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I look in the Emperor’s eyes.
“He was your father.”
The Mastermind looks at me, questioning. “The Don?”
“Yes. I killed him.”
“No,” the Emperor steps forward. “Mrs. Jago killed him. The housekeeper. Well, supposedly the housekeeper. Do you remember her?”
“No.” But a pang of dread grips my insides at the sound of her name.
“She found out he was having an affair with a much younger woman. So she shot him. In the dining room.”
She shot him, yes. but I killed him. Sometime, I have to tell his son. I can’t keep the secret forever. But not now, for fuck’s sake. I can’t get into that now, when I can’t remember anything else.
The Warrior says, “You must remember her cooking.”
With a wry smile, the Mastermind says, “It would be a blessing if you didn’t. I wish I could forget that.”
Panic and terror rip through me. I pull free and then barge through, between them. They call after me. I run back up towardthe entrance hall. The huge space makes my head spin and I swerve. Dive into a dark, paneled room.
Memories float around me, pictures without sound. Words without sense. Through there I come to the dining room.
Echoes of cold, heavy silences, and of black moods from the head of the table pour into my head.
And what happened here. That awful day. What I did.
Turning, dashing blindly, I slam straight into the Emperor’s huge frame and the hot bulges of his hard chest. His eyes blaze and the front of his suit pants is strained. He moistens his lips.
He holds the tops of my arms. Gently, he says, “Listen?—”
My head shakes.
“I have to get out of here.” I look up into his eyes. All the tenderness, all the strength and all the cruelty. The man you would do anything for, just to have him on your side. “Please.”
He holds me. His strong hands and arms and his massive chest feel like they could shield me from an army. Keep me safe in a hurricane. Carry me through fire.
But they can’t lift me out of the panic that I’m feeling here.
A spinning storm of tension starts to swell inside me. I swing and twist, pull and wrench myself free. And I run.
I hurtle through the horrible space of the hallway and slam into the big double doors. They’re locked. Over my shoulder, I hear the men. All three of them. Coming closer.
I jerk and tug at the door, the latch, the lock.
I feel like I’m going to faint.
I force myself to take a breath. A big hand lands on my shoulder. Recognizing the Emperor’s touch at last, closing my eyes for an instant, I turn to open them.
My voice is cool, like stone. I look in his eyes.
“Alessio. Get me the fuck out of here.”
I had the men all sit together in the front of the van. They argue about where we’re going. Our immediate destination is not very important to me.
I need to be alone, so I sit as far back as I can get. Most of all I need space to think and process.
Memories lit up in the house. They flooded into me, all at once. It was like I was seeing my whole life in a single instant. Everything, simultaneously. Seconds, weeks, months, years, all compressed into a single picture. In it I saw all the people, all of the elements, but without any order. No sequence.
