I stepped into the shower, my toes flinching at the chilled floor. Off with the clothes, I cut the shower on, steam filling the room. The lukewarm water poured down and I watched the blood trickling down my body, turning pink as it touched the floor. I couldn't look at the swirling water beneath my feet. Tilting my head up, I closed my eyes and let the water hit my face. Each time the image of Taylor laying on the floor of the gas station, blood flowing out of the wound in his forehead flashed through my mind.
It was a lucky shot for Silas. I had aimed it right but when I had pulled the trigger, my eyes had been closed. It was a wonder how the bullet went straight through Taylor's head.
It was a wonder how I was still standing on my feet, not pulling at my hair and screaming.
I killed a man and I was guilty of it.
There, I said it.
My eyes opened, unable to tolerate the images in my mind. It would go away. Someday, perhaps.
As I pushed my damp hair behind my shoulder and held out both hands before me, I saw blood. One blink and then the stains were gone.
The fact that I hadn't sunk down on my knees and burst into sobs already was strange. I felt bizarre as well as if it was all part of a huge conspiracy, as if someone was lurking behind waiting to tell everyone that Dawn Dale was a murderer.
I heard water sloshing and footsteps behind me. From the blurry glass, I could see the outline of Silas's body, facing the tub, a white towel in his hands. Finishing the rest of my shower fast enough, I walked out, finding him already done dressing his wound.
"Hi," he half-smiled and half-winced as he stood up from where he had sat while his bullet-retrieving-procedure.
"Hi, how are you feeling?" I took a towel from the holder, wrapping it around myself.
"Awful." He made a sour face.
"Honest much?" I smirked at him through the vintage mirror before me, reaching for the one cotton dress I had stuffed inside the bag, the only cloth that wasn't jeans.
Silas didn't say anything, only shook his head with a knowing smile.
Once I dried my hair, my head felt clearer. The adrenaline rush was fading away gradually.
Silas sat on one of the white upholstered chairs behind the dining table, looking at a tray of food when I sauntered through the corridor, my bare feet trailing beads of water down the wooden floorboard.
The room couldn't have been more than five hundred sq.ft. Between two windows, there was a white console table bearing a glass vase. Just like the dining table facing the first window, there was a yellow floral-motif velvet couch facing the second one. The bed was separated from the room with a pillar perched in the middle and white chiffon-like curtains.
I opened the window by the couch, feeling my husband's eyes on me. But I forgot about it almost immediately at the sight before me. We were in the heart of Florentine civil life. The old building, resembling a stone fortress, was distinguished by the soaring tower that overlooked the plaza below it and probably the whole city. Palazzo Vecchio was only a few yards away from this building. Tourists were walking in and out from the door, admiring the ornamental marble front piece. There was that replica of Michaelangelo's David, I thought dumbly.
A slice of my own nightmare surfaced in my mind. Yes, bloody hotel rooms and balcony facing this tower. No, I hadn't forgotten the shivering sight. This had to mean something.
Someone knocked on the door, startling me. I turned, my eyes still wide, eyebrows still furrowed. Christie carried another tray of food inside which she set down on the table, near the white vase of yellow Tulips.
YOU ARE READING
Here's to Us (Blood Money #2)
Romance"What we had is over, Dawn. You don't have to do this anymore. You're free to go." I traced the glass separating us with my fingers, looking into his green eyes and whispered to the phone, "So you want to know why I'm still here?" He just stare...
