Page 571 of Reign

“Then why are you bothering me?”

“Because when Luciano wakes up and sees you covered in his blood, he’ll decide this is somehow my fault.”

“I’ll tell him I refused.”

“That will only piss him off that both of us ignored his instructions.”

“He can reprimand me too.”

Rafael glances at me. “I suspect our consequences would be very different.”

I stare at him.

His expression remains perfectly serious.

A laugh escapes me before I can stop it.

It sounds strange in the corridor, thin and slightly broken, but it’s still a laugh.

Rafael holds out the scrubs again.

I take them.

“You’re right about that. Where’s the bathroom?”

His mouth twitches. “Directly behind you.”

I change.

I wash Luciano’s blood from my face, my arms, and beneath my fingernails. The water runs pink before disappearing down the drain.

No matter how hard I scrub, I can still feel it on my hands.

When I return, Rafael is sitting outside the closed doors.

I take the chair beside him.

Then we wait.

Every time the doors open, I stand.

Every time someone walks through without saying Luciano’s name, I sit again.

Rafael answers calls in a low voice. I hear Angelo’s name. Santo’s. Men securing the road. The vehicle. The bodies.

I stop listening.

The clock above the doors moves too slowly.

One hour becomes two.

Sometime during the third, Rafael drapes his jacket over me.

“I’m not tired,” I tell him.

“I didn’t say you were.”

I close my eyes because the lights hurt.