A muscle leaps in Santo’s jaw. He nods.
And there’s a dull sense of peace as he leads me back outside to where the others are waiting on the stone steps. Nico presses a kiss to the strange woman’s hair; Diego stares unblinking at the maid bustling past, her light blonde bob ruffled by the breeze. And the doctor… Raul watches me as we approach.The doctor stares like no one else in the whole world exists.
“Allegra.” There’s no sound when he says my name, but I see his lips move. My stomach gives a pathetic flop.
I look away.
“I need one of you to bring a new vehicle around.” Santo scowls at the over-heated mess I left half on his steps, engine still ticking as it cools. “One that will bear Allegra’s terrible driving. And,” he whistles to the maid where she’s ducking through the mansion doorway. She hurries back to our group, hands clasped in front of her plain black uniform dress. “My sister will need help to pack.”
The maid nods and bobs a curtsy, but I’m not looking at her. I’m biting my lip as Raul sniffs and stares out at the grounds. He’s got that empty, thousand-yard look in his eye, despair etched in the lines on his forehead.
My chest aches. I want to go to him so badly.
Why did I make such a scene?
“Say your goodbyes,” Santo mutters, then strides away.
The night air is cold, nipped with frost, and our breaths freeze in chalky plumes in front of our mouths.
“It won’t be forever,” I say weakly, the doubt creeping in fast now. Raul looks hollowed out, the doctor’s mouth pressed in a firm line as he frowns at the shadows. Does he think I don’t want him? Surely he knows I wanthim, just not the lies?
Have I overreacted? Wallowed in my hurt feelings and taken things too far?
Iammy brother’s sister, after all. The De Rossi family is known for our dramatics, and our Thanksgiving dinners are non-stop fireworks.
But… perhaps I don’t want that anymore. Perhaps I want something steadier; steady as a doctor’s hands. I clear my throat.
“On second thoughts…” I begin, but a loud crack rents the air. There are several loud pops, and the stone tiles rush toward my face. A heavy body covers mine, squishing my torso into the ground, and there are screams. Yells. The screech of tires.
My cheek grinds against the frozen stone, and I’m stiff with shock. The body on top of mine is heavy, squeezing the air from my lungs, and I jab an elbow between its ribs.
“Raul?” I wheeze, calling out as loud as I can. “Raul!” Boots thunder past my nose, and there are more gunshots. I grit my teeth, bracing my palms on the tiles.
It takes all of my reedy strength, but I shove my human shield off to one side, grunting with the effort. Beside me, Nico has flattened his wife to the ground and kneels over her, gun jerking in his hand as he fires into the shadows. A few feet away, Diego kneels in front of the white-faced maid, blocking her with his body and speaking quickly into his phone as he draws a knife from his boot.
“Raul!”
He’s behind me, sprawled on his back, staring glassy-eyed at the clouds, breathing hard. Blood soaks his shoulder, the dark, sticky fluid seeping through his white t-shirt.
“Help me!” I screech, and Diego’s already here, slinging the doctor over his shoulder in a fireman’s hold. He strides inside the mansion, the maid’s wrist gripped in one meaty hand, and I follow them all, bile rising in my throat.
The world tilts as the door slams shut, and everything is sickly and wrong.
Raul.
Eight
Raul
It’s not the first time I’ve been shot, and it won’t be the last. Call it an occupational hazard. Everyone else in this mansion understands that, with Diego ducking out immediately to go after the attacker, but from the way Allegra keeps pacing by my bedside, you’d think I was an innocent office worker caught in a crossfire.
“How did this happen? You said the grounds were secure!” She tugs at her wild dark hair, my blood staining the front of her sweatshirt as she paces up and down. Up and down.
No one else speaks to Santo like that and lives to tell the tale, but the mob boss sucks his teeth and ignores his baby sister. He’s in an armchair near my bedside, on the phone to security with one hand, the other holding a bandage against my wound.
“Keep the pressure,” I force out, teeth gritted from pain.
Santo presses harder.