He controlled it all.
Everything that belonged to me belonged to him too.
Through the angry haze that seemed to cloud his judgment, he really looked at me. His eyes followed mine—searching his.
“How did you find me?” I barely got out.
“A feeling. Burt confirmed it.”
I nodded, taking his suit in my hands and holding on with all the strength left inside of me. They were going to burn him to death. Set him on fire. They would make me watch as—I turned my face away from his, not able to hold his stare.
“Rosalia,” he said.
For some reason, it sounded like he’d said it before. But he hadn’t. Itfeltlike he had. An echo passing through my head from another time.
With my grip still tight on him, he took my chin and forced me to look at him. “Tell me what he said,” he said.
“Who?”
In a move that almost seemed violent, he ripped his fingers from me. I went to reach out for him, to feel him in my grip, but I knew it was useless. He wanted the truth.
How could I tell him?
How could I admit how this was all going to end?
I couldn’t recall the memory, but there was no doubt in my mind that the last time Big Bismo had given me a similar warning, it had me rethinking what I was willing to sacrifice. How could it not?
The need to run coursed through my veins like adrenaline then. The need to keep him safe was beyond anything I’d ever felt.
How could I allow them to kill him because of me? This wasn’t going to be an easy death, either. This was going to be a fucking horror show. They were going to make an example out of him.
How could I not tell him though?
How could I not warn him?
“He told me if we continue doing what we’re doing, they’ll burn you to death,” I said, my voice sounding stronger than my body felt.
My knees gave out a second later, but a second before I hit the ground, he caught me, keeping me tight against his body. I felt like a rag doll just hanging there. A plaything.
“You?” His voice was hard, even though his touch was tender as he moved the hair away from my face.
“What about me?” I said, my voice strained. A sob was rising in my chest, and I was losing the fight to keep it down.
“Your punishment,” he said.
“Immurement,” I said.
I’d never felt true fear around Aniello Assanti before, but in that moment, it was so real that goosebumps rose on my arms, and my neck tingled—from the look on his face. In the darkness, with only the glow from a few lights, he was terrifying.
His expression went lights fucking out.
He stared at my face, but it didn’t really seem like he was looking at me. He was lost somewhere inside of his head. Even as he moved us toward the thicket of trees, that terrifying expression stayed on his face.
He used his foot to open the door to the Hamartia Garden. It was already unlocked. He closed it the same way but didn’t bother locking it like he’d done the last time. He set me on the bench and then turned his back on me, eyes toward the statue.
“He said the same thing to you before your accident,” he said. Even though it came out as a statement, I could hear the question lingering.
Did Big Bismo threaten me before with the same punishment?
