“I’m sure the Colonia already have them by now,” I say.
“What? How are you here?”
“I wasn’t going anywhere until I knew you were all right.”
“You could have left me with any one of your people.”
“They’re gone, Sarah. Every one of them. Tamara and Oliver. Gone. Benny—”
“Massimo shot him when he came for me.”
My face must be on the floor.
She puts her hand on mine. “I’m sorry.”
What a mistake to leave her here with one guy, no matter how important. No matter how skilled.
“Benny taught me how to shoot straight,” I say, watching the water boil.
Someone’s buried under the flagstones. I could tell as soon as I got onto the patio that they’d been moved. Connor, I guess. He shouldn’t have hung around to do it. Shouldn’t have been standing on the street where Sarah saw him.
I shake it off. Grief is a luxury we don’t have.
“They were all supposed to disappear if I got captured.” I turn off the burner. “And they did. It was the right thing.”
I dump the pasta into the colander. Sarah turns the heat off under the sauce and grabs a ladle. We make the meal together like the only two cogs in a functioning machine.
“That means Connor’s somewhere. And Remo,” she says. When I look at her in surprise, she shrugs. “I saw him across the street too.”
“They must have seen the commotion yesterday.” Would they have? A hundred commotions have happened in Precious Blood without anyone knowing any better. “They left like they were supposed to in the first place. They’d be here if they could be.”
“You don’t believe that. They could still be by that bus stop.”
“You’re right.” I kiss her.
She’s given me a glimmer of hope. It’s a shaft of light in a dark room. I bring the two bowls of pasta to the table and pull out her chair.
“What about Willa?” she asks before eating as if she’d been starved with her family.
She has a dot of sauce at the corner of her mouth.
“Let me see you.” I hold up the napkin and dab her face when she looks at me. “Willa’s not answering her phone. Same for her parents on St. Kitts.”
“Can’t someone who’s already on the island go check?”
“I’ve been calling the authorities. They’re stonewalling. I’m sure your brother bought them out.”
“We need to go down there.”
“If your brother left right away, they’re already there. Which explains why the phones are dead. The women will be back in New York, in those cells, before I can even get there.”
“Well, what do we do? We can’t just play house and cook spaghetti. I can’t just do the laundry and clean up knowing I was traded for so many people. How am I supposed to live?”
“This is the question.” I pick up a strand with a tine of my fork and start to twist it, but I can’t continue. I can’t eat this without clarity. I started the conversation directly, and she’s the one who pulled it in the direction she wanted.
“So what’s the plan, Dario? Don’t you have a plan? We need a plan!”
“I need…”
I need her. I need to protect her, and I need to keep her with me.
I need her to be still and stay where I can secure her, but I love the way she moves when she’s free.
She needs to be silent, but I need to hear her every thought.
I can’t have her both ways.
She needs to choose for herself.
“I need you,” I say. “That’s all. Nothing else. When I was in that box, I didn’t have anything, but I knew I had you. I knew you were close to me. Sometimes I could hear someone upstairs and I felt you there. No matter how far up the creek we got, you were my hope. You kept me alive to be with you, and I won’t live without you now. I can’t stay in that kind of darkness. I used to be able to.”
“Dario.” She takes my hand. I open my fingers so they interlock. Our scars match across. “I’m here.”
She’s not getting it.
“If I destroyed the Colonia and my own life with it, that was a fair trade. But I can’t now. I’m not the same man. I need to live in the light now, and that’s with you.”
“I’m here,” she repeats. “With you.”
“You are. But I can’t make a plan without knowing what you want. Do you want this house? This life? I can give it to you. But I need time to get those women back.”
She leans into me, ready for a fight. “Not without me, you’re not.”
Relief floods me, and terror hardens at the core.
“It’s not safe.” I’m telling her so she chooses wisely. I hope she stays by my side and stays home at the same time.
She pulls her hand away. “Nothing’s safe. Don’t shut me out, Dario. Don’t keep me in a cage the way you were kept.”
“I won’t.”
She’s already standing, pointing at me. “I will not be in a prison. I am not your pet. I’m not your prize. I’m valuable!”
Standing, I take her wrists.
“Okay.” I kiss her, pushing her against the table.
“I mean it.”
“I know.” Reaching behind her, I push the plates out of the way. “You’re the most valuable—”
“Not like that. Not like—”
“I get it.”
She lets me bend her over the tabletop. “—like some porcelain doll.”
“You’re only valuable if you’re free.” I push up her dress.
Her panties are lace ones she wore before we were captured. They curve up her sides and dip at the center, where I wedge my finger under them to feel the soft skin of her belly.
“You’re strong, Sarah.” I kiss her body. “You’re clever. You learn fast. You’re going to be with me, side by side.” I stand straight and look at her curves with my hands on either hip. I intend to slide the panties off her and get my dick out of my pants before my balls explode, but I can’t take my eyes off her. “I’m not going to like it. I’m going to protect you when I have to protect you. But…”
I drift off to run my fingertips from between her breasts to her navel.
“But what? I’m free to be protected?”
“Prima?”
“Are you okay?”
“When was the last time you had your period?”
She gets up on her elbows. “What kind of question is that?”
Colonia men have no idea how women bleed, when, or why.
“It’s a question with an answer.”
She looks away, eyes flicking back and forth, trying to remember. She never had it when she was with me. Blame stress for that time without it, and when we were trapped with the Colonia, assuming she didn’t have it then either. Stress could have stopped every single period since the day I met her, but this lovely curve to her belly isn’t from a hearty diet.
When she looks back at me, she doesn’t have to say a thing.
“Do you think…?” she asks.
My laugh isn’t because the question’s funny. It’s joy squeezing between panic and determination—exiting like a bullet.