Damage

by Natasha Knight

  I shake my head. “I want to go home.”

  There’s that word again.

  Home.

  Do I even have a home?

  He reaches over, takes my hand, squeezes it. “You’re safe now. Nothing’s going to happen to you ever again. I swear it.”

  3

  Stefan

  Nothing’s going to happen to you ever again.

  I swore it.

  But can I guarantee that? Obviously not.

  I look at her while she stares straight ahead. I think she’s still in shock. And part of me, it’s pissed at her. Pissed at her for walking out of the house and onto that stupid boat. For putting herself in this situation.

  And the other part wants to hold her close and never let her go because when I saw her at the bottom of that well, hell, before that, there were moments when I thought she might be gone.

  There were moments these last couple of days where I thought she’d drowned.

  Fuck.

  I tug at my hair.

  What the fuck is wrong with me?

  I killed every one of those men. I did it slow. Bullet after bullet placed to inflict pain but not kill. Then I dropped them into the well. Some survived the drop. I heard them down there. And I walked away.

  I’m a monster, I know that. What would she think if she knew exactly what I did? Would she run from me?

  As if I’d let her go.

  I laugh out loud and see how her gaze snaps to me.

  She doesn’t talk much during the trip back home, but I’m surprised when, as soon as we’re back and she sees Millie, she goes straight to her and lets Millie envelope her in her arms, breaking into sobs the moment she’s there.

  This is a girl who grew up without a mother. A girl who grew up without affection. Physical touch. At least not the right kind.

  Millie hugs her hard and I see the look of concern on her face. She was worried about Gabriela. This arranged—no, let’s be real here—this forced marriage, I don’t know what I expect from it. I haven’t thought it through on any level, actually. Other than I am taking her from Marchese, I haven’t given thought to what I’d do with her. To how real this marriage will be. I haven’t considered what her days will be like.

  I haven’t cared.

  And it’s not that I care now, I tell myself as Millie looks Gabriela over and tells her she’ll make her something to eat and get her something to drink.

  “I want to shower. And throw these clothes away,” Gabriela says.

  “Millie,” I start, not looking at Gabriela. Not sure I can without taking her in my arms and I’m not sure if it’s to hug her tight or to shake her so fucking hard, I may do more damage than those men did. “Did you get in touch with the doctor?”

  “Yes. He’s on his way. He should be here any minute.”

  “Good.” I run a hand through my hair, not quite able to focus on anything but this chaos of emotions inside. “Take care of it. I’ll be back.”

  I walk away. I don’t say goodbye to Gabriela. Don’t say a word to her. I just walk out of the house and I can feel Gabriela’s unbelieving eyes burn into my back.

  But fuck her.

  She brought this on herself. I haven’t lied to her once and when I told her about Alex, she didn’t believe me. She called her fucking father to be rescued from me.

  The urge to throttle her has my hands fisting as I step into the Bugatti and drive into Palermo. I go straight to Rafa’s house. Just walk right in and make my way to the living room, pouring myself a whiskey before I sit down.

  When he sees me, he seems surprised. He’s on the phone. I notice his hair’s wet and he’s changed his clothes. Mine still have crusted blood on them.

  “Stefan,” he starts, disconnecting his call. “Something happen?”

  I swallow my drink. “Yeah, something happened. I think you were there for it.”

  He gives me a strange look, opens his mouth to say something but I shake my head.

  “I’m pissed, Rafa.”

  He turns to walk behind the bar and get a glass.

  “I’m fucking pissed. She could have been killed and my men didn’t even see her go. Fucking idiots.”

  He walks to the couch, carrying the bottle of whiskey with him.

  “You fired them. The new men will know better to look out for her.” He pours himself a whiskey and refreshes mine.

  “Seeing her in that well…” I give a shake of my head. “It fucked with me. I don’t care about this girl. I hate her, in fact. I should, at least.” I finish my drink, rub the back of my neck as Rafa refills my glass once more.

  “But you don’t. You like her.”

  I turn to him. “I don’t fucking like her. I’m not fucking sixteen.”

  He makes a face like yeah right.

  “What happened to your car?” I ask, abruptly changing the subject.

  “Nothing,” he says, casually turning his gaze away. “Sideswiped someone. Probably shouldn’t have been driving.”

  “Sideswiped two cars at once?”

  “Wall on one side.”

  “When?”

  “Couple nights ago. Doesn’t matter.”

  I study him. Remember there was paint on both sides of the car. But I decide to drop it. “I’m grateful to your father,” I say, swallowing the bitter taste the words leave.

  “He’ll be glad to hear it. But you should tell him yourself.”

  I nod my head, finish my drink and stand. “Let’s go out.”

  It’s late when I get back to the house. I pass Gabriela’s room when I get upstairs, only pausing for a second. Once inside my own room, I hit my shin against the baseboard of the bed as I stumble to take off my shoes and socks.

  The balcony doors are open and it’s a stormy night. I walk outside.

  I love rain in Sicily. It’s so rare and when it comes at night, fuck, it’s something to see. I stand there in it, stand there getting soaked.

