Chapter 6 Elio
ELIO
The first book is flying at my shoulder before I fully register she’s moved.
Proust. Heavy leather binding, gilded edges catching the light as it spins past my head. I step left. The second one, Dickens, I think, sails past my ear close enough that I hear the pages flutter.
“You fucking psycho.”
Her voice is raw. Wrecked from crying, from screaming, from whatever she’s been doing alone in this room for the past three hours while I made myself wait. Made myself give her time to adjust to her new reality before I came to explain it.
I catch the third one mid-air—The Divine Comedy, fitting—while she’s already grabbing a fourth, her arm cocked back, that auburn hair wild around a face twisted with pure, incandescent rage.
Paradise Lost. She has excellent taste when she’s furious.
“—I’ll kill you, I swear to God I’ll fucking kill you—”
I let that one hit my shoulder. A gift. The sting of it, her violence made physical, is more satisfying than I anticipated.
Then she runs out of books and changes tactics. Bare feet slapping marble, fists raised, she’s coming at me with absolutely no technique, and absolutely no hesitation.
There she is.
I’ve waited weeks to see this. The careful, controlled restorer who measured her words and her smiles, who held herself apart from everyone in that sad little apartment, alone with her sketches and her blood oranges and her loneliness.
I knew there was more underneath. I knew if I peeled back enough layers, I’d find something worth keeping.
This is it. This feral creature, all bared teeth and swinging fists, and creative profanity. This is what I wanted.
Her knuckles connect with my jaw. The impact is nothing, she doesn’t know how to throw a proper punch, but I let her have it. Let her feel like she’s doing damage. Her nails rake toward my face, and I catch her wrist, then the other when she swings again.
“Get your fucking hands off me—”
She writhes in my grip, trying to twist free, and lands a kick to my shin that actually hurts. Good. Strong legs. All that climbing on the scaffolding definitely helped.
“Let me go, you bastard—”
I spin her, pulling her back against my chest, her wrists crossed and pinned at her waist. She thrashes, kicks backward, tries to slam her head into my face, but I tilt my chin and take the blow on my collarbone. It hurts. I don’t care.
“Breathe.”
“Fuck you. Fuck you—”
“You’re hyperventilating. It won’t help.”
She screams. Pure rage, no words, just sound ripping out of her throat like she’s trying to expel demons. Her body convulses against mine, every muscle straining. I hold her through it. Wait for the storm to pass.
Bit tt doesn’t pass. It transforms.
She stops thrashing and goes still in my arms. When she speaks again, her voice is ice.
“Who the fuck are you?”
Progress. I release her wrists. She spins immediately, backing away, her eyes scanning the room for something else to throw. Let her look. She won’t find anything I haven’t already considered.
“You know who I am.”
“I know you’re a fucking psycho—”
“Obsessed.”
She stops. Blinks.
“There’s a difference. Insanity implies a lack of control. I’ve been nothing but controlled.”
She stares at me like I’ve grown a second head. Good. Let her understand exactly what she’s dealing with.
“What does that mean? Obsessed with what?”
“You throw left when you’re angry.” I take a step toward her. She takes one back. “But when you’re thinking through a problem, really working it, you use your right hand. You gesture at whatever you’re examining like you’re having a conversation with it.”
Her face drains of color.
“You bite your lower lip when you’re concentrating. The inside corner.”
“You’re—”
“I know the exact sound you make when you’re trying not to cry.” Another step forward. Another step back. Her shoulders hit the wall. “I’ve heard it three times. Once after your mother called. Twice when you thought the fresco couldn’t be saved.”
She goes completely still.
The horror dawning in those green-gray eyes is exquisite. Like watching someone finally see a painting from the correct distance, where all the brushstrokes resolve into meaning.
“How long?” Her voice cracks. “How long have you been watching me?”
“Twenty-three days in Palermo. Six months before that, through other means. Longer, if I’m being honest.” I stop an arm’s length away.
Close enough to catch her if she runs. Far enough to give her the illusion of space.
“Your photograph on the grant application caught my interest. I’ve never been interested before.
Not like that. Not by a face on a page. I had to understand what made you different. ”
“You’re fucking crazy.”
“I’m thorough.”
She backs toward the shelf she’s already emptied, hands flexing at her sides, that beautiful mind working even through the terror and rage. Every reaction teaches me something new about her.
