"What happened to your neck?"
Marco followed my gaze and touched his neck. His hand went rigid.
He tugged at his collar.
"Serafina scratched me earlier, when I was teaching her a lesson."
"Was it a scratch, or a kiss?"
Marco's expression turned uneasy.
"Gioia, what are you talking about? You're too on edge right now."
He stood up and crossed to the table, lifting the lid off the container. Somewhere down the corridor a soldier shifted his weight outside the door, the floor creaking under the man Marco had posted there.
"I went all the way to the south side of the territory to get your favorite little wontons. You haven't eaten all day. Have some warm soup first."
He scooped up one wonton, blew on it, and lifted it to my lips.
That lemon-sea-salt scent drifted over again.
I pushed his hand away.
I leaned over the edge of the bed and started retching.
Marco reached out to pat my back.
I slapped his hand away hard. "Don't touch me!"
"Okay, okay, I won't touch you."
Marco raised both hands and stepped back. "Sweetheart, don't get worked up. I'll go get the doctor."
He turned, pulled open the door, and hurried out.
Just now I'd almost believed he was doing this for my sake.
But the kiss mark inside his collar, and the messages I'd just seen, told me plainly.
He wasn't stopping me from bringing in the Feds for my sake. He was doing it to protect Serafina.
For the next two weeks, Marco never left my side in the private room the Family kept quiet at the clinic.
He wiped my face and fed me my meals.
When I shifted in the middle of the night, he'd sit up at once and take my hand. "Don't be scared. I'm here."
When the nurse came on rounds, she said to me, "Your husband is so good to you. Every time I come in on the night shift, he hasn't closed his eyes."
I looked at Marco.
"Yes. He's always been this good to me."
I thought back to the morning the alliance was sealed, when Marco had just put on his suit for the union that bound our families in blood.
Serafina called, saying her stomach hurt so badly she was rolling on the floor, telling him to come rush her to the hospital.
Marco shouted into the phone, "If your stomach hurts, call the house doctor! I'm getting married today. The sky could fall and I still wouldn't go!"
He blocked Serafina's number right in front of me, then took my hand and walked out the door.
I once thought a man like that would love me for the rest of my life.
"Marco, I'm bringing in the Feds."
I brought it up again.
Marco's hands stopped moving. In the hush, the ice in the pitcher on the tray settled with a small, brittle sound.
"Why are you bringing this up again?"
He came to the bedside. "Didn't I tell you? I already taught her a lesson."
"I can't let this go."
Marco raised his hand and, with a loud crack, slapped himself hard across the face.
Then another slap.
"It's all my fault!"
He struck himself left and right. "I didn't protect you! I'm useless!"
Red handprints surfaced fast across his face.
"Sweetheart, do you really have to tear the wound open and show it to every Family all over again?"
He grabbed my hand and forced it against his own face. "Hit me, take it out on me, just don't go to the Feds, all right? I'm begging you!"
I pulled my hand back and said nothing. Under the blanket, my thumb turned the empty space on my left ring finger, around and around.
Marco crouched on the floor, covering his face, crying.
At eight that night, Marco's phone rang.
"It's the crew. I need to take this."
He walked out of the room.
I sat up and picked up the second phone he'd just slid into the drawer.
I opened the car service's order history.
The morning of the alliance-marriage.
Marco had suddenly told me there was a big problem with the arrangements at the hotel, that he had to get there early.
He'd told me to take a separate car.
The record showed he'd been picked up at our building, and the destination wasn't the hotel at all.
It was Serafina's apartment.
Right after that, I saw his messages with Serafina.
Serafina: 【You have to keep Gioia calm. You absolutely cannot let her bring in the Feds!】
