"I have to take this one,dolcezza. I'm sorry." Giancarlo was already backing away, his expression a mix of relief and regret.
Sarica stared at him in frustration. "But we—-"
"This would only take a few minutes. I'll be right back."
Giancarlo was gone before she could answer him, and contrary to his promise of a few minutes, half an hour had already passed with no sign of his return.
Aaaargh.
Sarica wished she still had it in her to drop an F-bomb, but she didn't really want to.
I'm sorry, God.
She had known even then that the promise she had made was pointless and stupid. But at that time, she herself had been made stupid by grief and despair, and falling back on her old bad habits was all she could think of.
Since rebelling in her younger years had been her way of grabbing Giancarlo's attention, she had decided to start swearing in hopes that a still-missing Giancarlo would hear of it and he'd be so incensed that he'd come right back to scold her.
Ugh.
God might as well take back her brains if she were to ever act that stupid again. And besides, even if Giancarlo didn't want to admit it just yet—-
They both knew he was hers.
Always was.
Always would be.
But—-
Sarica struggled against the urge to seethe in jealousy.
Was there really someone else who had Giancarlo's one and only bare-chested photo?
The thought nagged at Sarica as afternoon bled into evening with no sign of his return. She paced the luxurious prison, remembering how careful he'd been with his answers, how guilt had flashed across his face at her assumption.
Hmm.
There was only one way to get him back to the room, and Sarica put her plan into motion first thing the next morning.
"I'm sorry," she told the attendant who regularly brought her breakfast, making sure her voice carried to the others hovering nearby. "But I'm going on a hunger strike."
The effect was immediate. The staff started to panic, speaking rapidly among themselves in Arabic, and thank God for Dauphin's insistence on language training, which allowed Sarica to catch fragments of their conversation.
The master will kill us...
But we're not supposed to disturb him...
What about his wife?
Sarica's knees buckled, and she grabbed the back of a chair just in time to keep herself from crashing.
His wife?
Surely they could not be talking about her Giancarlo.
Right?
The room suddenly felt too small, the air too thin, and Sarica could feel her face lose color as memories assaulted her heart.
