Page 206 of Alessio

Not this time.

Corrado blinked as Alessio kneeled down beside him, and set a couple of items to the floor. He tried to take in his features, but he was pretty sure one of his eyes were swollen shut, and he couldn’t see all that well in the darkness anyway. Not with that added bit of light shadowing Alessio’s face as he put together something he’d set on the floor.

“You called me Les this time.”

Corrado chuckled, but that hurt, too. “Don’t get used to it, okay?”

“Mmm, here,” Alessio said quietly, “drink.”

Corrado didn’t even bother to ask what it was that the man offered him—but it was cool, had a fruity flavor, if not a bit chalky, too. Still, he drank it down, eventually taking the bottle directly from Alessio to hold it up himself with shaking hands that clenched too tightly around the plastic, so much so that he spilled a bit.

Alessio didn’t seem to mind.

“It has vitamins, and … other things,” Alessio explained, even though Corrado hadn’t asked. “It’ll help; you’ve been down here too long, and you need something.”

“How long?”

“A month.”

That long?

Corrado tried to settle that, but he couldn’t. Not that it mattered, as his mind wasn’t working that well, anyway. Even there, it seemed like all he could think about was darkness and silence. Was that a part of the plan, too?

“Chris?”

Alessio, seemingly understanding his question even though he hadn’t given much detail, said, “He started phase two last week.”

But he was out of the rooms.

Out of the tank.

Corrado could breathe easier for that.

He hadn’t startled when the door was open, or when he realized it was Alessio that came into the room, but he did jump a bit when something warm pressed against the side of his face in the darkness. Alessio’s hand, he quickly knew. His palm curved against Corrado’s jaw, and then his thumb drifted over the swell of his bottom lip.

Gentle.

Slow.

Kind.

All things he was not given in these rooms.

“You have to give them what they want,” Alessio murmured, “do you hear me?”

“They want too much.”

“You have to.”

He didn’t reply because he didn’t feel like repeating himself.

Alessio’s sigh echoed beside him, his thumb sweeping Corrado’s mouth again. “Stubborn. That’s what you are. It’s a process, Corrado, you have to trust it.”

“I gave them everything.”

All that he could give, anyway.

“The rest, I’m keeping,” he mumbled.