“You’re out of books,” I observe.
“Fuck you.”
“Perhaps later. For now, I’d like to show you something.”
I turn my back to her, and walk out of the room leaving the door open behind me. She’ll follow. She’s got nothing else to do.
The hallway outside her room is seventeenth-century stone, original to the villa, the iron sconces restored rather than replaced. She doesn’t notice the architecture, her eyes are too busy looking for exits, measuring distances, noticing the guns of the two guards we pass.
Good. Keep looking. Learn the layout. It will make this easier.
I stop at a door halfway down the corridor. Push it open.
She freezes on the threshold.
The studio is small, intimate, with north-facing windows that cast perfect natural light across the wooden worktables.
Her supplies are arranged precisely as she kept them in her apartment.
The German graphite pencils ranked by hardness, the acid-free paper stacked by weight, the magnifying glasses, calipers, and fine brushes she uses for detail work.
I’ve even left a Ming dynasty porcelain bowl filled with her blood oranges next to her worktable. A present from me to her.
“My—” Her voice catches. She steps inside despite herself, drawn to the familiar objects like a moth to flame. “You took my things—”
“I collected them. While you were resting.”
“While I was unconscious because you drugged me—”
“Yes.”
On the center table, laid out are three fragments of fifteenth-century plaster, each one carefully extracted from the damaged section of the cathedral’s east wall. Samples of the pigment. A cross-section of the original binding medium.
Her hands reach toward them before she catches herself.
“You went to the cathedral.”
“My people did. The restoration will continue without you, I’ve already arranged for a replacement specialist from Rome.”
She turns to face me. The rage is still there, but it’s colder now. More focused. “What?”
“Your apartment has been cleared. Your belongings are in storage, the personal effects, at least. The rest has been donated. Your landlord was grateful for the three months’ advance notice.”
“No one knows I’m here.” Not a question.
“No one that isn’t loyal to me.”
The color drains from her face. I watch her process it, watch the horror settle into her bones, and then—
“You can’t—” She swallows hard. “You can’t just take someone. People will look for me. The foundation—”
“I am the foundation. But just to cover the trail I sent a letter this morning. Expressing their deep gratitude for your preliminary assessment and announcing that you’ve been offered an extended research fellowship in a remote location.
No communication for several months while you focus on your work. ”
Her face goes white.
“No—”
“Your phone is forwarding calls to a service that responds appropriately. You’re very busy, apparently. Too busy to talk, but not too busy to send the occasional text to your mother assuring her you’re eating properly.”
“You bastard—”
“Your bank account will show regular activity in Palermo for the next several weeks before going dormant, a pattern consistent with someone who’s taken an off-grid research opportunity.”
She stops moving. Stops breathing, it looks like.
“You’ve erased me.” The words are hollow. Devastated.
“I’ve simplified your life.”
For a long moment, she just stares at me. Processing. I watch the stages of understanding cross her face. First the intellectual comprehension, then the emotional impact, then—
“My family.”
There it is.
“What did you tell my mother?”
“The foundation contacted her about your extended leave. She was very pleased. Apparently she’s been worried about you working too hard.”
“Danny won’t buy that. He’ll—”
“Daniel Murphy, 37 West Fourth Street, Apartment 3B, South Boston. Works at O’Malley’s Auto on Tuesdays and Thursdays, runs numbers for Mickey Flynn the rest of the week. Still on parole for the assault conviction. Very protective of his little sister.”
Her hands ball into fists at her sides.
I continue. “Sean Murphy. Construction foreman for Kelleher Brothers. Married, two kids, lives in Dorchester. Coaches his daughter’s softball team on Saturday mornings.”
“Stop.”
“Your mother goes to Saint Augustine’s every Sunday. Confession at four. Mass at five-thirty. Then she walks to Morano’s Grocery on Tuesdays and Fridays. Always parks in the same spot. Third row, near the cart return.”
Violet’s chest heaves. The color gone from her face entirely.
“You can call them.” I keep my voice even. Reasonable. “Weekly, if you like. Video chat, even. Prove you’re safe and happy. I’m not unreasonable.”
“Not—” She laughs. The sound is jagged. “Unreasonable?”
“You can tell them about your research. Your extended fellowship. How much you’re enjoying the solitude.” I pause. Let the words land. “But one word, one hint, one cry for help—”
Her breath catches.
