Across the room, Lorenzo is moving toward me now, his own men spreading, clearing, shouting that the suite is secure. He stops a few feet away, looking down at me with a face I can’t read anymore.
Maybe because my vision is going.
“Did she call you?” I manage.
My voice sounds like hell.
His jaw tightens. “Yes.”
I nod once or try to. “You know. He took her.”
“I know.”
Of course he does now. The irony would almost be funny if I could feel enough for that.
I look past him at Cesaro’s body sprawled in a widening stain of blood and shadow, and some ugly knot inside me loosens.
At least that bastard dies tonight. It means my death won’t be in vain.
Lorenzo crouches. It should feel like a victory to make him kneel in front of me. Instead it just feels exhausting.
I look at Lorenzo. At the man who has ruined Birdie and been ruined by her right back. At the man I wanted to kill not an hour ago. At the man whose child she carries.
Christ. What a mess.
“She chose safety,” I say, the words scraping out of me. “That was all. Do you understand?”
His expression flickers. I keep going because there may not be time for him to understand.
“She didn’t love me,” I tell him. “She was surviving.”
Something terrible moves through his face at that.
“She called me because she was afraid,” I whisper. “Don’t make her regret it.”
The room is dimming at the edges now.
Someone is shouting for medics.
Someone is swearing.
Lorenzo says something I don’t catch.
I force my eyes open wider.
“One more thing.”
His gaze locks on mine.
I smile or try to. “If you break her worse than you already have…” My breath catches hard. “I’ll come back and haunt you.”
For the first time all night, something like grim understanding touches his face.
Then the strength goes out of me at once.
All of it starts slipping.
My last clear thought is not of war.
