Assassin's Heart (Assassin's Heart, #1)(63)

“Marcello will be angry.”

“He’s always angry.” I paused. “Why did you do it? Why did you tell Lefevre you were the murderer?”

Les rolled over. “It was the right thing to do,” he mumbled.

I poled us under a bridge. He’d put me before himself. I’d never known anyone who helped people just because he wanted to help them, and yet Les did so again and again. And it wasn’t just me he helped.

He made me want to . . . I wasn’t sure. Do something or be someone different.

To trust him fully, anyway. It was the least I could offer him in return.

Somehow I managed to reach Marcello’s. I helped Les off the boat, my arms aching from steering it down the canals.

Getting Les into the tunnel was easy. Getting him up the ladder at the other end was not. His feet slipped off the rungs and he kept apologizing. He sounded so genuinely ashamed that guilty tears came to my eyes until finally I called for help.

The tunnel room above us flared with light, and a shadow stepped into the room.

“I thought I said you weren’t welcome here,” Marcello said from out of sight, his voice stern.

“It’s Alessio,” I said. “He’s hurt.”

The grate opened and Marcello leaned over us, lantern in hand, looking so much like my father. He glared at me, but then Les apologized again and I almost went berserk, prepared to scream and threaten my uncle, anything really, to make him help us.

Marcello set his lantern on the ground. He crouched, and together we lifted Les up the short ladder into the room.

He vomited again, and Marcello looked worried. I pulled myself out of the tunnel and into the room.

“What happened?” he asked me.

“We were attacked. He cracked his skull on a stone wall.”

Marcello swore. He used his shoulder to escort Les out of the tunnel room and into their great room. He gestured at the lantern. “Bring the light.”

We walked past the fireplace to the curtained-off bedroom area. Marcello helped Alessio to a bed, and Les sat on the edge.

“Hold steady,” Marcello said. He bent Les’s head forward and prodded the back of his skull.

Les flinched, but Marcello forced him still and continued to feel beneath his dark hair.

Finally, he stood, satisfied. “The bone isn’t fractured. He’ll heal with some rest. Help me get him to bed.”

I unbuckled his leathers and pulled them off his arms and chest, being careful not to bump his head or snag his pendant.

When I’d seen him shirtless before, I’d stared. Now he looked so tired and hurt that there was no excitement in seeing him, only more guilt.

Marcello tugged off Les’s boots and pants while I removed the tie in his hair. I always hated sleeping with my hair pulled back. It gave me a headache.

His hair was soft and smooth as it slipped through my fingers. Les lay down, and my uncle covered him with a blanket.

“Sleep for now, Alessio,” Marcello murmured, pushing the hair off Les’s face. It was a surprisingly gentle and loving gesture from a man I’d seen mostly rage and anger from. “I’ll have to wake you occasionally, to make sure you’re healing right.”

Les mumbled something in a language I didn’t speak, and my uncle leaned closer. When Marcello looked at me with a calculating expression, I turned away, giving them their privacy.

“Yes, I understand.” Marcello kissed Alessio’s forehead, and we left him to rest.

I walked to the fireplace and collapsed into a chair. Fatigue covered me like a shroud. Since the fire it seemed I always found myself on the edge of exhaustion.

I set my mask on the table and rubbed my face. My hands were filthy, but I didn’t care. It was time to stop caring about a lot of things.

Marcello handed me a glass with amber liquor. I drank it and it burned down my throat until it settled into a deep warmth in my stomach. He took a seat, eyeing his own glass before drinking.

I placed the empty glass on the table, and my left shoulder burned with pain. I gasped and sat back, bringing my hand to it.

“You’re injured.” Marcello stood.

“No, it’s nothing. I just . . .” I closed my eyes and sighed. “Can you help me remove some stitches? They’ve mostly snapped at this point.”

He set his glass down and walked away.

I undid the buckles of my leathers, letting them slide around my waist. I sat half-dressed, wearing only my leather trousers and my under-leather camisole, but I was so tired it didn’t matter. The fire kept the room warm, and more than anything I wished to bathe, to curl up in a bed somewhere and maybe never wake.

My shoulder was red and inflamed, but the wound in front appeared closed, a pink scar stretching smoothly across the flesh. I looked down and gasped.

Beneath my loose camisole and across my chest, from below my breastbone and up to my clavicles, stretched a violent purple bruise from when the giant had rammed into me. I pressed against the bone, and pain flowed across my tissue. I bit back a whimper.

Marcello returned with a medical kit. He glanced at me. “What’s the key to?”

I looked at my key hanging around my neck. “My home.”

He didn’t comment. Instead he pulled out a small scissors and examined my shoulder.

“What happened?” he asked gruffly. He began to snip and pull out the threads on the back of my shoulder.