  I look at her doors. The curtains billow in the wind and rain blows inside. She should close them. I walk to her room wondering how she can sleep with all this noise, momentarily panicked that she snuck away again.

  But she’s here. She’s in her bed and asleep under the covers. Out cold. I wonder if she slept at all during her captivity.

  I brush hair back from her face, take in the bruises. She looks peaceful. And even with the bruises, she’s still beautiful.

  It could have been worse. They could have really hurt her, but they didn’t.

  This wasn’t about hurting her, though. Someone’s sending a message.

  They can take what’s mine.

  My hands fist, fingernails digging into my palms. I will kill whoever did this. I will demolish them.

  I pull the blanket back, stumbling a little when I do. I’m drunk. I should go back to my room. But I don’t want to.

  Gabriela stirs, but doesn’t wake.

  She’s just wearing a pair of powder blue cotton panties. No top. I can see why. She’s got bandages all over her, a large one wrapped around her lower ribs. Did they break her ribs?

  A gust of wind blows so hard that it knocks a vase over, sending it crashing to the floor.

  Gabriela bolts upright, startled awake. I don’t know if she processes where she is. When she sees me, she opens her mouth to scream. I don’t think she realizes it’s me. It’s dark enough she wouldn’t see my face.

  Without a thought, I’m on the bed, my hand over her mouth pushing her into the pillow.

  “Don’t,” I tell her.

  She struggles, her broken nails sharp against my skin.

  “Stop. It’s me. Gabriela, it’s me. It’s Stefan.”

  She blinks as a cloud clears the moon and, in the light, she sees my face. She stops fighting and I move my hand from her mouth. She pulls up to a half-seated position.

  “Stefan?”

  I look at her, at her naked breasts, small and pretty, her nipples hard. My mouth is watering to lick that tight little tip, take it into my mouth and
suck, just a little, just enough to make her moan.

  “What are you doing in here?”

  I don’t answer. What am I doing in here? Didn’t I come in to close the balcony doors?

  She looks over at the clock and so do I. It’s a little after two in the morning.

  I shift my gaze to her breasts again. I reach out and touch one nipple with the back of my hand, just brushing my knuckles over it. It hardens and when I shift my gaze to hers, I see how her cheeks flush, how her throat works when she swallows.

  I want her.

  Even now, like this, I want to have her.

  I lower my gaze to the bandage.

  “Your ribs,” I say, touching the gauze.

  “Bruised. That’s all.”

  “That’s all?”

  “Stefan,” she starts, pulling the covers up to cover her breasts. “Are you drunk?”

  I grin, take hold of the blanket and tug it out of her hands.

  “Not drunk enough,” I say, moving to straddle her, my knees on either side of her hips as she lays back and I cage her in with my hands to the sides of her face. “I didn’t know,” I start, leaning close to her, inhaling her clean scent. “I didn’t know if they pulled you out of the water.” Her hands come to my shoulders. “I didn’t know if you were alive or dead.”

  “I—”

  “I didn’t fucking know, Gabriela.”

  I lay some of my weight on her, careful of her ribs when I see her wince. Sliding one hand behind her head, I weave my fingers into her hair and tug her head back to tilt her face upward.

  I look at her like this. At her parted lips, her pretty eyes. That bruise on her forehead that was there before everything. “Why did you look at Rafa when I asked you about that man?” I ask. I don’t know why I ask it.

  “What?”

  “When the assholes were lined up and I asked you who hurt you. You looked at one man in particular then at Rafa.”

  She lowers her lashes, looking fucking guilty as sin.

  I squeeze my hand in her hair and she winces.

  “Stop, you’re hurting me,” she says.

  “Why?”

  “Stefan, stop it.”

  I smile down at her and something akin to jealousy burns in my gut.

  “Were you with him? When his car got sideswiped?”

  She tries to shake her head and when she answers no, she shifts her gaze away and I know she’s lying. I know she’s fucking lying.

  I loosen my grip on her hair, grit my teeth.

  “Why are you wet?” she asks, brushing my wet hair back from my forehead.

  That touch distracts me. It’s soft. Tender.

  “What?” I ask.

  “You’re soaked,” she says.

  I look down at myself then back at her. “Rain.” I lean in close to her, brush my jaw against her cheek so my mouth is at her ear. “You’re not off the hook with me, Gabriela.”

  When I draw back, I see that same caution I’ve seen before. Not fear like what I saw when I took that filthy hood off her head, but she is wary of me.

  “What do you mean?” she asks.

  “I mean you ran away. You snuck out of the house and in doing so, you almost got yourself killed and you did get yourself hurt. You’ll answer for that.”

  She doesn’t reply. I’m not sure I expect her to.

  “You’re in no shape to do so now, though,” I say finally, standing. I need to go. To get out of here. Because if I get into bed with her, I will want things.

  I straighten, look down at her. I run a hand through my hair.

  “Doctor’s coming tomorrow,” I say.

  “He just came today.”

  “He’s coming again.”

  “Why?”

  “Birth control.”

  Her mouth falls open. Not what she was expecting, I guess.

  “We’re moving the wedding up.”

  “What?”

  I lean down so my face is inches from hers. “You better not lie to me again, Gabriela.”

