Chapter 56
EMBERLINE
The house smelled like dust and old plaster, and I’d never been so relieved to come home in my life.
Dante kept an arm around my waist as the wards fell into place with a reassuring hum.
Nico slipped in behind us, inky black shadows curling around his boots before sinking into the faded floorboards.
I gave in to my overwhelming urge and threw my arms around his neck. “Thank you,” I sniffed, blinking back tears as I hugged him. “Thank you for saving me.”
“He only helped,” Dante grumbled. “I did the actual saving.”
“It was a team effort.” Nico chuckled, patting me on the back, making no move to end our embrace until I stepped away. Then he adjusted the blanket, something tender in his expression. “Good to have you back, principessa. You do liven things up around here.”
“I get it, liven things up.” I narrowed my eyes at him. “Wait. I’m not sure that’s a compliment.”
“Now you’re catching on.” He tweaked my nose, and Dante growled, a low, aggravated sound that had Nico rolling his eyes and me searching for something clever to say and coming up empty.
“Upstairs,” Dante ordered, not waiting for an argument. One arm slid under my knees, the other around my back, and suddenly I was off my feet, cradled against his strong chest, biting back a sigh.
I was safe.
Safe because Dante would never let anything happen to me.
Relief and exhaustion turned my bones to lead, dragging my eyelids closed, turning my thoughts to soup…
So heavy. Can’t breathe. Can’t think.
I shivered at the too-vivid flash of memory—smothering dark water, the moment I’d released that last breath of air from my burning lungs and knew it was over.
For a heartbeat, the house vanished, and everything rushed back in—the crushing weight, the cold, the certainty this was the end, that there would be no second chances.
My fingers tightened reflexively on his arm, and Dante readjusted his grip, pulling me closer until all I heard were his heartbeats, hard and steady.
“I’ve got you, and I’m not letting you go,” he promised. “You’re safe with me. You will always be safe with me. Breathe, tesoro, just breathe.”
So, I did.
In. Out. The air tasting like this old house, like ward-magic, and Dante.
Not algae. Not the lagoon.
Just… him. Just him.
Nico trailed behind us up the narrow staircase, his hand trailing along the banister, shadows flickering like restless smoke along the wood. He saw where my eyes landed and smiled, like we shared some kind of secret.
The bedroom was exactly as we’d left it last evening—bed unmade, blankets tangled from lovemaking, my trunks pushed against the wall, overflowing with weapons, dresses, and workout clothing I wore to train—and smelled of day-old sex and… Gods, I hoped Nico’s vampiric senses were on the fritz.
Out of nowhere, I needed to hide—everything crashing in at once—the fact I thought of this place as home, the empty dark hole inside of me, the fact Dante clung to me as though he’d never let me go.
“I… need to use the bathroom.” Tear stung my eyes, and I dug my fingers into Dante’s thick arm as he headed straight for the bed. “Please, marito.”
He hung onto me a moment longer, finally setting me down, tracking every step as I crossed the room, his big hands flexing compulsively, his eyes blazing.
“Give me a minute,” I whispered, then closed the door behind me and stared into the mirror, feeling… untethered. And from my reflection, looking like a drowned rat. My hair hung in snarled waves, my clothes were torn and bloodstained, and rusty streaks still darkening my face and neck.
Like I’d fought a war I didn’t even remember starting.
And my eyes… I leaned closer. There was a faint silver ring around my irises, like moonlight glinting on metal.
I turned the shower on, stripped quickly, trying to get rid of this dark, haunted feeling, like I still had one foot in the Underworld.
When I stepped under the stream of hot water, I started to cry.
Sobbed, actually, in great heaving waves that wouldn’t stop, not until the tears ran out, and I was left with an empty, aching sorrow that felt like I was being raked over the coals.
I fucked up.
Fucked up so badly, now I have to play dead, so I don’t really get dead.
Somehow, I’d thought I’d be dealing out revenge with an emotionless, cold hand and walk away with my heart untouched.
Now I’m an emotional dumpster fire, burning out of control.
I toweled off and realized my clothes were ruined and wet. Finding one of Dante’s shirts wadded up in a corner, I slipped it over my head. The fabric still smelled like him, and that jagged edge inside of me smoothed over, like putting a band-aid over a wound.
