Sudden Legacy (28 page)

Someone was crying loud, ugly sobs. It took me a minute to figure out that the noise was coming from me. I stumbled stiffly to Julien’s desk and picked up the phone. I dialed nine-one-one but nothing happened. “It’s broken!” I was pretty sure I was hysterical. “Nine-one-one is broken!” A hand grabbed at my arm and shook me to get my attention. I jumped in a panic. It was Marla, still on the floor. “One-one-eight,” she said. I stared at her blankly. “One-one-eight!” she repeated. “The emergency number is one-one-eight.”

Signore Passarelli took the phone from my hand and proceeded to dial the correct number to alert an ambulance. I sank numbly to the floor next to Marla. I was empty. I was in shock. I registered the fact that I was shivering, but it felt more like I was watching someone else shiver that looked a whole lot like me. Marla wrapped her small arms tightly around my neck and we shivered together, each of us crying into the other’s hair.

I was in a fog of exhaustion. I had given my statement to no less than three officers, and had watched as first Savio, and then Mr. Martin had been taken away atop gurneys. Neither of them had fully succumbed to their wounds, but they both remained unconscious. Mr. Martin looked especially pale and I worried he may not make it through this. The thought was enough to start me crying again.

Alex. I just wanted to go to Alex. I was grateful he was asleep in his bed, and would never have to know of the night’s events. I ached to hold him, and press relieved kisses to his sleeping face. At last it looked as if things were coming to an end. I stared catatonically at the smeared puddle of blood that marred the floor where Mr. Martin had lain, and the much smaller smudge where Savio had fallen. Who was going to clean them up? How do you get blood out of hand-woven unicorn fur carpets? Surely Julien’s carpets weren’t the type you could just hose off. Hydrogen peroxide? We’d need a vat of the stuff...

“Lara?” Julien’s soft voice broke into my rambling thoughts. He was staring down at me with concern. “Are you well?” He offered me his hand and pulled me up from the sofa. “Go up to bed,
Chérie.
I will finish things down here. He kissed me on the forehead and pointed me toward the door. I was too numb to argue. I climbed the stairs like an automaton, pausing to listen a moment before opening Alex’s door. It was silent as a tomb.

The first thing that caught my attention was the fact that one of the windows by the balcony stood open, its long, sheer curtain billowed out, lazily swishing with the cool night air. Rushing to Alex’s bed I pulled back the comforter, already knowing I would find it empty.

Frantically I turned, and ran smack into Savio, who had come up behind me. Before I could react he had me by the throat. “Where is he?” he asked. His palm was clammy against my neck, he was sweating profusely, and I could smell the coppery tang of blood on his damp shirt. His eyes were feral.
Where is he? Savio doesn’t know - that means he doesn’t have him!
My body sagged in temporary relief. Savio took that as an indication of surrender. He lessened his hold on my windpipe to allow for my answer. I gulped in a fresh breath and prayed Alex was hiding far away, perhaps sleeping with Pops and Nan. “Go to hell,” I said. Savio immediately clamped down hard again, causing my throat to tickle and spasm, and my blood to pound behind my eyes.

“I
will
find him,” he said quietly. “I will find him, and gut him like a little fish. When Julien sees my handiwork he will beg me to finish the job.”

I was getting dizzy. I stumbled back, and Savio pushed his advantage, shoving me against the wall next to Alex’s bed. “With the addition of the queen’s corpse, the collection will be complete. How tragic. A whole family, taken so quickly by... A fire? Yes. A fire will serve my purposes perfectly. It takes care of all the loose ends, and prevents any messy questions being raised.”

Black stars were beginning to flicker before me and I was becoming disoriented. I tried to focus on what he was saying. He meant my family harm. He meant to kill us all. My hands clawed frantically at his steel grip on my windpipe. The edge of the side table was pressing painfully into my thigh and my jostling caused it to shake on its legs. I vaguely registered a light bump against my hip. Julien’s toy truck. I snatched it up and slammed it as hard as I could into Savio’s face, feeling no small amount of satisfaction as the pointed corner of the truck bed punctured his flesh.

The assault stunned him momentarily, loosening his grip enough for me to wrestle myself free. My only escape route was over the bed, but I hadn’t even made it half way across before he grabbed ahold of my leg. I kicked at him in a panic, my heel connecting solidly with his jaw. Somehow I managed to get him in a scissor hold. Adrenaline was coursing through my veins and I felt a super human strength rise up in me. I remembered a news story I had seen once about a mother single-handedly lifting an SUV off her child to save him. This moment, this psychotic man between my legs, was my SUV. Years of horseback riding had conditioned my legs and core, and I pulled on the strength of a mother’s love and the certain knowledge that this situation was kill or be killed. I literally had Savio in a death grip.

