Inferno(76)

Dom and I were both shouting now. Luca tackled Nic at the knees and they went flying backwards, crashing against the wall. Nic slipped towards the ground and Luca seized his unsure footing, looping his arm around his neck and clamping him in a headlock.

They fell to the floor together. Luca flipped Nic over, pressing his knee against his brother’s back and pulling his arm towards the ceiling behind him. Nic was wedged between Luca and the floor, his whole body twisted on itself. He was panting, his face turning red from the pain. Luca would snap the bone if he wasn’t careful.

‘Basta,’ he growled in Nic’s ear. ‘OK? Enough.’

Nic gurgled something. Luca had won, but he didn’t seem any happier about it than we were. He released his brother and Nic flopped across the floor, holding his arm gingerly.

Nic shot to his feet and tried to wrangle Luca’s neck. He mistimed and Luca swivelled, his face contorted with fury. He threw himself at Nic, knocking him to the ground again and landing on top of him, planting a leg on either side of his torso so Nic couldn’t get back up. They were screaming at each other in Italian and now Dom was getting involved too. He tried to pull Luca away, but he didn’t have the strength, and my attempts weren’t helping either. Felice remained as he had been all along – spectating.

Nic spat across the floor. Luca whipped out his switchblade, flicked it open and drove it into the wood beside Nic’s head. He pulled back, heaving, and I could see the shock coursing through Nic, the speechlessness slapped across his face. The knife glinted less than three inches from his head.

‘Enough.’ Luca’s teeth were bared. ‘You’ve had your show.’

He got to his feet, this time being careful not to turn his back on Nic again. The fighter in him disappeared almost immediately and he returned to his previous sense of calm, fixing his T-shirt and rolling his neck around until it cracked. He was beat – his shoulders sagging and his torso dipping more to one side. I could tell his wound was hurting but he would never admit it.

Nic got up. His cheeks were flaming red and he was panting hard. He didn’t look at me. He didn’t look at anyone. Without saying a word, he ducked, like a football player about to tackle, and charged full-force at Luca. He knocked him backwards and together their momentum surged, carrying them towards the window. We were all yelling then, but Nic was frenzied with anger, an animal buzzing for the kill. He kept running at Luca until, with his own twisted war cry and the mingling of our screams, he released him and Luca went crashing through the window. The glass shattered into a million pieces that rained over him as he slid backwards over the ledge.

I shrieked as we rushed towards him. Nic just stood there, peering out of the window at his brother, who was lying in a bed of glass shards stained with his own blood.

‘Sei fuori di testa,’ said Dom, turning on Nic. ‘What the hell were you thinking?’

Luca’s eyes unglazed as he sat up, taking in the trickles of blood along his bare arms. His face was cut up too, crimson dripping down his cheek and on to his neck. He pressed a hand against the wound in his side. I hoped it hadn’t reopened from all the fighting.

Felice came to stand between us, his hand clasped over his mouth as he watched Luca sway unsteadily to his feet. He shook his head, tutting loudly. ‘My window,’ he sighed. ‘That was Venetian glass.’





CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

THE LOOK



Luca climbed back through the window. I balked at his casual return, studying all the thin lines of blood that were streaking his body. He didn’t look at Nic again and Nic didn’t apologize to him. He was too busy arguing with Dom.

Luca shrugged off my concern and pushed by us.

‘Hey!’ I called after him.

‘I’ll go get cleaned up.’

‘You’re hurt,’ I said to the back of his retreating head. ‘You need to go to the hospital.’

He swatted his hand in the air as he disappeared into the hall. ‘I’m fine.’

Like hell he was.

I left the room and followed him up the marble staircase, trying to decipher the feelings that were lurching inside me. There was worry – sure, his face was bleeding and his arms were cut up. There was anger, too, at Nic, because he had been a royal asshole for targeting Luca’s wound and then for throwing him through that window. But there were other things that I couldn’t place and they swirled inside me, filling me with anxiety. I wondered at the eagerness of my steps on the floor, desperate not to lose Luca as he climbed higher and higher with no regard for my shadow.

I kept staring at him, at the way he clutched his side, at the weariness in his slow steps. He had started to pick the glass out of his arms, breaking apart his skin and removing the shards without so much as a flinch. He was many things to his brothers – a constant, protective presence, wise and focused, and loyal. He was so important to the family and yet, wounded, he retracted into himself.