Page 74 of Ruthless

Sara nods toward my upper arm, where a stray bullet hit me. “So are you.” Wincing, she runs her finger over my torn flesh. “It looks like it went clean through, but there might be a transverse laceration. We need to get you up to the?—”

I sweep her up mid-lecture, my voice a low croon. “Oh,coniglietta, you know I love it when you talk medical to me.”

“What the hell are you doing? Put me down! You’re going to give yourself a grade three tear, and then you’ll never be able to lift your rocket launcher again!”

I chuckle and ignore her sweet little protests. When we reach the stairwell leading to the basement, we slip through the hidden door to the main house.

In truth, I like when she fusses over me. Considering my life is spent ensuring everyone else stays upright and breathing, it’s a rare luxury to be the one tended to. I could get used to this, though.

As we cross over into familiar terrain, she relaxes against me in that way you do when you’re returning home, and my chest tightens.

Thanks to Luca, the power is back on in the main house, and Sara and I ride up to my office on the second floor, still bickering over who needs to be treated first. She presses her hands to my wound to help stem the already-slowing bleeding.

The house is a flurry of activity on all floors. Staff race up and down the stairwell carrying medical supplies, and the radios echo through the halls as soldiers coordinate body removal before the police arrive. We have a gas-fired industrial furnace for a reason beyond the cold winter nights.

I should bring Sara to the clinic to get her hand checked out, but she seems okay, and I need her to myself for a bit.

I struggle to drag air into my frozen lungs. I was so close to losing her. Her cell, the very place she was supposed to be the safest, almost became her grave. When I consider how differently the night could have gone, my hands shake even harder.

Once upon a time, I would have hated her for making me feel this way. Now, I only hug her closer and pray that, unlike Zanni, Sara remains blind to my weakness.

Frustrated, I kick open the door and plop her onto the edge of my desk. “Even if I’m bleeding out, you come first. Now, give me your hand.”

She sticks her lower lip out in a pout but does as she’s told, presenting her hand for me to unfurl the leash. Due to how tightly she wound it, her fingertips are bloodless while her palm is red and swollen. The indentations where the chain cut her skin seep in several places.

Just an hour ago, I snapped a woman’s neck in a secret act of mercy after watching her get flayed to a bloody pulp, but it’s these small cuts on Sara’s hand that leave me rattled and unsettled. “Why do you do that to yourself?”

Sara hunches over. I don’t really expect an answer, so I’m surprised when she speaks. “I started doing it to help curb myanxiety and then couldn’t stop. It’s always worse when I’m stressed.”

“When did you start? You never did this while we were together.”

She visibly braces herself. “Five years ago.”

My chest wrenches. Five years ago. So basically, just after circumstances tore us apart.

I don’t have the bandwidth to process this right now. All I can claim with any certainty is that my previous doubts about Sara’s involvement are growing.

It’s hard to tell whether I want to yell at her or embrace her, so I concentrate on peeling the chain out of her skin, one section at a time. When she’s free, I throw the leash and chain in the trash and pull out an emergency first aid kit from the bottom drawer of my desk.

Sara studies me, her muscles bunching up as I pour alcohol on a cotton pad and swab her palm. When I pass over the deepest wound, she winces, and I curse myself beneath my breath. My injured arm causes some clumsiness, but I’ve been shot before, so I’m no stranger to working through pain. This one is relatively mild, which suggests that I should be healed up in a few weeks.

Once I’ve cleansed her hand, I wrap it in gauze that I smooth out with a satisfied pat.

Sara inspects my handiwork with a thoughtful expression. “Not bad. Thank you, Dante.”

Normally, I would prioritize my need for answers over all else, but I never realized the intense satisfaction that comes with caring for someone else. Helping them heal. When she looks at me like I’ve hung the stars in the sky and named them each for her, the agony in my arm disappears.

Gripping her hips, I pull her to the edge of the desk and bend down, intent on claiming her lips. From the doorway, Luca clears his throat.

I sigh, resting my forehead against Sara’s. “When did you get here?”I’m so fucking tired of all of this.

Luca looks between the two of us before meeting my eyes. “I just got done correlating the event history in the system. Someone used a level four administrative override code to put the primary sensors, the ones we have on all the doors,andthe camera arrays into maintenance mode ten minutes before the breach. I double-checked to see if it was done digitally by a hacker, but it was a clean software kill.”

I curse under my breath. “Perfect.”

Luca stops my impending rant.“However, the fucker didn’t account for the redundant analog tripwires on the secondary loop we installed a few weeks ago. That’s how we caught the trigger.”

My fingers tighten on Sara’s hips.