It almost didn’t register when he finally went limp. For a moment I thought he might be faking it so I would let him go. Suddenly there was a thundering commotion in the hall. Julien and several officers came barreling through the door. I let go of my hold on Savio’s unconscious body and relentlessly kicked him away. Without the force of my legs holding him, he slipped off the bed and sank gracelessly to the floor with a dull thump. He was immediately engulfed in lawmen, and I was immediately engulfed in Julien’s arms. “Alex!” I was panting, trying to catch my breath. “Where’s Alex?”

“I have him. He’s with Nan and me.” Pops materialized from the hall, wearing rumpled pajamas and a confused frown. That was all I could handle. Alex was safe. Savio was in custody and no longer a threat to my family. As if a switch were turned from on to off in my body, I succumbed to the horrors of the night and slipped blissfully into a sanity preserving faint.

It wasn’t until the following morning that I learned how Julien and the police came to be in the hall. Apparently Savio managed to overtake the paramedics and make his way back to the house, slipping into Alex’s room undetected in all the commotion. When the second ambulance made its way down the drive they noticed the first ambulance parked oddly on the lawn. Upon investigating they found two unconscious paramedics and no Savio. They immediately alerted everyone back at the house.

I gave Julien a squeeze, wanting to change the subject but even more so because Alex was stirring on my other side and I didn’t want him to hear any of this. The three of us had spent the night in Julien’s bed, neither of us wanting to let Alex or the other out of our sight. He took the hint. “You are
une tigresse, Chérie,
” he said softly, hugging me back fiercely and dropping a kiss on my temple. Alex’s head popped up beside me, showcasing his uncanny ability to go from sleep to perfectly awake sponge in zero point four seconds. “Mama, good morning!” His apple cheeks were rosy and warm from sleep and his curls framed his face, the morning sun shining through the window behind him and giving him the appearance of a cherub. “Yes, baby,” I answered. “Good morning.”

Mugga is a very small country laying just to the east of the Italian comune of Muggia. It is close to eight hundred thousand acres, or roughly the size of Rhode Island. It boasts a population of five hundred thousand citizens, all of whom seemed to be participating in the annual festival, flooding the streets dressed in elaborate costumes with wigs and make-up and glowing accessories.

Floats meandered down the crowded cobblestone boulevards of the capital city. It was atop one of these floats that Julien and I rode, bundled in thick coats to keep the chilly February night at bay.

I smiled as we passed sign after sign of Nonna Vera’s face, welcoming the lost queen back into her proper place as ruler of this small kingdom.

“You know,
Chérie,
don’t think it has escaped my attention that you have yet to officially answer my proposal,” said Julien into my ear. I shivered as his warm breath tickled my neck.

“That may have something to do with the fact that you have yet to officially
ask
me,” I answered. His brows rose in surprise. I thought I heard a chuckle come from Mr. Martin in the back corner of the float. I definitely heard him say something jeeringly in their special pidgin language. Julien frowned in the other man’s direction, then turned his full attention back to me.

“So I haven’t. Let me rectify that egregious oversight post haste.” He lowered himself gracefully down on one knee - no small feat considering the jostling of the float - and steadied himself with his hands on my hips. The position put him level with my slightly protruding belly. Unable to resist, he pulled aside the layers of my coat and dropped a kiss on my five months pregnant paunch. I felt a fluttering from within, but it was still too weak for him to feel, so I didn’t mention it, instead keeping it a secret conversation between my passenger and me.

Julien cleared his throat theatrically to make sure he had my undivided attention. “Lara, my most beautiful, cherished, Lara. Would you do me the honor of becoming my wife?” He pulled out a clamshell case and opened it to reveal a stunning blue sapphire ring.

“I thought you’d never ask,” I said, pulling off my glove and presenting my finger for the ring. It was a perfect fit. He stood up and pulled me into his chest. “You still haven’t answered,” he pointed out. “Yes!” I said. “
Sí! Oui! Yes!
Does that cover all of them?” He beamed at me, and lowered his lips to mine for a sweet, then searing kiss. As if on cue the carnivale fireworks began, their vivid colors bursting across the night sky as if in celebration of our love.