Page 82 of The Savage

My bad arm flares white-hot pain but my body remembers what it was built for: acceleration. I shoulder the east-wing door and take the corridor in a crude, lurching sprint, one palm on the wall to keep from eating stone.

Her door is ajar, light spilling across the floor.

She’s tangled in the sheets, wrists striking at the air, her voice raw. ‘No, no, tell me she’s… not… oh God. Please⁠—’

‘Giada.’ My voice sounds like someone else’s. I’m there in three strides, catching her hands before she hurts herself, pinning them gently to the mattress, lowering my weight so she feels pressure, not prison. ‘Angel, svegliati. It’s me. Wake up.’

Her eyes slit open, but they’re blind with sleep. She doesn’t see me. She sees the past clawing at the edges of her skull. ‘Blood,’ she says, choking. ‘So much blood.’ She pulls her hands free and stares at them in horror, even though they’re unblemished. ‘My hands – oh God⁠—’

‘Just a dream,’ I lie. I recapture her hands and gather her closer, because telling her the truth now would be cruelty. ‘You’re safe.’

Her breath stutters against my chest so hard, the rosary on her nightstand clicks against the wood with each shudder.

Up close she smells like soap and sleep and the shampoo I chose for her.

Simple scents, yet so intoxicating I could breathe her in forever.

I tuck the hair at her temple back under the wimple she refuses to shed, and something traitorous inside me aches at the thought of slipping it off with my teeth.

Her heartbeat steadies slowly, painfully. She blinks up at me, the focus coming back in jerks. ‘Renzo?’

‘Yeah.’ I keep my voice low. ‘It’s me.’

She swallows and her throat works again. ‘I heard – someone shouted – run.’

Her sister, Maddie. Urging her to flee. To save herself.

Dooming us all to the hell of never knowing.

‘And then…’ Her gaze drops to her hands, still caught in mine. Shame and horror knot her features as if she’s been painted with them. ‘It wasn’t mine. But it was on me. I can’t—’ She closes her eyes, like darkness can unsee what memory shows.

‘Look at me,’ I say, because the only way out is through. When she refuses, I say her name sharper. ‘Giada. Look at me.’

Her lashes lift. God, those eyes.

‘I’m here,’ I say, and realise I’m saying it as much for myself as for her. ‘You’re in Ortigia. In my house. In my arms. Not in any past that can hurt you from the inside. Do you understand?’

She nods, a small, reluctant movement. I ease my grip and her hands slide to my chest with the slow awkwardness of a person embarrassed by need. I cover them with mine and feel the fine tremors still moving through her.

‘Breathe,’ I tell her. ‘With me.’

We do, counting silently, the way I taught myself to ride the pain when it spikes. In, four. Hold, four. Out, six. Her breath stumbles, then learns the count until the hummingbird panic in the room settles to a trapped, wary thing, then to something that sits on the edge of the bed and watches.

‘I’m sorry,’ she whispers after a while, mortified. ‘I woke you. Did I wake the whole palazzo?’

‘Who gives a fuck if you did? Not me.’ I don’t add that I haven’t slept; that I was halfway to breaking into her room anyway under the pretence of checking the windows or some other crap. ‘Nightmares don’t ask for permission.’

She huffs the smallest laugh. ‘Like you.’

I should argue. I don’t.

‘Do they always come like this?’ I ask.

‘Not always.’ She searches the ceiling as if there might be a clean answer etched up there. ‘Sometimes it’s just a smell – a choir – lilies.’

I can’t help but grit my teeth.

She’s mentioned the lilies before.