  She stares at me.

  I turn and walk back out onto the balcony, into the rain. One of the metal chairs screeches when I stumble into it before making it into my bedroom and collapsing on my bed.

  4

  Gabriela

  I don’t sleep after that. I can’t.

  We’re moving the wedding up? Why? What does my getting kidnapped have to do with the wedding?

  Is it because he wants to fuck me? Is he so honorable that he won’t do it before the wedding?

  Even as I think it, that word, honorable, makes me sneer. Because what if I say no? What then? How honorable will he be then?

  There are two sides to Stefan Sabbioni. Maybe more than two. One is violent, filled with rage. The other is the one who carried me out of that well. The one who swore he’d never let anyone hurt me again.

  I don’t know if I can reconcile the two.

  When the doctor comes the next day, he gives me the birth control shot. After he leaves, the seamstress is back with the final fitting of the hideous wedding dress. Millie’s in and out too and there seem to be double the guards as there were before.

  The only person not here is Stefan.

  I’m surprised when Millie walks into my bedroom that afternoon to tell me my father is on the line. She’s holding a house phone out for me. I guess I don’t expect him to call me here.

  “Dad?”

  “Gabriela. Why haven’t you called me?” Not are you okay?

  “I’m just trying to wrap my brain around it all myself.”

  “Well, I’d have preferred to hear from you that you’re all right rather than that man.”

  “That man saved me.”

  “He should have had you better protected. I’ll kill him if anyone touches a hair on your head again.”

  How heartfelt, I think, rolling my eyes. “Well, I’m on the mend if you’re concerned.”

  Silence. “Of course I’m concerned,” he says a few moments later. “Don’t be stupid.”

  “The men on the boat, are they both…”

  “Gone. Yes.”

  “I’m sorry about that.”

  “It’s their job. They knew the risks.”

  Still. It’s two lives. Two more lives gone because of me. “He’s moving the wedding up,” I tell my father. He sighs and I realize something. “You already know, don’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Doesn’t what happened change things?”

  “Why would it?”

  “Because I nearly died.”

  He makes a sound like a snort or a chuckle. “Don’t be dramatic, Gabriela.”

  I’m shocked. But why am I shocked? I know my father, don’t I?

  “Did you arrange it?” The words are out before I can stop them and the instant they are, I swear I feel ice on the line.

  “Did I arrange for men to kidnap my daughter and drop her into a well?”

  It’s his tone that has me quieting. That has me remembering those moments in the water when I’d thought of her. My mom. His tone and the silence after that remind me of that night so many years ago and even though we’re separated by hundreds of miles, even though I can put the phone down and just walk away, I shudder, freeze up.

  My father still scares me.

  And I’m very aware that he’s not denying that he had anything to do with it.

  “Waverly is sending over a revised contract. Be sure to read the modification before you sign it. I’m sure as heroic as you must think your husband-to-be, he won’t have shared this little tidbit.”

  “What modification?”

  “It’ll be hand delivered. I have to go, Gabriela.”

  “What modification?” I press.

  “Goodbye.”

  I hear a click and he’s gone. For a moment, I stand listening to the dial tone before finally putting the phone down.

  I sit on the edge of the bed and run my fingers through my wet hair. I touch the bruise on my forehead, the one from when Rafa and
I were driving, and those men sideswiped us. It’s the same person who arranged for me to be kidnapped because the man Stefan was asking about was at both events.

  Why didn’t I tell him that? Tell him about Rafa and Taormina and that man?

  There’s a knock on my door and Miss Millie comes inside with a tray of food.

  “Shall I take this?” she asks about the phone once she sets the tray down. She doesn’t ask me how the call was. She knows better. Or maybe she just reads it on my face.

  “Yes, thank you.” She’s about to leave when I stop her. “If he calls again, can you tell him I’m not here please?”

  She studies me for a moment, then nods her head. “Of course, dear.”

  On the second evening, I go downstairs for dinner because if I spend one more minute in this bed, I’m going to go crazy. There’s a replacement cell phone on the table at my place with a note from Stefan stuck to the box.

  Don’t drop this one at the bottom of the sea.

  S

  The joke is in poor taste, but I find myself smiling anyway.

  I take it out of the box. It’s the same pretty rose gold as the original phone and the same numbers are programmed.

  I check the time. It’s almost noon on the East Coast. I program the number for Clear Meadows and ask the receptionist for Melanie. She connects me a few minutes later and I ask if it’s a good time to FaceTime Gabe. I can hear the smile in her voice and a few moments later, using Melanie’s cell phone, I’m looking at Gabe sitting in the community room with a smock on that has paint smeared all over it.

  “Gabi!” he calls out and I see his finger coming toward the camera. I guess he’s trying to touch my face.

  “Gabe! It’s so good to see you!”

  “What happened to your face?” he asks.

  I touch my bangs, push them down to cover the bandage.

  “Oh, it’s nothing. Just fell down. You know how clumsy I am.”

  “You’re not clumsy.” He peers closer, the camera showing me just part of his eye and nose for a moment. “You’re hurt,” he says, his expression so worried, it breaks my heart.