Page 37 of A Beautiful Crime

I hold my breath as I wait for his response.

Constantine smirks down at him, and I know with that smirk his intentions are not pure. No, with the mischief dancing in those eyes of his I know what he is about to say isn’t good at all.

“You want to know what I think of Carina, hmm?” Luca says nothing but I can feel the tension in the air between the two of them. It’s heady enough to cut with a bloody chainsaw. “She had the balls you clearly didn’t to end your little brother’s life.”

The air seizes from my lungs.

He knows.

He knows.

At the gala, while we were dancing he had mentioned Elio’s death as if he knew the true insidious meaning behind it. He stared at me with eyes that looked right through me and into the depths of my mind. As if he had the key to unlock Pandora’s Box.

I didn’t possibly imagine that he would know.

Luca stands motionless, statuesque, and I bet if I could see his face it would be flushed.

Constantine’s smirk turns to a brilliant satisfied cold smile. It should be disarming, it should be terrifying, but to me it’s one of the most dazzling smiles I have ever seen.

I find myself leaning over the slightest bit of the rails of the banister to see it up close. I find myself wanting to photograph it and keep close for when I want to feel again.

And that’s it, isn’t it?

Constantine Donati makes me feel.

No, no.

This absolutely can not be.

“Imagine what she’ll do to you, Luca.”

Imagine what she’ll do to you, Luca.

I feel underused muscles in my face put in the effort to lift my lips and cause an ache in my cheeks.

My fingers tentatively touch my lips and they shake as I realize what my lips have formed.

It’s small, a hint, but it’s there.

The barest hint of a smile graces my lips.

The first genuine one I’ve had since my rebirth.

No, that’s not true.

It’s the first genuine smile I’ve had since mamma died ten years ago.

The monumental moment, the impossible having been made possible causes my heart to kick inside my chest and a storm of emotions to rise in me.

Suddenly I don’t feel in control.

I don’t have the reins on the steed who has guided me since mamma’s death.

I don’t have the echoing void of nothingness blanketing my entire being since my rebirth.

My blood feels like electricity flowing through my veins. My skin feels hyper aware. My eyes flash back to life.

As if he can sense it, as if he knows something miraculous is happening inside me, something unbelievable, his eyes leave my brother’s and they look up above him to where I stand with my hands hanging onto the rails with a death grip.

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