Page 25 of Enduring Caine
“Oh, don’t you worry. You’ll get your tour, just as Antonio requested.” He stepped into the room, taking up the space I’d conceded.
Shit. Not good.
Footsteps sounded on the stairs behind Leonardo—please be Antonio.
“Leave her alone,” Antonio said in his deep voice that sent a different shiver through me than it usually did. One of relief.
“We were only chatting, weren’t we?” Leo’s smug smile lingered until Antonio’s hand appeared on the shoulder that was too close to me.
“I said—”
Leo shrugged out of Antonio’s grip. “What are you going to do with only one arm? Run away like you did the last time someone challenged you?”
“Making wise choices isn’t running away.” Antonio shook his head, like he pitied Leo for his anger, which he probably did. “That’s something you’ve never been able to understand.”
Leo turned his face toward Antonio, squaring up against him. “A word of warning—and I don’t care if you tell Cristian: You can’t just come back here and think you have a place in this new world. There are too many wolves at the gate for a soft man like you.” He shouldered his way past Antonio, ramming against his injured arm.
Antonio held his breath, eyes and lips clamped shut.
“What the hell was that about?” I asked, watching Leo’s retreating form.
Once the footsteps on the stairs had faded, Antonio let out a slow, “Cazzo Madre di Dio, but that hurt.”
“Are you alright?”
“Speaking of wise choices, I think we should stop taunting him.” He stretched his shoulder backward, holding the arm tight to his body. “I should have put the sling on before I thought to argue with him.”
“And maybe hide some spikes in it for the next time he tries that.”
Antonio laughed and groaned. “Remind me to never get on your bad side.”
“You’ve already been there.” I pulled close, wrapping an arm around his neck. “You just got the silent treatment.”
“Punishment suits the crime?”
“More it suits the criminal.” I lifted on my tiptoes to kiss him, but he shook his head.
“We can’t.” He whispered, “Did you spot the camera?”
I scanned the square floor that surrounded the L-shaped staircase. Nothing on the walls or the ceiling here. “No.”
More footsteps sounded from the floor below, two pairs.
“It’s in the finial at the top of the staircase. Three-sixty. They see everything outside of the bedrooms.”
What would that have meant if I’d backed down with Leonardo? “So if Leo had pushed his way inside my room…”
“He’d threaten you, but he wouldn’t—”
“Cugino!” Cristian appeared on the stairs with Johann at his side, both of them carrying bags. “It’s time to go.”
Antonio’s gaze remained locked with mine for a moment before he nodded. “I need to grab my jacket and sling.”
Cristian approached me, while Johann took Cristian’s bag and followed Antonio into his room. The leering gaze he’d used on our arrival was gone, replaced by an almost casual friendliness. Either he recognized the first one didn’t work or Antonio might have had a talk with him about it.
“Will Johann be taking me down to the ruins?”
“No, Antonio said you have a passion for this sort of thing, so I picked the man who knows the most about the ruins and the cave,” said Cristian. “He’s busy right now but will be up within the hour.”