs to be at peace." Angelina pulled away. "I'm going home now. He needs to do some thinking about us, too. I don't want him to make any decisions in a vulnerable state like this."

"I think you two have a lot of talking you need to do. You need to stay and be a part of his aftercare."

She shook her head. "Marc doesn't like to show me any sign of weakness. He'll be too vulnerable when he comes out of the effects of the interrogation. As it is, he probably won't remember I was here. He thinks he was talking with his mama and his aunt. But if he wants me, he knows where to find me."

Adam held her upper arm lightly, keeping her from leaving. "You were right, Angelina."

He'd just admitted she was right about something? Had the earth tilted on its axis? "About?"

"About coming into the interrogation as his mother. About touching him. You've done an incredible job of helping solve some of the mystery that is Marc's past."

"I still don't have a clue who is his aunt and who is his real mama. Dio, it's so confusing. I only shared some of what I knew about his past. One thing I know, though, is that Mama D'Alessio wants to have her son back-maybe even to really have him for the first time as her own. They're going to have to work out some things."

Angelina wanted Marc to put this behind him and move on-with her, she hoped. But dredging up more of the past might lead to more hurt for him.

She shrugged. "I love that man more than the air I breathe. I just want him to find what he's searching for."

The urge to run to him and throw herself into his arms was difficult to fight, but she'd only confuse and upset him. She needed to get away before she lost it. "Have him call me when he's ready to talk."

Angelina turned away without waiting for a response. Suddenly feeling as if she bore the weight of the world on her back, she left the dungeon hoping she'd never have to come back down here again. Unless it was to play with Marc. Dio, she'd go anywhere that man asked her, do anything he wanted-if only he'd let her back into his life again.

But she wouldn't beg him.

Marc needed to figure out what to do from this point on his own. She hoped he was willing to work on their relationship. Surely he would, once he wasn't so lost and confused.

Adam watched Marc toss around on the rack as his psyche tried to process more of the shit that had just gone down the past five days.

RACK. Hell, this had gone beyond RACK even.

Fuck. Adam rarely got involved doing scenes mined with so many fucking boobytraps. Mindfucks were one thing, but he'd not only fucked over Marc's mind but had put his body through hell as well.

"Why'd you have to be so hard to break, Doc?"

Once they'd gotten into the scene, there had been no turning back. He just hoped Marc would find some kind of closure after all the hell he'd been through. He'd barely been lucid the first thirty-six hours of aftercare. Sleeping mostly.

"Don't fucking leave me again, Gino!"

Marc's arm struck the bed beside him. Time to talk out some of this shit.

"Doc! Open your eyes."

Marc furrowed his brows at Adam's order, but his grunt training won out and he obeyed his master sergeant. Blinking several times, he soon focused on Adam's face.

"Where am I?"

"One of the private bedrooms at the club. What were you just dreaming about?"

He thought a moment. Adam saw the flash of pain in his eyes when realization dawned.

"Gino. He was talking to me." Marc's eyes filled with tears.

Fuck. Marc wouldn't want Adam witnessing the waterworks, but Marc's filters had been annihilated. His voice grew raspy. "He told me he wasn't dead. I believed him. So real. I wanted to ask him to forgive me, but he left before I could. Again."

"Forgive you for what?"

Marc didn't answer for a while and then shrugged. "I guess for being so pissed at him over Melissa."