Page 25 of Taming Dahlia

I tried to pull her up by the shoulders, but the grip her hands had on mine tightened. Heart pounding, I dug my fingers into her shoulders and forcefully dragged her out of the water. She gasped for air as she emerged, all the while breathing heavily and coughing.

“What the hell are you doing?”

My voice shaking with anger —or was it fear— I wasn’t in the right state of mind to distinguish it.

How did it get from me washing her hair to her… what, trying to drown herself?

“Isn’t this what you’re into?” Ludovica blinked up at me, the water droplets falling from her eyelashes and trailing down her rosy face.

“I could see it in your eyes today, you know. You like hurting people, don’t you?” She shook her head, her coughing gradually starting to subside. “No. In fact, you actually enjoy it.”

“Do you want to kill yourself?” I stupidly asked, not seeing any other explanation for what had just occurred.

In response, she sunk back into the tub, limbs loose, and relaxed as if the past couple of minutes hadn’t even happened.

“That’s the thing about me. I always want to die… all the way up until I don’t.”

Unsure of how to respond to that, I just tentatively placed my hands back on her hair, prompting her to let out another pleased sigh.

“That doesn’t make any sense,” I informed her softly, trying to keep my tone mild. The water had turned lukewarm by now, but she didn’t seem to mind.

“I must be doing something right. I’m still alive, aren’t I?”

While that was an interesting point to make, it didn’t make me feel any better.

“Please don’t do that anymore,” I murmured, not entirely sure that I had any right to ask that of her, but still feeling that I needed to.

Ludovica merely let out another soft, noncommittal sound and I resumed running my fingers through her hair with care. When I returned to my room, the fragrance of flowers continued to linger on me a long time after.

Seven

Virgil

“Iswear that I’m going to punch Lorenzo,” Ace loudly announced as he walked through the door. “Like — in the face, I mean.”

“What did he do now?” King asked, distracted, paying more attention to the phone in his hand than Ace’s sudden outburst.

Hah. As if that even needed to be a question.

Lorenzo was always doing something. The rest of us just learned to ignore him; something that Ace, even after all these years, still hadn’t managed to learn.

“It wouldn’t be the first stupid thing you did this week,” I commented, and Ace let out a groan. He leaped over the back of the couch and settled himself comfortably next to King.

“Oh, please don’t tell me you’re still not over that.”

Over what?

The fact that he thought that it was a smart idea to set an entire warehouse on fire.

Of course I was over that. Why wouldn’t I be?

It was fortunate that the Don had a soft spot for us, or I could only imagine what the punishment might have been otherwise.

Ace always did this. He always made rash decisions without taking the time to think things through.

With how quickly the fire had started to spread, it was sheer luck he managed to get out of the warehouse completely unharmed. Not that he cared.

And about wanting to punch Lorenzo, well… that was an urge I was sure many other people shared. However, we weren’t animals. We had the ability to control ourselves — something that Ace seemed to lack.

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