Page 148 of The Cost of Silence

No.

The word lands in my chest with a thud.

No.

Not this time.

Not like this.

I spin, scanning the room with new eyes.

Fire needs fuel. Air. Time.

I don’t know how much of them I have.

There’s a wardrobe, heavy and old, that looks like it weighs more than I do. A dressing table. The bed. The drapes. All flammable, all wrong.

The windows look original, though. Old glass in thick frames. If they’ve been painted shut over the years, I’m in trouble. If they haven’t…

I cross to the nearest one and yank the curtains aside. The latch is stiff but not immovable. My fingers fumble on the cold metal, slipping once, twice, then catching. I force it up.

The window grudgingly gives.

Cold air rushes in, biting my lungs but blessedly clear. Smoke curls past my ankles, snaking across the floor.

The drop isn’t far, one story, maybe, onto a flat strip of roof over a lower level. From there, if I can find a way down…

No time to overthink.

I grab the heavy quilt off the bed and fling it onto the sill, padding the edge.

For a second, I picture Nico’s face if he could see this. He’d have a heart attack and a lecture lined up for me at the bottom.

“Sorry,” I mutter to nobody, and jump.

The impact jars my bones, sends a crack of pain through my ribs, but I stay upright. The roof is graveled, the stones sliding under my feet. I catch myself on my hands, skin scraping.

Behind me, smoke is pouring out of the open window now, thickening from light gray to a darker gray. Heat licks at the back of my neck.

I scramble to my feet and run.

There’s a low ledge at the edge of the roof. Beyond it, a trellis climbs up from the ground, twined with the bare knots of what might be roses in summer. It looks fragile as hell, but it’s something.

I swing myself over the edge, gripping the wooden slats with both hands. It creaks, complaining, but holds.

“Hold it together,” I whisper to the trellis, to myself, to the world.

I climb down, feet slipping, palms burning, smoke chasing me in slow waves. By the time I drop the last few feet to the ground, my lungs are aching.

I stagger, catch myself on the side of the building, and look back.

The cottage, because that’s what it is, a large, ornate cottage attached to something bigger, is belching smoke from two windows. Flames are licking at the curtains inside, orange tongues tasting the glass.

For one awful second, I imagine being on the other side of that, choking. Then I make myself stop.You got out. Move.

There’s a gravel path leading away from the cottage, curving around hedges that have been clipped into submission. In thedistance, I can see the main house, all stone and big windows and history. Beyond that, the faint suggestion of a gate.

I have no idea where Domenico and Orlov are now. On their way to the dock, if the timeline matches what they were bragging about, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t men left behind.