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Corrado stands at the foot of the bed/couch, hands on his hips, a mean expression on his face. I’d hate to be the assassin who missed me. Corrado’ll make it his mission to find the person responsible and bring him to me. I look forward to it.
“How is she?” I ask him.
Surprised, he widens his eyes. “She’s not been shot.”
I know my brother better than he knows himself, so I’m sure he’s interrogated her and maybe even threatened her life. She’s innocent, terrified, and if she didn’t despise me before I got shot, she’ll certainly despise me now.
“What’s she doing in there?” I ask.
“I drew her a bath.” Corrado narrows his eyes. He’s testing me, seeing how I’ll react with regards to him and her in the bathroom alone, not to mention alone while she gets into a bath.
Deception is a game at which I am a champion, and my mask doesn’t crack. “Good.”
Corrado snorts, then turns to Dr. Tru. “Thank you. Let yourself out if you’re done.”
Dr. Tru repeats what he told me to Corrado as if I’m a toddler who needs his daddy to care for him, when the truth is I haven’t needed anyone to care for me since my toddler years. Okay, maybe not toddler, but close enough.
My mother died of breast cancer when Paulina and I were eighteen months old. If she hadn’t, she would have left my dad the way all the other women did before and after my mother. He couldn’t keep a woman to save his life.
Once, I asked him why they all abandoned us. He said some of us are meant to walk this life alone. Since I shared a wombwith Paulina, she’ll always be the other part of me, but I get what my dad was telling me. He told me that one day, when I inherit the Order from him, it’s for the best I remain single. Alone.
As I grew older, I found I actually prefer solitude to relationships. It’s not the people I dislike. I like people, but I’ve never been interested enough in a woman to want to share my life with her. This life I lead isn’t for everyone. She would have to be carefully selected, be someone I connect with, someone I enjoy spending time with, someone I miss when I travel for work.
The medical staff leaves, and Corrado walks to the bar. He pours himself a whiskey, neat.
I check the clock. “It’s a little early for hard liquor. I’ll have one too.”
“You’re on the meds,” he says.
I extend my hand.
With a heavy sigh, he deposits a scotch onto my palm.
“How did you know I want scotch?” I don’t, but he’s passive-aggressive when he can’t be just aggressive and tell me what to do. I’m the only person in the world Corrado listens to. Correction. I used to be. Now he’s married to a kind woman who asks little of him, thus making him want to give her the whole world.
Secretly, I wish he never married. Now I have all these vulnerabilities I must shield and protect. “Have the women departed yet?”
Corrado nods. “Paulina wouldn’t leave without you. I had to sedate her.”
“You’ll never hear the end of that.”
He shrugs and moves the love seat to face me when he sits, elbows on his knees, gaze on the floor. “She’ll forgive me.”
My brother is a ruthless man. We make a great team, which is why we must split up.
Since beating around the bush and avoiding conflict isn’t my style, I ask him, “When is your flight?”
He lifts his head. “We’re leaving together.”
“You know we can’t stay at the same place. Not after the attempt on my life.” Paulina, Corrado, and I make up the Head of the Serpentine Order. I don’t want us all in the same place at the same time after what happened this morning.
“You can’t think I’d leave you here.”
“Yet, that’s what you’ll do.”
Corrado chuckles and changes the subject. “Who did it?”
I scrub my face. “Someone who wanted Gio dead.”
