I consider switching out the lights and trying to sleep, but I won’t be able to. I’m too wound up. I get up, grab my phone out of my tote, and check for messages. There aren’t any.
When I’m walking back to the bed, I notice a book lying open and face down on the dresser.
I pick it up, read the title. I don’t recognize it. I open it, meaning to flip through to read the first few pages when a photograph falls out.
I bend to pick it up. It’s a photo of an older man with his arm around a younger woman, and beside them stands a man who resembles Giovanni. He’s got a baby in his arms, and the woman, I assume the baby’s mother, has her face turned to the baby. A little hand has got a fistful of her hair, and she’s trying to loosen it.
I turn it over to look to see if it has a date, but there isn’t one, and when I look at it again, I have to smile at the woman’s expression.
I’m so engrossed that I don’t hear him come in.
“Are you going through my private things?”
I’m so startled when he snatches the photo out of my hands that I almost don’t understand what he says. I don’t know if it’s the anger in his tone or something else that makes his accent suddenly so much heavier and his voice so much deeper. Like a roar. Like he sounded when he was talking on the phone.
“I wasn’t going through your things,” I quickly defend. Was I? No. It was right there. On top of the dresser.
He looks at the photo, his face darkening a little.
I stare up at him. When he shifts his gaze to me, glaring down at me, I find myself stepping backward, not realizing the bed is at my back until my knees it it.
“Did this just jump out of the drawer at you, then?”
I shake my head, confused, taken aback. And scared. “The book was on the dresser. It fell out. I wouldn’t-”
But before I can finish, he leans down, takes me by the throat, and hauls me up to tip-toe.
“Giovanni!” I grip his forearm, but he’s too big. Too strong. And his fingers, they’re squeezing too tight.
“You will respect my privacy.”
I slap at his arm, his chest. God. Does he know how hard he’s squeezing? Does he know I can’t breathe? Can’t make a sound.
It feels like an eternity passes, and the edges of my vision begin to darken like an old-fashioned photograph before he finally releases me.
I drop onto the bed.
I gasp for breath, clutching my neck, knowing I’ll have bruises in the shape of his giant hand.
He stares down at me, and I stare back, mute.
The rage on his face, it’s a terrifying thing. Like the beast has been let out of the cage. No. It’s chewed through the bars in its rage and is on a rampage now. A murderous rampage.
Then, just as quickly as it came, it’s gone.
His expression changes, and for a moment, I swear it’s like it wasn’t him just then. Because that man I just saw, I’d never have made a deal with him.
I’d never get in his bed.
No, I’d run like hell from that man.
But then, without a word, he turns his back and stalks away, into the bathroom, locking the door, leaving me trembling on his bed.
——-
Giovanni
I stand under the shower, letting the spray hit me in the face, the water cold as ice.
The look in her eyes. That terrified look. The feel of her delicate neck in my hand. Her hands fell away as I strangled her.
Christ.
What the fuck is wrong with me?
I shake my head, try to clear away the image, but it’s impossible.
No personal effects.
That photo is a personal effect. Am I going to have to lock every drawer?
I switch off the water. I’m fucking freezing now.
I dry off, my mind wandering back to the phone call. Jack telling me the deal didn’t go through. Jack telling me to be careful.
I’m close.
Too close for it all to get fucked up.
I walk back into the bedroom to find her sitting on the bed much like she was yesterday. Like a terrified little girl.
Fuck.
This night has gone straight to hell.