Page 37 of A Love Most Brutal (Morelli Family #2)

MARY

At some point in the middle of the night, I wake to the sound of the bathroom door softly clicking shut and a light switch being flipped on before sink water starts running. The cat meows on the other side of the door, the same way she does when Maxim comes home later than she deems reasonable.

“I know, I know,” I hear him mutter softly, like he’s assuring an upset child.

I rub the sleep from my eyes and slide my arm across the cool bedding, ensuring that it’s still cold. Maxim wasn’t here when I went to sleep, the last sign of life was a text from Sasha that said “making rounds”.

Maxim isn’t much of a texter, and I loathe to admit that when he’s not around, I worry.

It’s not that he can’t take care of himself, but we were attacked in broad daylight in the middle of a restaurant, so it serves to reason he might be in significantly more danger at night in one of his clubs. Particularly the ones below board.

A couple of weeks ago I asked Sasha if he’d give me updates sometimes, little check ins, and then I told him I’d break his fingers if he told Maxim I asked.

So far as I know, he hasn’t told him, and on the rare occasion Maxim isn’t here reading in bed next to me, I get a text from Sasha assuring me that they’re fine.

I hear a noisy clatter and a string of Russian curses from behind the bathroom door. I climb out of bed, dizzy for only a second before I push the door open without knocking.

My mouth falls open at the sight I’m met with, first the too-bright bathroom light, then the fucking blood .

I take in the spots of crimson on the tile floor and counter, and then his strong back as he leans over the sink, his palms on the counter as if holding him up.

In the mirror, I find him looking at me with a cloth pressed to his head.

Beneath it, blood stains his face, neck, and across the chest of his white tank top.

Greta is on the ground, still meowing, and looking as concerned as I suddenly feel.

“What happened?” I demand, rushing toward him.

It’s not a towel pressed to his face, but his white button up shirt, and it’s completely destroyed by the amount of blood it’s soaked up.

I reach for his hand to pull the shirt away and assess the wound, but he leans away from me.

“It’s fine,” he says. “Go to bed.”

I can’t help the incredulous laugh that bursts from my throat.

“Maxim, you’re covered in blood, and it looks like you have a black eye. You’re not fine .”

“I can handle it.”

I see now what made all the noise; the contents of a first aid and suture kit are spilled over the counter amidst drops of blood.

“Don’t be stupid. Your hands are shaking,” I say, and he looks surprised to see that this is true. Then, because I’m trying to be nicer, I lower my voice. “Please, Maxim. Sit down.”

His resolve cracks and his shoulders slump before he steps past me to sit on the side of the bathtub.

I prepare some sterile pads, gauze, and reach for a clean towel. I step to him, and he’s just below my eye level like this.

“Show me,” I say, and with a wince, he pulls his shirt away from his head.

I squint at the wound, a small but nasty gash on the corner of his forehead beneath his hairline.

That would be why there’s so much blood.

Head wounds always bleed more, the drama queens of injuries, but this one luckily doesn’t look exceptionally deep, but butterfly bandages aren’t going to cut it, he’s going to need a few stitches.

“Why didn’t you call your doctor?” I ask. I toss his shirt into the bathtub and press my fingers beneath his chin until he tilts his head back.

“I’ve dealt with worse.”

“On your forehead? In a mirror?” I ask, but don’t let him answer. “You need stitches.”

“I’ll do them.”

“Maxim,” I start, exasperated. I raise my eyebrows and prop my hand on my hips waiting for him to realize how he sounds. He smirks and huffs what’s almost a laugh through his nose.

“Alright.”

I roll my eyes and almost laugh, despite the open wound on my husband’s forehead.

Placing a wad of gauze against the wound, I have him hold it in place while I put up my hair, put a still-meowing Greta in the other room, and wash my hands thoroughly.

I’m not the best at stitches, but I can hold my own.

I know things need to be sterile at least. Last thing we need is the cut getting infected.

I pull my sinus rinse supplies from under the sink and mix a couple of the saline packets into the bottle, shaking it until it’s all dissolved. I hate nasal rinses, but my allergies are shit sometimes, and in instances like this, it’s handy enough.

Maxim doesn’t ask what I’m doing, only watches my movement. He looks pale, like, I don’t know, he’s been bleeding from a head wound for at least twenty minutes?

The first aid kit has multiple pairs of gloves, so I put a pair on and peel the bloody cloth from his head. “Let’s get it washed.”

