32. Hyacinth
THIRTY-TWO
HYACINTH
I reach out for the bottle of painkillers, but Zane pulls it out of my reach.
I drop my arm onto the pillow and scowl at him. “What?” I ask.
“You already had the max dose,” he says, reading the label. “The doctor was clear about how often you’re allowed to take this.”
Yes, the pain is dulled, but it’s still there. I lift my arm and don’t grimace through it, although it’s a near thing.
“And stop moving the arm!” Zane takes my wrist and places it back down on the mattress.
“There are still a lot of things to take care of,” I point out. “I’ll be able to get things done a lot easier if I’m in less pain.”
Removing the bullet and sewing me up somehow didn’t relieve the pain, now that I’m not seething with rage towards Keith.
Funny, how violent intent works as the best anesthesia.
“There’s nothing you need to be taking care of.” Zane’s fingers flex on my wrist. “Now behave, or I won’t give you what you want so desperately when you are all healed up.”
My body tingles from the dominance in his voice, and I sigh.
Fine.
Maybe I can take a small break to heal properly.
I settle back into his bed, the sheets only partially covering me. The only thing I’m wearing is the bandage around my arm and a pair of horrible boxers Zane forced on me before the doctor arrived.
Zane strokes my hair gently, and I’m reminded of how Chrys would try to comfort me after the worst training sessions.
I need to send her a text.
“I won’t be able to do any jobs for you for a while,” I say. “Not because of the arm. That’s, a month, tops. But Keith announced my name in front of a bunch of cameras. Supposedly the footage won’t be shown publicly, but until we can be sure it’s all gone…”
“If all of my opponents dropped like flies all at once, it would be all but waltzing into the police station and begging to be caught,” Zane points out. “A break will be fine. We can handle things differently. Creatively. As for the footage…”
His lips purse, and he takes a moment to consider.
“We’ll have to wait and see,” he finally says. “If it gets released, it gets released, and we’ll deal with it then. I have ideas for how to do damage control.”
If it gets released, it gets released.
That would mean that I’d have to be even more careful. Even more of a ghost.
Or it would mean that I couldn’t do this work at all.
I don’t know how to feel about that.
A life where my job isn’t killing seems… wrong.
I don’t even hate it. I relished murdering Keith and those men who hurt Chrys. But maybe there is some version of me that could do less of it.
And definitely not at Forest or Dante’s whim.
I sigh and settle in closer to him. “I want to be useful to you,” I admit. “My entire life, that’s the only thing that mattered. Serving the family.”
“You’re going to be my partner,” Zane says matter-of-factly, like that’s the simplest thing in the world coming from a man who’d been so deep into the closet that he could see fantasy worlds.
“It wouldn’t be a good idea to publicize, even to my men, that you’re an assassin.
Too many people have loose lips, and until I determine who can be trusted…
Well. We’ll have to figure out other ways you can help me.
When you aren’t tied up in my bed, at least.”
I press my lips against his clothed thigh. “I expect to be tied up at least half the time.”
After the whole ordeal with Keith, I half expect to balk at the idea, but all it does is make my exhausted body grow warm.
It’s not like the problem was the bondage. And I’d gotten myself out.
I might need to place tools around Zane’s room too.
I trust him, but…
Just in case.
“Mm, half the time? I think I can manage that.” Zane strokes my hair. “Once you’re healed, we’ll be experimenting with different ways to make you cry.”
I groan at the thought. “Crying? Really? That was the worst one.”
Fucking embarrassing, honestly, that I’d burst into tears because of a minor whipping.
On the other hand, if Zane wants to see my tears… I’ll give them to him.
“It’s my favorite,” Zane replies. “So I don’t give a fuck what you think about it.” He smirks at me. “Deal with it.”
I smile and nuzzle higher up his thigh. “I might be able to deal with it. If you show me just how much you like it. You could get a tear or two out of me if you fucked my face now.”
“Or you could rest and heal.” Zane twists his fingers in my hair, tugging hard to get me to look up at him. “Which I suspect is more torturous to you than anything else I could do.”
I let out a long-suffering sigh. “It really is. I get so bored with nothing to do. Last time I was injured, I rotted my brain with internet videos. I let the auto-suggest thing go on endlessly. I could feel my brain cells seeping out of my ear.”
“I’ll find something to keep you entertained,” Zane says. “Something that isn’t sex.”
I grumble, but I can’t deny that it feels good to have somebody looking after me.
I’m about to suggest we both go to sleep when my cell phone starts buzzing obnoxiously.
Zane picks it up from the bedside table.
“Let it go to voice mail,” I say, nudging my head against his thigh. “Whoever it is, they’re not important.”
He glances at the screen, which should bother me but somehow doesn’t. “It’s your sister.” He taps ‘accept call’ and holds it out to me.
“Hyacinth?” Chrys asks. Her voice is on speaker. “You didn’t answer my texts earlier.”
I close my eyes. “I didn’t see them earlier. You know I’m not always available, Chrys.”
“You’re supposed to always be available for me,” she says, sounding far perkier than she had the last time we’d talked. “You left without saying anything! I wanted to take you out to dinner first.”
“Something came up. Sorry.” I try to sit up, but Zane puts pressure on my head to keep me down. “Anyway. I can probably visit you in a month?”
“Why a month?” Chrys demands. “I thought you’d given up on your current job. Come back sooner so you can help me unpack in my new place. I have an extra room for you and everything.”
“I’d love to help,” I say truthfully. “Give me… two weeks, then.”
Zane stays quiet, but his grip on my shoulder tightens.
