Lost Your Mind novel · Chapter 6 of 24

Chapter 6: The Novice

Benedetta sat on the edge of a garden chair in my father's courtyard and held a cup of tea she wasn't drinking.

She wore a grey coat that was too big for her, and no veil.

Her light brown hair was tied back with a shoelace.

I sat across from her and said nothing for a minute.

I hadn't decided yet whether I wanted to hear her.

Nico waited by the fountain with his back to us, giving us the distance of a man who was listening to every word.

"I shouldn't have come," Benedetta said.

"You did."

"I slipped out of the east house kitchen while the guards were arguing." Her hands shook against the cup. "I've been walking two hours."

"Why come to me?"

Her grey-green eyes lifted.

"Because you opened the door," she said. "And you didn't look at me like I was dirt."

I hadn't known I'd done that.

"I was twenty when I came to St. Cecilia," Benedetta said. "My mother had just died. I wanted somewhere quiet, and the sisters were kind."

"And Dario came to donate money."

"He came to the garden, the third week. He said he'd never seen anyone pray like I did."

She laughed, short and bitter.

"I was praying for my mother's soul. He thought I was praying for him."

I kept my face still.

"He brought me flowers. He told me about his father, and his brother, and how nobody ever let him decide anything." She turned the cup in her fingers. "He said he'd marry me. He said it was an arrangement, and he'd never loved the woman."

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