I push his shoulder back until he’s leaning over the bathtub and pour the saline solution over the cut. He grunts at initial discomfort, but otherwise makes no show of pain. For balance, his hand holds my side and I feel his grip loosen as I keep rinsing the wound.

“Here,” I tap his knee with mine, nudging his leg open wider so I can stand between them to get a better look at the wound.

It’s really not so bad now that it looks less like a bloodbath; I’ve fixed up many worse cuts on Leo, and once on Sean while Willa tearfully watched, holding his hand and scolding him for not being more careful.

“Deep breath,” I say to him, but really it’s for me before I get to work stitching him up.

He doesn’t complain the whole time, doesn’t make a sound while I tie off each suture which is impressive since I know from experience that stitches without anesthetic hurt like hell.

“What happened out there?” I ask after tying off the third stitch. Only a couple more to go and he’ll be fine. His palm is warm and grounding where he holds my hip, so I don’t tell him to move it.

“Drunk, belligerent fuck threw a bottle at my head when I was otherwise engaged in a conversation.”

“Did you kill him?” I ask, no judgement in my voice. I think I would have.

“No. He’s a fine man that’s gone through something horrible. It wasn’t meant for me. Sasha did snap his arm though.”

“Good.”

I focus on my task, pulling the line through his skin before tightening like my dad taught me.

When I tie it off, Maxim’s other hand reaches up and fingers the hem of the shirt I was sleeping in.

It’s another one of his, this one a worn New York Knicks tee that fits me like a short dress.

Sean would probably disown me if he saw me wearing it.

“Where did you find this?”

“Your drawer,” I lie. It was in the basket, at the top, barely worn. Hardly even dirty. I don’t tell him it smells like him, and that I have a hypothesis that the scent of him is the only thing that lets me sleep a whole night through.

“I like it on you,” he says. His fingertips skim across my upper thigh, sending goosebumps across my skin and up my back. I pause.

“Stop distracting me,” I grumble. “You’ve lost too much blood, you’ll probably pass out if you get a boner right now.”

Maxim’s eyes fall shut and he lets out a light laugh, one so soft, and so foreign in this gruesome scene it makes me smile and let out a huff of my own.

“Focus, darling ,” I chastise. “We’re almost done.”

His hands return to their place on my hips, and I think for a moment of the many ways he’s used them on me in the last few days.

No .

Not the time.

I force my attention at the job in front of me.

“You’re good at this,” he remarks.

“Hold your assessment until you see the results,” I say, but I admit that they look pretty clean. I once gave Leo stitches so bad on his upper arm that we still laugh about it ten years later. I had to learn somehow, I guess.

“Who taught you?”

“My dad. I was fourteen, he was giving stitches to my uncle.”

“Leo’s father,” he says.

“Yes.” I pull the knot a little too tight and he barely winces. “Sorry.”

“What happened to his parents?”

“Car crash,” I say. The memory still makes my chest ache—my aunt and uncle were a formidable pair and as involved in my life as I am with my sister’s children.

We live such dangerous lives that it’s almost more of a shock to die in as common a way as a car accident or a heart attack. “It was their anniversary.”

“How old was he?”

“Seventeen.”

“That must’ve been hard for all of you,” he says.

I pause my work for a moment, remembering that time. It was a huge loss to us all, and Leo the most. He was an only child, though always felt like our brother. He moved into the guest house and hasn’t left since, which is how we’ve all liked it.

“Do your sisters also know how to give stitches?” he asks.

“Just Leo and me. And Sean. Willa hates wounds. Vanessa is better at snapping orders and buzzing about while Leo or I do the tending.” I cut the thread for the last time and tilt his head left and right to survey my work.

I soak a pad with hydrogen peroxide and rub it lightly over the newly stitched wound.

“The last person I stitched up was Cillian.”

Maxim stays quiet, but his eyes darken at the mention of him.

“I should’ve let him bleed out,” I add.

“I’m sorry he betrayed you,” Maxim says. He’d said something similar the day we stormed the church where Cillian nearly forced my sister, bound and bruised, to marry him. I drove there in a car with Leo and Maxim, my arm still in a sling from the gunshot wound.

Maxim was already calling his men to meet at the church, and I remember that I was shaking with adrenaline and rage, urging Leo to drive faster.

I’d been picking at my nails, and cursed as I pulled too hard and one started to bleed.

Still on the phone, Maxim handed me a handkerchief without missing a beat.

I still have it.