I don’t finish the sentence. I don’t need to.
“Would you really hurt them?” Her voice shakes now. For the first time since I walked in, she sounds small.
I could lie. Could reassure her, play the merciful captor, let her believe her compliance is buying safety rather than simply delaying consequences. But I don’t lie to her. That’s the rule I’ve made for myself. Everything else is negotiable, but not this.
“You love them,” I say quietly. “I don’t think you’d want to test it.”
She stares at me. The rage is still there, I can see it burning behind her eyes. But underneath it now there’s fear. Not for herself. For them.
There it is.
This is the leash that will keep her here when walls and locks fail. I’ve researched every person she cares about. I have eyes on each of them. She could break every window in this room and it wouldn’t matter, because she’ll never risk her family.
Her expression hardens. The fear doesn’t disappear, it becomes sharper. Colder.
She moves faster than I expect.
Blood oranges roll to the floor as she hurls the Ming dynasty bowl at my face with the kind of desperate, unhinged force that comes from feeling truly cornered.
Intent to injure.
I catch it six inches from my nose. The porcelain is cool against my palm, fragile as a bird’s skull. I don’t break eye contact as I place it on the worktable beside me.
“You’ll need to be more creative,” I tell her.
She’s already coming. No weapons left, so she’s made herself into one. She shoves against my chest with both hands, putting her whole body weight behind it. I don’t move. She swings, a right hook this time, and I catch her wrist. A left jab. Caught.
“Let me go, you sicko—”
“I’ve spent months learning you.” My voice stays calm. Level. “I know you better than you know yourself.”
She spits in my face.
The warm saliva hits my cheek. I don’t flinch.
She freezes, eyes wide, waiting for the violence. For the punishment she’s clearly expecting. For some sign that she’s finally pushed me too far.
Instead, I release one of her wrists. Slowly, deliberately, I wipe the spit from my cheek with two fingers. I hold her gaze as I bring those fingers to my mouth.
She tastes like rage.
I savor it.
“What—” Her voice breaks. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”
I don’t answer. Just look at her. Even this, I think. Even her violence is mine to taste, to swallow, to keep.
She’ll learn.
I release her other wrist. She backs away immediately, her breath coming in harsh gasps, her face a mask of horror and disgust.
“This hallway will be open to you during the day, provided you’re well-behaved. More rooms will become available as you demonstrate cooperation.”
I walk her back to the bedroom. She moves like a sleepwalker, her brain still processing, still trying to find an angle I haven’t already closed.
Inside, she starts pacing. A caged animal. Beautiful in her fury.
“What do you want?” She spits the words as we enter her room. “What the fuck do you actually want from me?”
“You should change for dinner.”
She stops mid-stride. “Excuse me?”
“Change for dinner. Eight o’clock.”
Her eyes flick to the wardrobe. “I’m not wearing anything you picked out. Not ever. You can burn it all for all I care.”
“You will.” I keep my voice even. Patient. “Eventually. When you’re ready. I can wait.”
“I’ll wear these clothes until they fucking rot off my body—”
“Your choice.”
“—and then I’ll strangle you with them, I swear to God—”
“Good.”
She blinks. Thrown by my response.
“I will.” Her voice shakes with conviction. “First chance I get. First moment you let your guard down. I’ll put something sharp through your throat and watch you bleed out.”
The threat is raw. Violent. No holding back.
This is why I won’t give her the chance.
“I know.” I reach the door. Turn to face her one last time. “Dinner’s at eight. Something will be sent for you to wear. If you choose not to change—” I shrug. “No meal.”
“I’d rather starve than eat with you.”
“We’ll see.”
I step into the hallway. Close the door. Listen for the click of the lock engaging.
Then I wait.
On the other side of the door there’s nothing but silence. No screaming. No breaking things. No throwing herself against the walls like she did before.
She’s thinking. Planning.
Good girl.
Every escape attempt will teach me something new. Every plan she makes will show me more of how her mind works. The patterns, the priorities, the lines she’ll cross and the ones she won’t. I’m building an encyclopedia of her, page by page, and I have all the time in the world.
I’ve waited weeks. Months. Longer, if I count back to the photograph.
I can wait as long as it takes for her to understand that this is permanent.
This is her life now.