"She's at peace, boy." Angelo put his hand on Bobby's shoulder.
They were standing in a private mausoleum in one of the world's most refined cemeteries. Surrounding them were kings, and queens, barons, and baronesses, the bones of the rich and the famous - the honored dead. Without a true home, this was the next best Angelo could do. There had been many flights and many favors called in, but this place seemed appropriate.
"She didn't deserve this."
"No. She didn't."
Bobby turned toward Angelo, lowered his head onto his lover's shoulders, and burst into tears. In all the years they had been together, this had never happened, this absolute unleashing of pure misery and sorrow. Angelo held him close and let him cry.
"Why? Why did we let her… Why didn't we stop…."
There was no doubt they had made a judgment of error allowing Gemma to go in alone, but she had insisted, and it was thought she might be able to extract more information from the Spencer siblings. It was a gamble which had not paid off.
"This is your first loss," Angelo said, holding Bobby's chin between thumb and forefinger. "It hurts because you loved her. You loved her because she deserved to be loved."
"This is how it always ends, isn't it," Bobby said grimly when he could compose himself enough to speak. "Mark and Tilly have to hide their baby. And anybody we love is…."
He reached down and stroked her cheek gently. It looked pink and flushed, almost alive, but the moment he touched her skin, he felt how heavy and still and cold it was. Gemma was gone, for all eternity, and there was no reclaiming her, in this life or the next. He knew that they would never find their way to the same place. Gemma was an angel. She would be in heaven forever. He would never know paradise.
"We are cursed, Angelo." Bobby lifted wet, dark eyes to Angelo.
"We're not cursed," Angelo replied, though he did not sound as certain as he usually did.
"I want to get in there with her," Bobby sobbed. "I want you to cover me over, and I want it to just fucking end."
"Shhh, boy. Easy," Angelo soothed him, as Bobby once more fell into fits of emotion.
"We'll destroy anything good. Or, it will be destroyed just by being near us. That's why we can't have the baby. That's why Mark is raising the kid. Because he's not cursed like we are, he doesn't carry the mark of Cain…."
"Very biblical, boy," Angelo allowed himself the merest of smiles.
"I want her back," Bobby sobbed. The smile disappeared from Angelo's face as the note of the raw pain resonated through him too.
It seemed to Bobby that the world had become a hopeless abyss, with nothing but shades of misery walking atop it. He'd used to think that being a merciless bastard was the best way to be. But love had found him, somehow. It had gotten in, and it had made him soft, and now it was ripping him apart from the inside as if a bomb had detonated in his chest and sent shards through the core of his existence.
"She showed you something," Angelo said. "She showed you what you're capable of."
"And what's that?"
"Of caring for someone, of looking after them. Of being for them what I am for you. Their beginning and their end."
"God, you have an ego," Bobby snorted through his pain.
"Loss defines us. It tells us what we love. It tells us who we are. And why we care. Gemma was dead one way or another. Willow was never going to allow her to live. She expected us to kill her, but she was prepared to have it done herself."
"We couldn't have saved her?"
"We didn't save her, and there's nothing we can do about that. We did save Mark, Tilly, and the baby. We've removed a significant threat from their lives. We did what we set out to do."
"Yay," Bobby intoned bitterly. "We killed three to save three."
"I think you'd agree our offspring matters more than anybody."
"I guess."
Bobby couldn't feel love at that moment, or relief for Mark and Tilly, or anything. He'd gone all cold and still inside, just like Gemma. It seemed to him that they had lost everybody anyway. In the end, he and Angelo were doomed to end up together alone.
"Come, boy." Angelo tried to urge him away so that the burial could be completed. Bobby did not want to leave, but a long mourning period was also not a luxury they were allowed. People were looking for them, more than usual.
The scandal and aftermath of what was being described in the media as a noble bloodbath was something they had to distance themselves from. Their names remained out of the mouths of the media, but pictures of the deceased Willow and Digby were absolutely everywhere. They were being feted and mourned en masse as if they had ever been useful to anybody. Meanwhile, Gemma was completely absent from any mention. It was as though she had never existed at all.