Total pages in book: 82
Estimated words: 78811 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 394(@200wpm)___ 315(@250wpm)___ 263(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 78811 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 394(@200wpm)___ 315(@250wpm)___ 263(@300wpm)
He’s right about both of those things. “What about Sonny?”
“We’ll deal with him when you’re back. After the will is read. You good to go to New York?”
“I’m fine.” I stand. “I talked it through with Jarno while you were upstairs kissing her.”
“It’s not like that—”
“It’s why I came to find you. I’d better go pack.” I walk to the door, but before I open it, he calls out my name.
“Bastian.”
I turn.
“She belongs to both of us.”
“But one of us has to keep a level head. So you go on kissing her and tell yourself it’s just a kiss, and I’ll keep reminding you who she is and why she’s here.”
20
Vittoria
It was stupid taking the ring. What was I even going to do with it? I still taste soap and humiliation from the punishment he dealt and what happened before. For how my body responded when he touched me. How my stomach fluttered when he kissed me. At least he couldn’t see that.
I spend the next few hours locked in my room, staring out at the ever-darkening sky. I’m hungry. I can smell dinner, but I guess I’m not getting any. I look at the picture again. Look at Amadeo. At Angelo. Their smiles are so genuine. I haven’t seen one like that from Amadeo. I remember that scar I glimpsed. It was bad. How did it happen exactly? And how did Angelo die and he survive? Wouldn’t Angelo have been protected if he was next in line to take over the family? And now that Amadeo has, what does that say? Did he have anything to do with his cousin’s murder? What had he said about the man who’d killed him? He was dead. But that doesn’t necessarily mean Amadeo didn’t have anything to do with it.
But the way he looked at the picture, I know he didn’t. As much as I hate to admit it, I feel that truth in my stomach.
My growling stomach.
I get into bed because I’m sure no dinner is coming, but I can’t fall asleep. What is going to happen to me? What will the brothers do to me when they don’t need me anymore? And what about Emma? Am I right to bring her here? Is she truly safer here with me? How am I ever going to get us out of this?
When I finally fall asleep, it’s a restless sleep. It’s always restless this time of year. It’s when this particular dream comes. Like clockwork, it starts a few days before my birthday and lasts a few weeks after it.
High-pitched unnatural laughter drowns out the music, the rise and fall of the soprano’s lament. Faust. It’s one of my favorite operas. It was, at least. Before everything. Before I came to hate it. The room is dark, my vision obscured although not blocked completely by the blindfold, which is askew. I’m panting. Or is that him?
He opens a can of beer. Drinks it down. I hear his swallows over the music. He’s thirsty. Spent. His breathing is ragged, but he’s still watching me as he wipes his mouth and makes a satisfied sound. He’s quenched one thirst. He crushes the can, then steps toward me.
The music carries me away to a different place. A better place. My father took me to see Faust seven times because I loved it so much. I cried every time at this very scene, but I’m not crying now. Now I’m struck mute.
A flash of memory. Dad and me in our box at the Met. Me in my newest gown. Me watching him lose himself to the music.
“What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, princess.” Dad’s voice. I miss it.
But the memory evaporates like smoke when a dirty hand closes over my ankle, and I’m tugged back into hell.
I know it’s not real. It’s not happening. Not now. He’s dead. The man with the rank breath and sweat-soaked hair is dead. Yet as I kick and pound my fists, his breath is still on me. He’s still inside me. It’s almost over, though. I keep telling myself it’s almost over. And when he turns his face to mine, I hear it. The laughter. And then the bullet that abruptly ends it.
But this is the dream. I’m not there. Because the man who looks up at me is missing half his face. Blood and bone and brain graffiti the walls.
And I scream. I scream and scream and scream until I’m jolted out of that place, ripped out of that terrible nightmare. It’s the only way out.
I bolt upright. That scream that was so loud in my dream is nothing but a choked exhale of breath here. Sweat drips from my forehead, and I wipe it off my eyes. The room is dark. The stink of basement and sweat and filthy men lingers.