Page 95 of Monstrous Travels as Wicked as Sin

Percy reached for his wine, and when his hand met nothing but air, his eyes shot across to Althea, nursing it carefully by Leo’s side. “Kids, go to bed.”

“I’m nineteen!” Leo objected.

“And I’m eighteen!” Althea protested. “Now.”

“Bed!” Percy snapped.

The pair climbed to their feet with a lot of muttering and scowling, and Leo whined, “Can we at least go to a cafe or something? I’m starving.”

“No, you may not go to a cafe.”

Leo took the time to pause and fling an angry arm towards Percy. “Literally two weeks ago you had me burn the body of some guy you shot, and now you won’t let me go out for dinner?”

“The two things aren’t slightly related,” Percy threw back, slamming cupboard doors, searching for a new glass. He soon gave up, having no idea where anyone had put anything since the last ones had been smashed, and instead yelled across the room, “And have you forgotten there’s a maniacal witch on the loose?”

“There’s a what?” Giordano cut in.

Percy sent very particular eye-daggers across at him, not deigning to answer, then flicked the kettle on to boil, saying to Leo, “I’ll bring you something. Go.”

Leo rolled his eyes dramatically. Althea held onto her wine and followed him closely as they disappeared into his bedroom.

“And keep the door open!” Percy shouted.

“I’m nineteen!” Leo screamed. Yet the door made no sound as the pair settled down on opposite ends of Leo’s bed to try to hear the ensuing conversation

Percy dumped the pasta into a pot of boiling water with a hefty load of salt, stirred, and declared, “Giordano, you’re not welcome. Get the fuck out of my apartment and my life.”

Giordano let go a bitter scoff, shaking his head. “Fine. It’s been just as delightful as it always is.”

Percy didn’t turn back to see the last look. That final scan of his back, that bereftness in his eyes, mingled with anger, that said this was it. Their long, difficult, loving entanglement at an end.

But Joe, who had woken in cold sweats at the thought of living through that moment with Percy, called him back. “Stay. Please. I owe you both an explanation.”

“You don’t owe anything to anyone,” said Percy, smashing a colander down on the bench. “What’s in the past stays there. And he doesn’t get to dictate whether you do or don’t tell me whatever you choose to.”

“I’m not going to be responsible for ruining your friendship,” said Joe. “And I’m not going to let what happened to me do any more damage than it already has.” He pulled three wine glasses down from a cupboard, then leaned over Percy’s shoulder for the wine bottle, saying softly by his ear, “Put on some pasta for Giordano.”

“No,” Percy muttered. “He can go hungry.”

Joe’s eyes swept the empty bench. “You already put enough on, didn’t you?”

Percy stirred his sauce sulkily. “I didn’t want it to go to waste.”

Joe smiled, then made for the photocopied newspaper articles that lay glaring and shunned by Percy. He hadn’t seen that face in over a decade, but it was his and it was a picture he knew well; a frightened little boy, caught by the cameras of cold-hearted journalists as he made his way into the courthouse to be told the verdict on his case. It had been splashed across every paper in Italy for months afterwards. There wasn’t a person in the country, back then, who wouldn’t have recognised that face.

Giordano waited by a window in the living room, and Percy avoided any outward sign that would indicate he knew he was there. He made the food, he took some in to Leo and Althea. Joe set the other three servings on the table, with the wine and glasses, and when he and Percy were both seated, Giordano, while maintaining his distance, turned to listen.

Joe placed the papers down, spread them across the table with one movement of his arm, and calmly stated, “I killed them. My parents. Both of them.”

Percy would have taken that crack in their shell before he’d ever have let Joe fall into the stoic, vulnerable place his voice indicated he was, alone and on display like that. “You don’t need to say a word.”

Joe gave the slightest nod as acknowledgement of the sentiment he was about to overrule, then he met the brown eyes that studied him from across the room. “I lied in court, and I got away with it.”

“I knew it.” Giordano’s lip raised with disgust. “Everyone knew it.”

Percy ignored him and went about pouring wine. “Well, obviously they were possessed or something.”

“No,” said Joe.

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