25. Deirdre
Deirdre
I t’s a couple more songs before I realize Elio’s fallen asleep.
When I notice, I immediately cease playing, lowering my bow and my violin to my sides.
My arms tingle, and there’s a lightness in me that isn’t just the giddiness of the alcohol.
It felt good to play like that. I can’t believe it, but it felt good to play for him.
I thought he’d ruined violin for me, maybe forever. I thought I’d never get back to the heart of it, never be able to love it again. The one talent I shared with my beautiful mother. I thought he’d ripped it away.
But he hasn’t. I actually wanted to play for him tonight. And seeing how relaxed he is, how the slower music helped him fall asleep, makes my chest feel like it’s filled with warm honey.
Quietly, I set the violin and bow down. As I do so, I’m surprised to see something sparkling on my left hand. The ring. I never took it off.
I forgot to. How the hell did I forget to? When Elio gave it to me, I told him I’d only wear it for a little bit. And now, it’s like it’s a part of me. I didn’t even notice it was there.
I should go take it off. And head back to my own bed. Elio is sound asleep, his big, bare chest rising and falling with quick, shallow breaths. I won’t wake him if I leave.
Which I should.
But…
I don’t.
On silent feet I pad over to the bed, turning off the bedside lamps.
Before I can stop to think or let logic back in, I lift the blankets and scoot in beside him.
I don’t get too close – I’m nearest his really bruised side, and I don’t want to poke any tender places.
So instead, I lie on my side facing him, and I settle for placing my hand flat on his chest. His skin feels very warm, his heart throbbing beneath my fingers.
I wonder if he’s dreaming, and if he is, what he’s dreaming of. Blood. Money.
Me.
I stay like that, my hand on his chest, and eventually I fall asleep. I don’t have any dreams. But some time later, I’m woken in the darkness so suddenly that I almost feel like I’m dreaming. The bed feels like it’s moving, and it takes me longer than it should to realize that I really am awake.
But no. It’s not the bed moving. It’s Elio.
I suppress a cry and flinch out of the way just in time to avoid a flailing arm.
“Shit,” I whisper, pulse racing. I crawl to the edge of the bed and turn on the lamp before spinning back to see what the hell is going on.
The first thing I notice is the unnatural way Elio is arching, digging his head back into the pillows. The fist the flew by my head a second ago is now wrapped in blankets, and he’s pulling, like he’s fighting something.
“Elio? Elio!”
His eyes are open, but there’s no way that he sees me. His gaze shoots sightlessly around the room, wide and dark and blank. He’s panting hard, his skin flushed and sweaty. He groans, but it’s kind of choked. Muted. Like in the dream, he’s trying to scream.
He’s going to hurt himself.
He’s moving way too much for someone in his condition.
“Elio,” I say, crawling towards him. “Elio, you’re dreaming.”
“Fire… Get… Out…”
I barely register the words, they’re so strangled, so raw.
“Have to get my Songbird out. "
“Elio! I’m right here!” Not knowing what else to do, I lean over his contorted face and press my hands to his jaw, trying to wake him, to focus him, to make him see me.
But I instantly draw back, gasping. He’s burning up. Like the fire in his dreams are so hot, so real, that the heat is licking its way out of his skin.
“Elio. It’s alright. I’ll be right back,” I stammer, flinging myself off of the bed. I wonder if some part of him recognizes that I’m getting further away, because he suddenly twists and thrashes harder, grunting, like he’s trying to fight his way back to me.
I want to go to him. Stay with him. Cradle his head in my arms.
But I leave him there, sprinting into the hallway. Fucking hell! The one time I need somebody, and there’s no one in that stupid spot at the top of the stairs!
I run down the hall to the stairs, going them so fast that my footsteps sound like a furious drumbeat on the metal.
“Hello!” I call out frantically. “I need someone!”
Curse and Enzo come instantly into view, both of them crossing from the kitchen towards me with ground-eating strides.
“What is it?” Enzo asks, both of them already mounting the stairs to meet me halfway. I instantly spin and start running back up, not wanting to waste a moment. I’ve already been away from him to long.
