I pat him on the shoulder. He pats me back. This is damn good news. It almost wipes the bitter taste of killing Santo from my mouth. It means we have leverage.
It means, finally, we have a real shot at winning this war.
9
Hazel
“It’s your fault,” the man growls. He’s got a voice like a hurricane. It’s all I hear. In the dim darkness of the nightmare, I see that he only has one hand. “Your fault. You were always a stupid little slut. A greedy little slut. I wish you were dead, instead of her. But you killed her. You’re an evil—”
I wake to find that I am screaming, the sheets sticking to me. My body is drenched with sweat. In my after-sleep haze, it takes me a second to realize that the screaming voice is mine. I clamp my hand around my throat, trying to stop. My throat is raw.
The door opens with a crash.
I expect Ubert, but it’s Carlo, standing there in his steel-gray suit, his hair slicked back, pistol in hand. The concern on his face startles me.
He looks around the room before recognition fills his blue-green eyes.
“A nightmare,” he grunts.
He wanders over to the bed, looking down at me. But he’s shaking, wavering around the room. I try to laugh—my shadow to the rescue—but it comes out strangled. That’s when it hits me that I’m the one shaking.
“Hazel,” he says, dropping onto the bed as he holsters his pistol. “You’ll wake everybody. You need to calm down.”
Am I still screaming?
It’s hard to be sure.
I’m shocked when he takes my hands, moving his fingers over my knuckles softly.
“Just focus on the feeling of my hands,” he whispers. He’s grimacing slightly. Like he can’t believe he’s doing this. “Okay? And just breathe. Just breathe. You’re having a panic attack.”
I breathe in unison with his words, in slowly, out slower, and focus my entire being on the tingles his fingers create on the backs of my hands.
Finally, I am as close to calm as I am likely to get.
We sit like this for a long time, slightly awkward in the silence, Carlo’s eyes moving over me.
“What was it about?” he asks at last.
I shrug. “I don’t know,” I lie. “But I used to get night terrors as a girl all the time. I had this one of being trapped in a coffin. And no matter how hard I beat on the lid, I couldn’t get out, I couldn’t wake up. But I guess that one’s come true now, right?”
Carlo winces, making me feel ridiculously guilty. He lets go of my hands and stands up.
“I know a thing or two about pain,” he says. “Are you going to be okay now? I will have the maid change your sheets.”
“What do you know about pain?” I ask when he’s at the door, back turned. He’s a silhouette, lit only by the dim light from the hall, a solid outline of shadow that part of me wishes I could clutch onto all night long, even if I feel like an idiot for oversharing.
Then he turns and wordlessly lifts his shirt, displaying a torso of rippling muscle and a long, jagged scar that zigzags across the muscles. It’s slightly faded and I have to squint to see it fully, but whatever wound left it must’ve been horrifying. Seeing the look in my eyes—pity? empathy? concern?—seems to jolt him out of whatever mood he’s fallen into.
He’s clearly annoyed at himself for the intimacy.
“Get some sleep,” he rumbles, before striding from the room. I’m left to wonder if this, in fact, was the real dream.
As soon as I lay my head on the pillow and close my eyes, the vivid vignettes start up again. I shake myself awake immediately. Looks like I won’t be getting anymore sleep tonight.
So I stand up and get dressed in my gym gear, heading downstairs to the well-equipped gym at the rear of the mansion.
I go straight to the treadmill, fiddling with the sound system—built right into the machines—so that music comes blaring from the walls. I’m hoping that a booming beat will help me chase away the demons.
God knows I could use the help.
I remember reading about how some people like to get off by whipping themselves, which, apparently, is more than just an excuse to be kinky. I get the impulse. Running is a way to redirect all my attention to the searing in my legs. That way, nothing else exists. Not