Blood and Fire (McClouds & Friends #8)(172)

A nod, and they launched into Vivaldi’s “Four Seasons.”





Bruno gasped as the music slammed into him like an eighteenwheeler. He hung on to reality by a thread. The music dragged him back to that hour in Julian’s car, lying in the backseat with a smothering black mask over his head, wondering what was happening to Lily.

His blood pressure dipped, his stomach flopped. He gasped for breath. Everything swirled and spun.

“. . . the matter? Bruno? Are you OK? Bruno!”

He was against a column, Lily’s shoulder bracing him. He dragged her anxious face into focus.

“Are you OK?” she asked. “Should I call someone? Are you sick?”

“Just get me away from this f*cking music. Please. Fast.”

He kept his arm around her as she steered him away from the music. It almost disappeared when she pushed through a door into a dark, quiet corridor. She opened the first door she found, which proved to be some sort of library. She positioned him in front of a wingback chair. He thudded into it, still gasping for breath.

Lily put her hands on her hips. “So. What’s this all about?” she asked. “You don’t like baroque violin suites?”

“Nah, they’re OK.” He swallowed, his mouth trembling. “That particular piece was playing on the car radio while Julian was driving me to King’s headquarters. It’s just . . . it’s a bad memory.”

“Ah. I see.” She squeezed his shoulder. “Wait here. Be right back.”

“Lily! Don’t—” Don’t go. He was saying it to empty air.

He lurched to his feet, but his knees wobbled, and he flopped back down again, despair opening inside him like a sinkhole.

He’d scared her off. Too needy. She didn’t want any part of his cracked-up, stressed-out bullshit, and he didn’t blame her.

He could chase her through the ballroom, bleating for her love, but how pathetic, how useless, how undignified would that be? How painful for everyone to watch. All he could do now was try not to lose his shit at Kev’s wedding. That would be selfish, and childish.

“Hey.” The door opened. His heart sprang up into the air.

Lily held a steaming cup in her hand. “I saw them setting up the coffee station. Thought you could use a shot of caffeine.” His eyes drank her in and overflowed. He covered them with his hand. “Thanks,” he said thickly.

Her shoes clicked toward him. She held the cup out. He drained it in a couple deep swallows. It helped. He grabbed her hand. “Don’t go.”

“Um.” She stared down to where her wrist was swallowed by his hand. She was looking at his scars. He wasn’t sure at what point in their adventure he’d gotten them. That whole last day was a blur of pain and fire, with a few highlights pointing out, like spikes.

Like the part where he’d let King convince him that Lily was one of the guy’s operatives.

She wasn’t pulling away, though.

“So you’ve got the kids,” she said. “You’ve adopted them?”

“I’m in the process. They’ve been with me for a few weeks now.”

“Are they, um . . . OK?” she asked, delicately.

He shrugged. “They seem to be OK. They’re great kids. Holy terrors, particularly Tonio. Zia Rosa tells me he’s exactly like me.”

“How did you find out their names?”

“We didn’t. We named them, Zia and I. For Tony and Mamma. Antonio and Magdalena. They didn’t have names. Evidently King didn’t assign names until the third year, when the programming began.”

She shivered. “How awful.”

“It’s better,” he said. “It was appropriate to name them for Tony and Mamma. Tonio’s a big boss. He runs the show, or thinks he does. And Lena’s a diva, pulling all of Tonio’s strings. They’re awesome.”

“And you?” She tugged his hand gently. “How is it for you?”

He smiled and shook his head. “It’s good,” he said. “Difficult. Crazy. I don’t sleep much, but I never really did. I love those kids. And I’m glad to be doing something hard, and important. I’m lucky I have something to give a shit about.” He paused. “Under the circumstances.”

A tremor went through her. “So,” she said, with forced brightness. “What do they call you, then? Bruno? Uncle Bruno? Zio Bruno?”

“No,” he said. “They call me Daddy.”

She blinked. “They don’t need a brother or an uncle,” he went on. “They need a father. I never had one, but they’re damn well going to.”

“Ah.” There was an awkward silence. “Well. It’s amazing. And so lucky that you got them before King started, um, messing with them.”

“Wouldn’t have mattered if he had messed with them. King messed with me, and my mamma still thought I was worth saving.”

“Of course you were,” she soothed. “I wasn’t questioning that.”

Her eyes were big, wary. He was making her nervous. Cool it.

“What happened to those other kids we found?” she asked timidly. “The teenagers who were in the white room? Are they OK?”

He shook his head. “They’re struggling,” he said. “The fewer years of programming they’ve gone through, the better off they are. There were thirty younger ones, and they’re hanging in there. But don’t you know all this? I figured Liv or Edie would keep you up to date.”