Page 30 of The Savage

Of course my lost little angel still burns like this, even kidnapped.

Even terrified.

It hits me square in the chest. Giada Mancinelli’s quiet fire, that reckless, holy, forbidden fire, lives untouched.

And God forgive me…

I’ve missed it more than air.

But as I stare at her, a new, terrifying knowledge strikes me, vicious and so fucking deep, I lose what’s left of the air in my lungs.

Because those beautiful eyes bear no hint of recognition, the way her mouth parts in confusion.

My pulse thrashes against the monitor like it’s trying to claw its way free.

‘Giada,’ I rasp… implore again. My throat burns like sandpaper. ‘Angel.’

She flinches, blinking rapidly as if to dislodge tears – or truth. Or reality.

Maybe she’s dreaming too. Doesn’t want to wake up to this fucking nightmare where up is down and my long-lost angel is trapped in limbo.

I say something that doesn’t quite register and it seems to hit her like a slap. Wound her. I see it in the way her spine stiffens. But instead of relief, her face folds into dismay, almost disappointment.

‘I-I’m sorry but you’re mistaken,’ she says quickly, voice small but determined. ‘I’m not who you think I am. My name is Sister Benedetta.’

No. The words ring with practised truth and she looks like she believes it. But to me they might as well be hollow nonsense. And that is an insult to both of us. My chest seizes with the urge to laugh, to demand she stop pretending. To curse the weakness in my body that keeps me shackled to this fucking bed.

I don’t regret telling the doctors to fuck off when they cautioned against my little jaunt to retrieve what’s mine, but I have a feeling I’ll be paying for it longer than I want.

‘Giada,’ I say again, slower this time, tasting the name like a prayer I never stopped saying before offering it to her in clear, unmistakable taunt.

If… after six fucking years, this is how we’re playing this, so be it. From the agony tearing through my body, I have nowhere else to be but right here in this godforsaken bed. For the time being.

She looks down, hands twisting in the rosary wrapped around her delicate hand. Seeking courage? Divine intervention?

‘I’m sorry,’ she murmurs, softer. ‘Whoever this Giada is, she isn’t me. I’m a nun from Santa Maria delle Nevi. Perhaps you and your soldiers… umm, your associates… perhaps you took the wrong person from the wrong location. There’s no Giada where I’m from.’ She glances at the door where a lot of footsteps are approaching. Then she looks back at me. ‘I’ll speak to someone. I’ll pray for you, if that’s what you need. But afterward, please tell them I’d like to be returned to my convent. I won’t even press charges.’

Press charges. Christ. The absurdity almost makes me laugh.

But the monitors don’t. They accelerate, betraying the storm inside me. Building and ready to explode.

Behind her, the doors open and doctors surge forward. Two of them, one young, the other older, both terrified of the black-clad figures – apparently the soldiers she almost let slip just now – lining the walls. The doctors’ gazes flick between me and the men in black with expressions that say we didn’t sign up for this. One whispers something in rapid Italian about cardiac stress; another gestures nervously towards Giada, as if she’s the defibrillator.

I suck in a pained breath and force myself to assess what the fuck’s going on. Last night, I barely assessed the why’s and wherefores of the men who appeared seemingly out of nowhere to assist me in my little kidnapping jaunt. I initially thought they were part of hospital security, placed here by my brothers.

But now, I scrutinise them more carefully, my jaw locking when things fall into place.

The soldiers… while their posture is perfect enough to please a demanding Orazio Salvatore, are not our men. For one, they’re too strait-laced. Too disciplined. Too… government-issue.

And Orazio would rather toss his own foot into a meat grinder than let any Salvatore wear tactical gear over Italian wool. These stiffs are waiting for orders from somewhere above medicine, and far outside my family.

Besides, if my family had dispatched them, they’d be here.

Cesare, Rafa, Dante – hell, especially Orazio – would’ve bulldozed through these statues to get to me, and to the long-lost Giada Mancinelli standing three feet away like a ghost resurrected.

Which means only one thing.

Night – motherfucking – Owl.