I splashed more water on my face, took another look at my eyes—yup, still silver—and when I opened the door, I was immediately rushed into bed by my bossy, overprotective husband, who was not the least bit satisfied until I was propped on a pile of pillows and tucked under about twenty blankets.
“Dante,” I tried to sound soothing. “I’m getting your bed all wet, I should maybe…”
“Let me do this for you,” he cut in, motions frantic, jerky. “Just… let me take care of you, Ember.”
There was a desperation in the way he kept touching me, so I let him tuck me in like a child and brush damp strands of hair away from my face with shaking fingers, peering at me with eyes that reflected too much.
Pain. Fear. Guilt.
Evidently not one to be deterred by a tender scene or understand what privacy was, Nico lounged in the doorway, arms crossed over his chest, trying to look casual. His hair was wet from the boat spray, droplets of water sliding down the side of his neck.
I looked between them. “Emilia said death doesn’t like to be cheated. I feel…” I searched for some way to describe the indescribable. “Like I dragged some of that darkness back here with me.” I couldn’t stop my eyes from straying over to Nico, to those strange shadows curling around his feet.
They looked almost solid, as though they were taking physical form.
“What lives in that realm remains there.” Nico tried to sound nonchalant, but his eyes narrowed, as if he was trying to peer beneath my skin. “The veil between us and the Underworld can’t be crossed by the living.”
Dante didn’t say a word, but there was something ominous lurking beneath his glassy fear, something rumbling, like a monster wanting to escape.
This strange new darkness inside me seemed to sense its presence, and that quote came back to me—fate follows your scent, and Death will always keep her promise.
Death… was that what I kept feeling?
His knuckles grazed tenderly over my temple, and I wondered how someone so scarred, so damaged was still capable of so much gentleness. While he saw himself as broken, to me, Dante was the strongest male I’d ever known.
And the most pissed off, from the sheer amount of heat rolling off his body.
“Whoever touched you,” he promised quietly, “is going to wish they were already dead. And I know exactly how I’m going to hurt them, tesoro.”
Nico uncrossed his arms. “Whoever being Giovanni, is what he means.”
“Of course, I mean Giovanni,” Dante snarled. “He’s going to suffer for this.”
“We could go back there tonight,” Nico suggested. “Take a few hours to deal with him, then we’d only have Marcello to worry about.”
“As long as I get first dibs.” Dante straightened. “Depending on how talkative he is, I’ll spend the rest of the night making him regret the day he was born. Let me get a knife.” He turned away from the bed, heading for the stairs.
“Where do you two think you’re going?” I demanded, trying to untwist myself from the mammoth pile of blankets, which was harder than it looked.
“The DiRavello palazzo.” Dante tipped his head like this was self-evident. “To tear your dear uncle apart and see what secrets spill out.”
“Which will be messy. He’ll need someone to dispose of the body, of course. Clean up the blood.” Nico pushed off the doorframe. “Luckily, I work for free, so long as I get to help carve him apart.”
Great. Tonight had turned them both into psychopaths.
“No.” I threw my hands up in the air, trying to be the adult in the room, if only I could get myself untangled. “We have a plan in place.” At least, I assumed there was still a plan. “Infiltrate, gather intel, then strike. We’re still on step one. Infiltrate.”
“Clearly, your uncle moved up the schedule. Now, we’re to the part where things get messy,” Dante stalked back over and caged me between his arms, nothing gentle about him now.
“This is happening, dear wife. Nobody touches you and lives. He is going to die. I’ll bring you back his head as a prize since I never got you a wedding present. ”
Good gods, he was absolutely terrifying.
This was Dante in The Fossa. This was the male who’d survived the pits longer than any other, the only prisoner who’d ever escaped and lived to talk about it.
Except… he never talked about that place, did he?
“Both of you are staying right here.” My voice rose higher, and Nico’s shadows surged, unfurling around his boots like an ominous warning, tendrils of darkness reaching toward me. “You storm that palazzo now, and neither of you will be coming back.”
Dante took a half-step closer. “He tried to kill you, Emberline. If not for a miracle, he would have succeeded.”
“Well, he didn’t.” I tipped my chin up. “I need you alive, Dante. You want to put a knife in my uncle this badly? Fine. I’ll let you kill him after we expose Marcello.
” I swallowed down my disappointment at the concession.
“But we need that proof. We do this with a plan in place. Not because you’re terrified of losing me, but because we’re playing to win. ”
Some of the blind rage drained out of his expression, “I am not—”