From Scapegoat to Donna novel · Chapter 9 of 24

Chapter 9: Stitches

He dragged me down behind the pillar before the second shot.

Two of his guards came out of the stairwell door firing.

A car engine screamed somewhere on the upper ramp, and tires squealed up toward the street.

Then there was only the smell of burnt concrete and the sound of my own breath.

"Are you hit?" Tancredi said.

"No. Are you?"

He looked down at his left shoulder.

His jacket was torn, and blood was running through the cloth.

"It's nothing."

"I'll be the judge of that."

I stitched him in our bedroom, under the lamp, at one in the morning.

I had sent the housekeeper to bed and locked the door.

He sat on the edge of the mattress with his shirt off and his back straight.

The bullet had only furrowed the skin over the muscle, and I cleaned it and numbed it and began to close it with small, even stitches.

My fingers kept brushing him.

His skin was warm and he smelled like smoke and soap.

"You're not breathing," I said.

"I'm trying not to."

"Why?"

"If I breathe, I'll move."

I tied the last knot and cut the thread.

I put my palm flat on his back above the dressing and left it there.

"That's the fourth time I've touched you in private tonight," I said. "I've been counting."

"So have I."

"Term three."

"You wrote it."

"I was an idiot."

He turned around.

His grey eyes had gone almost black.

"Is that the whole Dottoressa plan?" he said. "Sew me up and stand there?"

I laughed, and the laugh broke.

"You're a bastard."

"Tell me to stop," he said, and it was a dare.

"No."

He took my face in both hands and kissed me.

It was slow this time, and deep, and it went on until I forgot the garage and the Don and the contract.

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