I start walking toward the guest wing, motioning at him to follow me. Might as well deal with the problem in person.
Valente reaches out, touching my arm to stop me. I do so, reluctantly, already annoyed that he is making this longer than it should be. If I can resolve whatever situation has arisen in five minutes, I could be back in my bed with Violet in the next ten.
"It's the Italian one, who had trouble adjusting."
"The one Violet likes to spend time with?" Okay, fine. I can spare ten, maybe fifteen minutes for this one. Only because Violet likes her.
"Yes. She, um?—"
Valente never minces his words.
"What is it?" I snap.
"She's dead."
Fuck. Violet will be devastated.
I take a deep breath and resume walking until Valente stops me in front of one of the doors. Most of the women have left already, back to their home countries, back to their families. Only a few remain, not ready to face the society just yet. Elena being one of them.
She refused the therapy we offered, or the plane ticket home.
There wasn't much we could do bar forcing her to deal with her PTSD, yet… I can't help but worry that Violet will think I should have tried harder.
Tried fucking harder… Goddamnit, I've already allowed strangers into my sanctuary, and all for her. Because she asked me to make sure they were okay.
I failed her.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
The door to Elena's room is open. Sicilian morning light pouring through the corridor windows. It has no business illuminating a dead woman's doorway. But light doesn't know that. It just falls where it falls.
I used to be like that.
The medical team I've hired to live on site while the women are here has already cut her down. Elena is on the bed, positioned with the careful dignity of professionals who arrived too late and still believe in procedure.
The knotted bedsheet is on the floor. Already bagged.
There's no note, she didn't leave one. I check everywhere. The nightstand. The writing desk. Nothing. Maybe she had nothing left to say to a world that took everything from her and then offered her a beautiful room as compensation.
I saved her. Pulled her from that compound. Gave her clean sheets and doctors and food…
And she used my clean sheets to hang herself.
Fuck this.
My fists curl at my sides. The fury is wrong. Directionless. No throat to put my hands around. No face to hit. She is the enemy and the victim and both are already gone.
"Cover her," I tell the medics. "Get Dr. Ferretti on the phone. She'll need to be moved out of here as soon as possible. The Syndicate will need a report too, they'll have to decide how to deal with this," I say, already walking out.
The morning light follows me down the corridor and I want to put my fist through every window it touches.
I can't go to Violet, if I go to her, I'll have to tell her and that will break her heart.
I need to think, and there's one place I can do it, without the entire world interrupting me. I go straight to my study, closing the door behind me and drawing the blind, shutting the rest of the estate out.
This room has clean lines and dark wood and problems I know how to solve, which is more than I can say for the dead woman in the guest wing and the living one in my bed who doesn't know yet.
I pour a whiskey. Put it on the desk. I won't drink it, not this early in the morning, but having it there makes me feel like I have one thing in this room I control. Pathetic. But there it is.
