Page 134 of Beni

“He stopped shouting like … twelve hours ago,” she said, her voice aching. “Or something like that—I guess he passed out.”

Bene rubbed at his chest with his left palm, wincing a bit as he let out a hard sigh. “Tom said you didn’t do well with the whole … well, anything.”

“Would you?”

He eyed her from the side. “No.”

August nodded. “Yeah.”

“Where’s the doc?”

“Sleeping in the room on a chair.”

Or, that’s what she was told. That way, if the shitty heart monitor they had went off, he was right there to react. Problem was, he needed to sleep, too, so that was another reason why she wasn’t allowed to go down the hall to see Beni quite yet. She might wake the doctor up before he had a solid stretch of sleep to recharge.

“When is he going to wake up?”

“Who?”

“Beni.”

“When he’s ready to,” Bene murmured, “because that’s just Beni. Nothing is ever on someone else’s time, it’s always on his.”

Wasn’t that the truth?

“I don’t mean to interrupt, but would you like something to eat, sweetheart?”

August glanced up from where she folded her hands in her lap to find a beautiful, red-headed woman standing just a few feet away. At her side, a man stood stoic and quiet, arms folded behind his back as he nodded at a younger man across the room.

“I … I don’t think so,” August said, “but thank you.”

Bene gave her a small smile. “August, this is our mother and father, Cara and Gian.”

Oh.

Oh.

She stared at the woman again, her soft features taking on a more familiar quality. She could easily see where the twins had taken after their mother, with just a dash of their father’s tall, dark, and handsome characteristics, too. They had her soft smile, but his dark eyes.

It was then that she noticed all the other people now standing in the waiting area, too. Shock really was something else—it could take someone to a whole different world, and make everything disappear while it took over.

Like now.

Next to the new people in the room, on another couch in the corner, Camilla had fallen asleep while her husband sat next to her. Joe, on the far end, hid under the weight of his leather jacket where he couldn’t be seen, probably sleeping, too.

It was August who couldn’t close her eyes.

Even if her body begged for the rest.

“And that’s Marcus,” Bene said, pointing at the man Gian had been nodding at, “our oldest brother.”

“Hello,” Marcus greeted from his position near the clinic’s front door.

“And Corrado.”

He gestured to the man talking in hushed tones to whoever was on the phone. Angled slightly away from them, all she could see was his profile. Although, the side of his face matched the man he stood beside.

“Chris, his twin,” Bene explained, “our other brothers. We’re missing a couple—Les stayed with Ginny because she’s pregnant, but he’s coming tomorrow. And Val, Chris’s wife, stayed behind with their daughter.”