The words are rough. Barely understandable.
She leans closer, her forehead almost touching my hand again. “You better be.”
The door opens.
A nurse comes in first, then a doctor, then Teresa right behind them, like she has her own personal call button thing for my room.
She probably does.
Her hair is pulled back, her face pale and drawn, but her eyes sharpen the second they land on me.
“There he is,” Teresa says, voice light in a way that fools no one. “The world’s worst patient.”
The nurse checks the monitor. The doctor moves to my bedside, asking questions I answer with blinks and small motions because prolonged speech is impossible. Name. Pain. Breathing. Can I follow his finger? Can I squeeze his hand?
Barely.
It irritates me how much effort it takes.
Caterina stays beside me the whole time.
Her hand never leaves mine.
The doctor says things I might care about later.
Extubated. Significant blood loss. Blah blah.
My eyes start to close sleepily as whatever the nurse just pumped into me starts to take effect.
The doctor leaves after telling me not to speak more than necessary.
Teresa waits until the door closes behind him before stepping closer.
For a second, she is not a psychologist or the wife of the Conti family’s future don.
She is just my cousin.
The kid who used to follow me around, asking too many questions. The girl who cried at my father’s funeral when I was too shell-shocked. The teenager who flew all the way to Texas to be there when I came back from my first tour, even though she was in the middle of exams. The woman who called me for help because her family needed protection.
Her eyes shine.
“You scared me,” she says.
I swallow carefully.
“Sorry.”
Her mouth tightens. “Don’t be sorry. Just don’t do it again.”
Caterina makes a soft sound.
Teresa leans down and presses a kiss to my forehead.
That undoes something in me.
“You’re going to listen this time,” she says against my hair. “To the doctors, to me, to Caterina. You’re going to heal up. Because this time, IknowI can kick your ass.”
I can’t afford to laugh right now, but she gets it.
