Page 51 of Die for You

The bleeding has lessened by the time I arrive at Nico’s.

I leave the car running as I stagger to his front door. The porch light flickers on before he sleepily opens the front door. When he sees me, his sleepiness is replaced with urgency when he runs to catch me as I collapse into his arms.

“Valentina!Quello che è successo?”

“I-I…I’m sorry.”

After that…I don’t remember.

I wake to unknown, muted female voices.

I don’t understand a word they’re saying.

But I don’t think they mean any harm.

“Oh, grazie a Dio.”

That voice, I do recognize.

And I soon remember the last conscious thought I had was that I owe Nico.

When I open my eyes, everything is blurry, and that’s because of the flickering candlelight. But through the dimness, I can see, bright and clear, the enormous wooden crucifix pinned to the wall in front of me.

Shrieking, I jolt up and scamper backward, knees toward my chest.

Where the fuck am I?

Childhood memories soon become a reality when I see three sisters in habits sitting by my bedside with rosary beads and Bibles in their laps. They’re praying for my soul, it appears. Looks like they missed the memo.

Nico takes my hand. “You safe,” he says kindly, but anywhere is safer than here.

“Why am I here?” I ask, peering down and blanching when I see the white nightgown I wear.

Ripping my hand from Nico’s, I brush my fingers through my hair, a sigh of relief expelling from my lungs when I feel my hair isn’t in two braids.

This is too much.

My mind and body slip back into a past I will forever be running from. But that can wait, when I pass my hand over my belly.

One of the sisters smiles. “Your baby is all right.”

How does she know that?

Unless I underwent an ultrasound when unconscious, then no one can know that, and I refuse to accept their knowledge as God telling them so.

“Doctor come,” Nico says, reading my disbelief.

There is no judgment in his tone.

Nor does he look at me with disgust.

He knows my secret, well, one of them, and he still wants to be here. He doesn’t ask what happened or why he had to bring me to this safe place. I don’t know what I did to deserve him, and if I believed in God, perhaps this is divine intervention.

Whatever the reason, I am thankful.

I hate that this place of worship provides me with a sanctuary. In the past, it was my hell. So the irony isn’t lost on me how the tables have turned.

Peering around at this holy place, I realize how smart Nico was for taking me here. This is probably the safest place for me to be, considering I started a war with the Sicilian Mafia boss.