Page 175 of Reign

Elena’s arms fold over her stomach. “I watched her get taken from this very window.”

The room sharpens around us.

The crib. The camera. The polished walls. The view of the drive.

Of course.

That’s why she came here. Hurt has a way of calling people back to the place it first learned their name.

I look at the window again, and this time, I see it how she must have seen it.

A little girl behind glass.

Too far away to stop anything.

Close enough to watch.

“Do you want to leave?” I ask.

Her eyes cut to mine. “Why is that your first instinct?”

“Because you came in here to breathe, and now you barely are.”

She shakes her head once. “Sometimes you need to sit in the hurt, Luciano.”

I don’t like that answer.

I like less that I understand it.

“Sometimes it’s good,” she says quietly.

“There are better things to sit in.”

That earns me a look. Weak, but there.

“You’re very annoying when you’re trying not to be nice.”

“I’m never trying to be nice.”

“Sure.”

I let that go.

Mostly because she’s still staring at the window, and I don’t know what expression is on my face. Something dangerous, probably. Something I should fix before she looks at me again and realizes how badly I want to put a bullet into a memory.

The room has her by the throat now. I can see it. The glass. The drive. The exact place where a child stood and watched her mother disappear.

Her breathing changes.

Too shallow.

Too controlled.

Too Elena.

Then she whispers, “Anaranjada.”

Everything in me stills.