“It’s Elio,” I pant, my words flying up and out of my throat like something’s chasing them. “He’s burning up! We need to get Doctor Morelli here or take him to a hospital. Or…”
“Shit,” I hear Enzo mutter. In a matter of moments, both men are on the phone barking orders, Curse telling Morelli to get his ass over here now, and Enzo seeming to alert the other soldiers stationed on the property as to what’s happening.
The three of us burst into the room at the same time.
Enzo turns on more lights while Curse and I both go straight to the bed.
Elio’s still tense and twitching, the tendons in his neck standing up with brutal contrast, every muscle in his chest and abdomen contracting.
The bruising looks so much darker today, his whole side painted with blackened violence.
Curse wears no expression, but his eyes are deadly focused as he whips the blankets away from Elio’s heated body. Shit. I should have done that before I left the room.
“I’ll get wet cloths,” Curse says tightly. “Get his pants off.”
I don’t bother to acknowledge him. I don’t even nod.
I just get started, working the soft fabric of the grey sweatpants down over his hips.
It’s hard, because he keeps twitching and threatening to thrash, but with effort I get them rolled all the way down and whisked away from his ankles.
I know he wouldn’t like it, but right now I don’t give a damn, and I take off his leather glove, too.
I consider taking off the splint, but worry in his condition he’ll damage his bones even more than they already are, and decide that the small amount of heat he might lose from the skin around that wrist isn’t worth worsening the fracture.
I’m just setting the sweatpants and leather glove aside when Curse strides swiftly back into the room from the bathroom, his hands laden with sopping wet cloths.
I don’t wait for instructions, instantly running to him and taking some of the wet cloths out of his hands.
We go to work side by side, me hauling myself up onto the bed between Elio’s legs, running the cool cloths along his thighs and abdomen, Curse up higher, near his head.
The instant the wet cloths come into contact with his skin Elio hisses, then moans, writhing as if to get away.
“It’s alright, a chuisle mo chroí, ” I whisper. “Just stay still for us now, love.”
Curse doesn’t say anything, but somewhere in Elio’s burning brain, he must know his younger brother is there. Because his wild eyes suddenly lock on Curse’s face.
“Have to get her out,” he croaks frantically. With shocking strength, his good hand shoots up and locks onto Curse’s shoulder. “Fire. Got… to get her now .”
“It’s alright,” Curse says, voice low. “Mamma’s not in danger anymore.”
“Not Mamma,” Elio moans. I’ve never heard him sound so desperate. “ Deirdre .”
Curse’s gaze sears to mine. His voice is clipped, almost like he expects me to argue with him, or run away. “He needs you.”
He heard everything I said to Valentina. About how I don’t plan on marrying his brother, how I feel trapped by the person he’s most loyal to in this world. He thinks I’m going to abandon his brother now, right when Elio needs me most.
Yeah, well. He doesn’t know me very well.
I sling myself over one of Elio’s taut thighs, straddling it and trying to keep him still with my weight.
If it weren’t for his injuries, I’d move up further, straddle his waist or even his chest. But this will work for now.
I lean forward, run trembling fingers up his chest until I’m cupping his face once more.
“Elio. Elio, I’m here. Everything is going to be alright.”
I don’t expect him to hear me, but I guess some part of him does. His hand falls away from Curse’s shoulder, dead weight thudding to the mattress beside him.
His dark eyes are glazed, but they seize on mine with savage power.
“Songbird,” he pants. “You have to go. Have to…”
“I’m alright, Elio. Mo chroí. I’m safe. And so are you. The doctor is coming. Just try to be still.”
His face twists in agony.
“I can’t ,” he whispers, and on the next words, his voice breaks. He looks younger than I’ve ever seen him. “I can’t reach you.”
I don’t notice I’m crying until hot drips fall onto my own hands.
But strangely, my voice comes out steady when I speak next. “Then I’ll just have to reach you instead.”
I lean down to him, my hair creating a curtain around us, and I press my mouth to his.
