Seconds slowly turned into minutes as they ticked by. Amy crossed a leg over her knee, and rested her laced fingers on her lap. Esmeralda's brows slightly shot up.
"So it's more serious than I thought, huh?" she commented with amusement. Amy followed her gaze to find her staring at her engagement ring. Esmeralda scoffed and continued, "Was the assistant your choice or is the big boss actually asexual?"
"Huh?" Amy's brows furrowed in confusion.
She let out an exasperated sigh. "What are you doing here? You should know by now that I'm not exactly fond of you."
"I want answers", Amy replied cooly.
Esmeralda's lips curved up as she looked behind Amy, towards the mirror. "Is this the best you could do?"
Rider shifted in his seat uncomfortably and muttered, "How the fuck does she do that?"
"I won't be asking those type of questions", Amy said, making her earn her attention once more. "Why didn't you kill me?"
It was Esmeralda's turn to furrow her brows in confusion. Amy continued using Dylan's words, "You had so many chances."
The confusion was soon replaced with a laugh. An amused one as though she had heard the greatest joke on the planet. Amy was annoyed with the reaction but sat there calmly, watching her.
"Gosh, you almost killed me with that joke", Esmeralda wiped an invisible tear from her eye as she calmed down before her expression turned icy. "I should've put a bullet through your head then I wouldn't be sitting through this bullshit right now."
"What about the other times? You knew everything about me including where I was", she leaned forward and plopped her elbows on the table, resting her chin on her laced fingers. She narrowed her eyes at Esmeralda, "That's what I'm curious about. Even without the Greco incident, you could've easily killed me, yet you didn't."
Esmeralda fell quiet, she had on a bored expression as she watched Amy ramble on. Couldn't they find better ways to torture her than this?
"You care about me. You saw yourself in me, the chance you probably wanted to live a life different from this instead you gave it to me. Isn't that why you made sure Joanne kept her lips sealed about my past? Or....", Amy carefully watched her expression as she uttered the next words. "Was it guilt?"
Sure enough, Esmeralda's hand clenched into a fist as she looked away. Did she hit the nail on the head? Amy was no mind reader but that action was confirming a lot of her suspicions.
On the other hand, Esmeralda's mind had taken her down memory lane. She could remember it like it was yesterday. Her four year old self coming back from a business deal with her father. She could not fully remember the conversations around the situation except that their cars stopped, two of her father's men drag out his very pregnant little mistress who was crying.
The three returned with the now bloodied girl passed out but a new sound reached her ears. A sound that had haunted her for years: the sound of a baby crying. It was coming from a ditch beside their cars before they drove off.
She may have been young but she had a vague idea of what happened. And as the years went by, her suspicions were confirmed when the young mistress kept visiting that ditch whenever they were in the U.S.
Esmeralda was left haunted with the baby's cries. Was it guilt? She was not sure how she truly felt towards the little one yet it still plagued her thoughts. Whatever it was, she alleviated it with killing her father fueled by his betrayal for having a soft spot for Amy.
She looked at Amy in front of her, who was fully grown. She could not allow herself to feel anything else, otherwise she would be left with the guilt of killing her own father. She couldn't have either. All the hate she had reflected in her eyes as she looked at Amy.
"Get out."
Amy leaned back in her seat instead, shaking her head with an opposite emotion reflecting in her eyes. "I honestly believe that things would have been different between us."
"What the fuck do you actually know? What do you know, huh? Are you really this naive?" Esmeralda looked at her with mirth.
"You had a choice", she countered.
"A choice?" She laughed an unamused laugh. "A choice? Do you have any idea what type of life I lived? While a normal day to you was reading books and playing with your friends, my normal day was watching someone get their fingers cut off because they leaked information, someone getting castrated for God knows what, being shot in the head for saying the wrong thing, my mother killing herself because of my father! That's what a normal day looked like, and what? I HAD A CHOICE? WHAT OTHER CHOICE WOULD I HAVE WHEN THAT'S ALL I'VE EVER KNOWN?"
"Nobody chooses the circumstances they are born in", Amy started calmly although she was horrified by Esmeralda's ourburst. "But we still make a choice whether to accommodate those circumstances or change, as hard as it may be."
Esmeralda scoffed but Amy pushed on. "You had that choice Esmeralda! You could have let the empire go down along with your father, you could have walked away and try, try to live a different life than what you knew. BUT YOU CHOSE THIS! YOU CHOSE TO STAY ON THIS PATH!" Amy was now riled up, shouting on top of her lungs.
"WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME? JUST LEAVE ME THE FUCK ALONE! LEAVE ME ALONE!" She screeched so loud that Rider had to take off his headphones.
It was now Amy's turn to laugh, hers was a sad laugh as a sad tear fell down her cheek. Esmeralda was breathing heavily as she watched her wipe away the fallen tear but more fell.
"Sad", she smiled through the tears.
"I don't need your sympathy", she spat.
"Believe me, if there's anyone who deserves sympathy it's me, for wishing things to have been different between us", she sniffled and wiped away her tears with her hoodie sleeve. Esmeralda scoffed before Amy looked up, holding her gaze as she continued. "I'm sorry."
Esmeralda's face showed how caught off guard she was along with Rider who was listening in. That took a whole 180! Where was she going with this?
"I'm sorry for the hurt my existence caused you, I'm sorry for everything you've been through. I'm being honest when I say I wish things were different, I do not condone our father's actions but I still..."she sighed. "And thank you, in your own twisted way, you still acted like a big sister to me by protecting me, keeping me alive. Because of that, I've gained a lot more that I'm grateful for."
Who knows how many enemies the King had? If anyone found out Amy was his daughter, though legitimate, who knew what would have become of her especially if Amy tried to dig up her past? That's why she was grateful to Esmeralda. Her thoughts went to Zach and Roserie and everyone in her life in that. She was really grateful for their existence in her life.
"What's the point of saying this now when you've practically sentenced me to death?" She raised her cuffed hands. Who knows what her enemies had in store for her once she sets foot in the prison walls?
"As far as I'm concerned, the new King died during an altercation between 'him' and the FBI with the help of A.J."
So no one would know her true identity unless she revealed it herself. Realizing what Amy had done for her, she could not help but be annoyed. "Should I be grateful?"
"No, it means we're even. How you live from now onwards is entirely up to you."
In other words, she had another choice to make. The two stared at each other. Even without words being said, they knew it was the last time they would see each other. Despite the bad blood and complications that came with their past, there was still some sort connection between them.
Without another word, Amy left the room and not look back. She felt much lighter and relieved after her 'little talk' with her sister. Well, not anymore. Esmeralda was getting what she wished for: never again crossing paths with Amy.
Rider left agents to attend to Esmeralda as he accompanied Amy. He didn't say a word and simply left her to her thoughts. Zach had given him a heads up but he didn't think things would be this intense. As it seems, Amy really needed this.
"Rider! Can you hear me?" Someone screamed in his ear.
"Rider here!" He responded with urgency hearing the tone of their voice. Amy snapped out of her thoughts hearing him speak like that.
"Be on the lookout! We have a suspect on the loose!"
He quickly pulled Amy behind him in a protective stance, looking around only for a second later Amy to be yanked from his hold. He spun around to find her being held hostage by none other than Aldo, holding a gun to her head.
"Rider!" His colleague shouted.
"No shit", he replied with a wry smile.
Aldo gestured with his gun at Rider's earpiece who complied by removing it. "Hands where I can see them. Both of you."
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