Page 21 of The Assassin's Captive
"Why?" I mutter, but the pounding in my head makes it hard to even hear myself. "Where are you taking me? Let me go!"
Lorenzo walks into the hallway, checking over his shoulders. I squint against the light, unsure where I even am. It's a hospital, or a clinic, but I don’t see any nurses or doctors. The lights are too bright to open my eyes. It all hurts my head too badly.
"Keep your voice down, Serena. I'm warning you. This is for your own good. Do you understand?" He talks with such a low tone, it terrifies me. The man who demands answers from me, from whom I had to escape, now wants to protect me? But from whom?
We reach a service elevator at the end of the hall. He shifts my weight to one arm while pressing the call button, and I feel the strength in his chest, the steady rhythm of his heart against my shoulder. The elevator doors open with barely a whisper.
"Where are you taking me?" I ask as we descend. My arms wrap around his shoulders naturally, but it feels stiff and uncomfortable. I don't belong in his arms.
"Somewhere safe," he grumbles, but I don’t feel safe. A hospital is a safe place, isn't it?
"Why…" I breathe, but he glares down at me and I stifle my urge to ask more questions.
The words offer no comfort. Safe for whom? Safe from what? My memories of the past few days remain fragmented—flashes of his house, the opera house, our confrontation, my escape. But the details blur together, leaving gaps that my injured brain can't bridge.
The elevator opens onto a basement level that's barely lit. I picture a janitor pushing his lone cart down these hallways after hours while smoking a cigarette, but we're alone down here. Lorenzo carries me through a maze of storage rooms and mechanical equipment. At the far end, a service door leads to an underground parking garage where a black sedan waits with its engine running.
He settles me into the passenger seat, buckling the seatbelt across my chest with movements that are gentle despite their efficiency. The leather beneath me is warm, expensive. This isn't the same car I crashed. This one carries no damage, no evidence of my escape attempt.
"The hospital will notice I'm gone," I slur as he slides behind the wheel.
"Not until morning shift change. We have hours."
Lorenzo drives through empty streets without speaking to me, but my head is throbbing too hard to talk, let alone put up a fight. Streetlights blur past the windows, casting intermittent shadows across his profile. His jaw remains tight, his hands gripping the steering wheel with more force than necessary.
The city gives way to countryside, and eventually he turns onto a private road that winds through olive groves and cypress trees. At the end sits a house that manages to be both modernand timeless—clean lines softened by weathered stone, large windows that reflect the star-filled sky.
This isn't a safehouse. This is someone's home.
Lorenzo parks in a circular driveway and kills the engine. For a moment, we sit in the dark, the only sounds our breathing and the soft ticking of the cooling motor.
"Are you going to kill me?" I ask.
He turns to look at me, his expression unreadable in the dim light. "No."
"Why not?"
"I can't."
The simplicity of his answer raises more questions than it resolves. There's tension in his voice, a shift in his tone that suggests complications I don't understand. Three days ago, he was willing to hurt me to get information. Now he risks exposure to steal me from a hospital.
"That's not an answer."
"It's the only one you're getting tonight."
He comes around to my side of the car and lifts me again, carrying me toward the house. Motion sensors activate security lights that illuminate a path lined with lavender and rosemary. The front door opens before we reach it, revealing an elderly woman in medical scrubs who steps aside to let us pass.
"This is Dr. Catalano," Lorenzo says by way of introduction. "She'll check your injuries."
The woman nods but doesn't speak. Her grey hair is pulled back in a severe bun, and her hands move with confidence like she's accustomed to working under unusual circumstances. She gestures toward a staircase that leads to the second floor.
Lorenzo carries me up the stairs and down a hallway lined with photographs and artwork. He pushes open a door at the end, revealing a bedroom that stops my breath.
This is his space. I can tell the instant I see it. The bed dominates the room—king-sized, covered in dark grey linens that look expensive and rarely used. Floor-to-ceiling windows offer views of a deep red duvet, bathed in moonlight. A dresser against one wall holds items that speak to the man who lives here—an expensive watch, cufflinks in a leather box, cologne bottles arranged by size.
He settles me onto the bed with care that contradicts everything I thought I knew about him. The mattress beneath me is firm, the pillows soft against my aching head. Dr. Catalano enters behind us, carrying a medical bag that clinks with glass and metal.
"I'll examine her now," the doctor says, and she bustles around, setting up her things.