“You quit your job, you hate New Valence, but you’re not hurrying to come home?” There’s an edge of suspicion in her voice. “Okay, spill. What’s actually going on?”
“Nothing,” I say quickly. “I’m fine. Just tired right now. I can call you back later and—”
“Hello, Chrys,” Zane interrupts me. “Zane Vilani here. It’s nice to meet you.”
There’s a beat of silence on the other end of the line. “Zane Vilani,” she repeats, her voice sweet. “Oh, I’ve heard all about you.”
Zane eyes me. “Is that so?”
“Mhm. My little brother is absolutely gone for you,” Chrys says.
“We’re twins,” I say with a huff of annoyance. “Anyway, now you know. I am having a sex-filled honeymoon period and can’t possibly remove Zane’s dick from my ass long enough to visit you.”
“Bring him with you,” she suggests without missing a beat. “He’ll be very useful in helping unpack your room.”
“Afraid I can’t take a vacation right now,” Zane says, and to his credit, he does sound apologetic. “But your brother went and got himself injured, so he’s not permitted to travel until he’s healed a little more.”
Chrys pauses again. “You what? By who? Do I need to come down there and take care of it myself?”
“He’s a non-issue now,” I say. “And it’s only a minor injury. I can barely feel it.”
“He’s lying,” Zane retorts. “Do you want me to punch him in the injured arm for you?”
Chrys hums. “Not this time. So are you going to tell me what happened, or do I need to start making guesses?”
Zane looks at me with a quirked brow.
“Guess whatever you want,” I say. “Oh, look, another incoming call. I’ll talk to you later. Bye!”
I try to press the end-call button, but Zane lifts the phone out of my reach, again.
“He’ll call you tomorrow,” Zane promises before he does end the call.
I grumble in annoyance. “She’ll expect that call now. And just watch, she’s going to hop on a plane to visit me.”
“Sorry,” he says, not sounding sorry at all. He strokes my hair again. “How much have you told her about me?”
I shrug. “Everything. I was exhausted from the flight, she needed a distraction. And… wow, that was yesterday morning.”
I should be mad that Zane interrupted the call at all, but aside from a small twinge of protectiveness toward Chrys, I realize I don’t mind.
It isn’t bad to have Chrys know that I’m injured.
It’s nice to know that Zane is looking out for me.
“She cares a lot about you,” Zane says. “And you trust her.”
“I do. She’s the person I’m closest to. But I don’t want to worry her either.” I glance up at him. “I don’t think I thanked you, by the way. For coming for me.”
“Of course I did,” Zane says. “I wasn’t going to leave you to that. You’re mine.”
The word settles around my throat like a collar. It’s a beautiful, comforting feeling, and I shift so my head is properly on his lap.
“There was a good chance I could have gotten out on my own, though,” I add.
“There was,” Zane agrees, “but that doesn’t mean I was going to leave you to it.” He’s silent for a moment, then he says quietly, “Someone came for me once. And I would’ve died if he hadn’t.”
I look up at him, and I see the vulnerability in his eyes. “What happened?” I ask softly.
He’d said he’d been betrayed by somebody he trusted, but I never found out more than that.
“My father,” he begins slowly, “was a good man. As good as you can be in this line of work, at least. But for all of his faults, he loved me more than anything. I lost my mother when I was young, and he was both running this empire and making sure I had a good life.” He strokes my hair.
“I was sixteen, and I was stupid. I trusted someone whose family had a grudge against mine. I didn’t even think before getting into the car with him.
Next thing I knew, I was waking up in a shitty warehouse. ”
His jaw clenches.
“It wasn’t pleasant, to put it lightly. But before they could put me out of my misery, the cavalry arrived.
My father was with them, which was exactly what Ben’s family had counted on.
They killed him,” he continues. He huffs out a humorless laugh.
“I’ve never told anyone before. Only Richard knew. ”
“I’m sorry,” I say. “I can’t imagine losing the one person who supports you.”
If anything happened to Chrys or Lionel…
Shit, I’m going to need to confront Dante and Forest at some point. Later.
But the mention of Richard reminds me, too.
“Did you get my text?” I ask. “Forest let slip that he had some sort of deal with Richard.”
“I did,” Zane says. “I didn’t understand it at first, but it helped. I should’ve realized it earlier. He was the one who’d vetted my bodyguards. Apparently he was paying them to be sloppy.”
“For what it’s worth, I would have gotten past them even if they weren’t sloppy,” I say.
But he does need actual competent bodyguards. Ones who don’t let him exit a building first, for example.
“I’ll vet the next round,” I state. “And they’ll know who they’ll answer to if a single hair on your body is harmed.” I smile up at him.
“Stefan is the only one of them I trust,” Zane tells me.
“Beyond that, yes, I do need to replace all of them. Bill tried to blackmail me, for fuck’s sake.
” He shakes his head. “I have a lot of work to do with my men. I let a lot of things slip.” He sighs.
“I almost let my father’s legacy slip through my fingers. ”
This sounds like a project.
The Vilani Family might not be as old as the Cuore Family or Bouchard Syndicate, but they’re respected. There’s no reason to let all that respect disappear, all because of Richard—and Forest’s—scheming.
“I’ll help you.” I raise my good arm to stroke his jaw. “I’ll be by your side, and we’ll strike fear into the hearts of all your enemies. And maybe pull out a few hearts, once I’m in better shape.”
I don’t need my cousins’ approval.
Zane promised me forever. I want it.
I want it so badly.
I deserve forever as much as anyone else.