He Let Me Die for Her, So I Refused His Ring novel · Chapter 3 of 32

Chapter 3: Face Down on the Blotter

Livia takes her license back from Massimo's desk in front of his captains, sees Bianca use his phone, and on Wednesday morning the gray car is at the gate again.

I knocked on the door once, then twice, then with the flat of my hand.

Nobody came.

I sat on the bed and thought about the window. It opened onto the roof of the colonnade, and from there it was a short drop to the roses.

I had my shoes in my hand when the key turned in the lock.

Bianca stood in the doorway in her nightgown, holding the key out like a gift.

"The housekeeper had the spare," she said. "I told her Massimo was being ridiculous. Come on, I'll go with you."

"You don't have to."

"Livia. Of course I do."

We went down together. Light was on under the study door, and I could hear men's voices.

I didn't knock. I opened it.

Massimo sat behind his father's old desk with two captains on the leather sofa.

My folder lay in front of him, with my passport on top of it and my leather bag on the floor by his foot.

All three men stopped talking and looked at me.

"Those are mine," I said.

"Go to bed, Livia." Massimo didn't raise his voice. "You're tired, and you've been saying strange things since this afternoon."

"My license was issued today. I start at the hospital on Monday."

"You start nothing until Friday."

"Because of the wager?" I said. "Because your father said, in front of twenty people, that I'm free until Friday?"

One of the captains shifted his weight on the sofa.

I turned to him.

"You were at the table. You heard Don Ettore say it, so tell me if I got it wrong."

The captain stared at his boots.

"He said Wednesday at ten," he said. "He said nobody touches the Corvi man till then."

"He said the Corvi man comes in unharmed," I said. "He didn't say anything about me being locked in my own room."

Massimo's jaw moved.

"I locked you in for your own safety."

"Then tell your father in the morning. Tell him you took a doctor's bag and her passport."

"Tell him you shut her in, two days before the wager's due."

Behind me, I heard the tiniest tapping sound.

I glanced back.

Bianca had slipped to the edge of the desk while Massimo looked at me. She was holding his phone, and her thumb was moving on it.

She felt me looking, and she set the phone back on the blotter, face down, and smiled.

"I was only checking the time," she said. "Massimo, give her the things. She's right, and Papa would be furious."

He watched her for a moment. His expression softened briefly, then hardened again.

He pushed the folder across the desk with two fingers, then the passport, and then he kicked the bag toward me.

"Take them," he said. "Nobody's stopping you from sleeping in your own bed."

"Thank you."

"You'll have two men with you if you leave the house."

"That's fine."

"And the next time you humiliate me in front of my father's captains," Massimo said, "I won't be this patient."

I looked at him.

In my last life I'd have said sorry.

I said sorry for a lot of things, for years, and every time I meant it.

"You called it patience when you locked a door," I said, "so I don't think we mean the same word."

The captain on the sofa coughed into his fist. The other one found something to look at on the carpet.

I picked up the bag, and the folder, and the passport.

Then I walked out, and Bianca came after me.

She caught up on the stairs and took my arm.

"Where are you going to put those?" she said. "I'd keep them somewhere safe. Somewhere I know about, in case something happens."

"I'll keep them with me."

"Of course."

She squeezed my arm and went to her own room.

I carried the bag to mine. I stood with my back against the door for a minute.

Then I took my passport and slid it into the lining of my coat. I put the folder under the mattress, and I locked the door from the inside with the new key.

For two days nobody tried it.

Massimo ate at the other end of the table and spoke to his father about shipments.

Bianca brought me tea, and asked about hospital shifts, and didn't ask about Corvi again.

On Tuesday night I tried to sleep and lay looking at the ceiling instead.

I had a plan for Wednesday at ten, but it was one line long.

Stand at the gate.

I didn't know what Adriano Corvi would say when he saw me.

I only knew what I had heard on the pavement in the fire, after the taillights were gone.

Somebody had knelt in the smoke beside me and said, very low, "I asked for you three times."

I never saw his face. I had gone over those words every night since I woke, and I knew nobody else's voice.

At half past nine on Wednesday morning, the house phone rang in the hall.

I was dressed already, and I took it.

"It's the gate," said the captain on the other end. "There's a gray car on the road again. Same one as the other day."

"Has anyone come out of it?"

"No. It's just sitting there."

I looked at the clock on the stairs.

There was half an hour left.

"Leave the gate shut," I said. "I'm coming down."

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