There’s nothing controlled about it. The kiss is a messy one. There’s terror and tenderness in the searching slide of our mouths. Desperation and desire. Elio’s lips part instantly, and he groans into me, his movements weak but frantic, spiked with feverish adrenaline.
But it seems to be working. I think he really knows I’m here now. One by one, I feel his muscles unlock beneath me, until his whole frame is trembling now instead of furiously tense.
I lose all sense of time and space. Lose my awareness of anyone else around us. There’s only Elio, the man who needs me so fucking badly, the monster only I can tame. I feel like I’m melting into him, like the borders between our bodies are wavering, turning soft and transparent like liquid.
I would have stayed there longer, locked in that starving and soothing embrace, if not for the stern, accented voice calling into the room, “Everybody back!”
I break the kiss, feeling like I break my heart as I do it. But I have to make room. That voice is Doctor Morelli’s.
I pull away from Elio, straightening where I’m sitting on his upper thigh and preparing to scramble off the bed. But at the sudden distance between us, Elio bucks in revolt, making a sound that reminds me of an animal in a cage.
“Don’t move,” Curse says quietly to me. “If you get off him now he’s going to lose his fucking shit.”
Doctor Morelli sends everything on Elio’s bedside table crashing to the ground so he can slam open his case. He doesn’t say anything else, I guess not caring that I’m on Elio’s leg so long as he can do what he needs to do. His eyes flash behind his glasses, his face is drawn tight.
“What is it? What’s wrong with him?” I ask. I don’t want to distract him, but I can’t stop the words from spilling out. Doctor Morelli doesn’t answer for a moment. He checks Elio’s blood pressure, then his temperature, then curses. His reply, when it comes, is in rapid Italian.
“What’s he saying?” I ask Curse, who’s moved out of the way for the doctor. As Curse listens long enough to translate I vow that as soon as things settle down I am learning fucking Italian.
“He’s only just recovered from the bullet wound, and his body wasn’t ready for the ribs and kidney. He’s got a secondary kidney infection now.”
Curse says it evenly, nearly robotically. There isn’t a trace of resentment in his face or voice, despite the fact that these are all injuries Elio’s gotten for me.
“Is he going to be alright?” I ask, my voice rising higher and higher.
Morelli speaks rapidly again as he tightens a tourniquet around Elio’s arm and starts tapping firmly at his inner elbow. He eases a needle into a vein, then barks a command at Enzo who’s waiting by the door. Enzo disappears.
“He needs IV antibiotics,” Curse says. “Enzo’s going to get the IV stand from the med room.” While waiting for Enzo to return, Doctor Morelli holds the bag of liquid aloft after connecting the tube to Elio’s arm.
“But is he going to be alright?” I ask again, more forcefully than I think I’ve ever spoken in my entire life. I nearly shout it, and I don’t mean to, but I can’t seem to help it. I feel like I might die if somebody doesn’t answer me right fucking now.
“Sepsis with multi-organ failure is a possibility,” Curse says flatly. He doesn’t get loud like I did, but nonetheless the calm delivery of his words hits me like a blow.
I blink away tears and tear my gaze from Curse, looking down at Elio. Elio seems to have slipped back into a deeper sleep. His eyes are closed now, his chest rising and falling rapidly. He probably can’t hear me, but I talk to him anyway, forcing myself not to sound as petrified as I am.
“Elio,” I say sharply through my tears. I’m going to start sobbing soon. I can feel it, pressure in my throat and eyes and lungs. But I have to say this. I have to get this out. “Elio Titone, I want you to listen to me. Listen closely. Because I have a proposition for you.”
I sniff against the tumble of tears threatening to spill. “It’s a deal. A good one, too. Alright?”
I rub my hands in quivering circles across his hot chest, not sure if I’m trying to comfort him with my touch or comfort myself with the solid bulk of him beneath my fingers.
“These are the terms,” I choke out. “And there’s no negotiating. You have to hold up your end of the bargain.” My hands curl into fists against his skin. “You have to live, Elio. You have to get through this. Survive, and I’ll stop fighting you. Stop denying you. Live, and-”
There’s no going back now. But I don’t hesitate one bit.
“-I will marry you.”