The Black Wolf (In the Company of Killers, #5)(62)

So she starts speaking in Italian.

Great—more reason I wish Victor was here, or at least talking to me into my ear.

Francesca and Valentina go back and forth in their native language for half a minute, and all I take from the conversation is that whoever Sian is, Francesca must really hate her, and that whatever she’s done, or said, is worse than being tripped by a guest slave and spilling wine on the floor, or even forgetting to address a master properly, maybe even worse than a slave looking Francesca straight in her eyes and telling her to f*ck off—I fear for this Sian, I really do. And by that look of dread on Emilio’s face, maybe he does too. The second Sian’s name was mentioned to Francesca, Emilio became someone different; his personality shifted so drastically that I feel like I have whiplash. His brown eyes churn with apprehension; his shoulders are stiff; his hands open and close into fists at his sides; he looks trapped, his only way out blocked by a terrifying sister he loves and yet…hates at the same time? I never would’ve imagined that of Emilio, but it’s there, as plain as day on his face. What a confusing, f*cked up family the Morettis are—and I thought our little family of killers had issues.

“I will deal with Sian myself,” Francesca tells Valentina in English so we clearly understand. That can only mean she wants us to know what’s going on, and that worries me immensely.

Francesca smiles at us.

“Come,” she says, gesturing. “Since you are here, Niklas, and you are a generous paying guest, I would like to show you my way of dealing with a whore—a true whore.”

Niklas stands from the sofa, taking me with him. Nora follows suit.

“Since we’re waiting on the cyprians,” Niklas says casually, straightening his tie, “a little side entertainment sounds good to me.”

“Brother?” Francesca calls out, looking over her shoulder at Emilio. “Join us won’t you?” It wasn’t a request.

Emilio looks at the floor, unable to look his sister in the eyes. I would normally think him a coward; I’d probably laugh at him inside, glad to see the * knocked from his pedestal, but for some stupid reason I can’t even fathom, I feel…bad for him.

“You don’t have to do this, Sister,” Emilio says.

“Oh, but I do.” She smiles wickedly.

Then she walks out ahead of Valentina, and everyone except the slave girls follow behind her. We file into the glass elevator and Valentina presses the button for floor three, and down we go, into the unknown and it terrifies me. It’s not a long way down a few floors, and the elevator isn’t particularly slow, but it feels like it’s taking forever—and I wish that it would. I catch myself looking at Emilio from behind, watching him struggle in his copper skin; the outline of his jaw rigid; his Adam’s apple bobbing in his throat. And I look at Francesca standing next to him, and she’s his opposite: calm and powerful, tall and dangerous, excited and vengeful, a woman who thrives on unjust punishment, who seems to have her poor brother’s nuts crushed figuratively in her hand so that if he ever opposes her, she’ll make sure he never forgets it. But their relationship is still a mystery to me, now more than ever—I don’t think I’ve ever been so confused.

Moving down one long stretch of white hallway, I see a small group of women out ahead—housekeepers, servants—standing outside a room, all huddled around it, waiting, for what I don’t know. A dozen faces all look up simultaneously when they see us—Francesca, particularly—coming toward them. They scatter, moving quickly away from the door and lining up single file along the wall on the other side of the hallway; I see one woman dressed in a white and baby-blue maid’s uniform, cross herself, mouthing a prayer.

My eyes dart from the women to the opened door still several feet out ahead when a scream pierces the air. Shouting. Angry shouting. Two, three different voices; one louder and more belligerent than the others. And amid all the shouts and screams, I hear the tiny wailing of a baby and my heart dies a little more every inch I walk further into that unknown.

“Please! Don’t take her!” the young woman’s voice roars, traveling down the hallway and into my ears uninvited—I feel like I’m being punished.

Francesca steps into the room and we follow. Like the rest of the mansion, the space is vast. And white. So much white. But this room, with a giant four-poster bed situated between two grand windows filtering in the night through the curtain-less glass, has been stained by blood; the crimson color has soiled the bed sheets; a small pile of bloody linen lies on the floor beside the bed.

The doctor, presumably, walks out of a side room; the sound of latex snapping as he removes the bloodied gloves from his hands. No words are spoken by or to the doctor; apparently he’s done here, and so he takes up his bag of tools and his brown leather long-coat hanging over the back of a chair, and he exits the room, moving past the wide-eyed women now all crossing their chests and mouthing prayers.

“Madam, I’m begging you,” the young woman in the bed who I’m sure is Sian, pleads. “Don’t take her from me. I’ll do anything…” Tears stream down her face; her long black hair is drenched in sweat; someone hit her in the left eye; it’s turning yellow and brown and black, swelling above her cheekbone.

I glance at Emilio—he’s shaking; he’s holding back the true measure of it, but it’s no mistake he’s shaking.