Dry earth squished between my toes. The night air was cool, not cold—mid-sixties—but I shivered as I walked, not from the temperature, but from the chill inside me. The path wove down the hillside, away from the winery and villa and into a small valley. My anxiety inched up the farther I moved away from the house. An owl hooted in the canopy like an ominous warning. The rapid flap of bats and other things I didn’t want to think about sent my nerves humming. I came to a small stream and had to pick my way across exposed rocks in the bed. Twice I slipped, and the hem of my pajama bottoms dipped into the cold water. Once I reached the far side, I shook the water from my cotton pants as best I could and scanned the dark forest. But I saw no sign of Luc.
That chill swirled inside me, making my hands cold and clammy. This was stupid. I didn’t know where I was or where I was even going. I should head back before I got lost in these woods. Luc had told me to stay put. If he came back to my room and found me gone, he’d flip out. After everything that had happened between us recently, did I really want to risk our relationship all because I thought I’d seen something in his eyes that might not have been there?
My hands shook, and I turned back toward the stream, intent on rushing back to my room before Luc realized I was gone. Just as I placed my bare foot on the closest rock, voices drifted on the air and reached my ears.
I stilled. Turned my head. Listened. They were male voices. I stepped away from the brook and squinted to see down the path. Nothing but darkness met my eyes, but those were definitely voices. Many.
My feet moved forward, drawn toward the sound as if being pulled by an invisible tractor beam. I pushed vines and tree limbs out of my way as I followed the path down the hill, shivering with each step. A hundred yards deeper into the forest, I spotted a warm, flickering glow in the dark valley below and slowed my steps. The voices grew louder. I strained to hear what they were saying, but the words were in Italian, not English, and the men were all speaking at once.
No, the men were all chanting at once.
The chill inside me grew ice cold, and my pulse shot into the stratosphere. Instinct pushed me off the path and into the brush. Instead of moving toward the sounds, I picked my way parallel to it, searching for a place where I could see what was happening far below. Twigs scraped my arms and pulled at my pant legs. A rock dug into the sole of my foot, making me wince and stumble. My pulse was a whir in my ears, but I didn’t turn back. I had to see what was going on. I needed to know what I’d heard.
I caught sight of stars and realized the trees were thinning out. The voices were louder here, the golden glow growing stronger. Easing my way around large boulders and small saplings, I finally reached what looked like a rock outcropping. Carefully, so I wouldn’t give myself away, I stepped up behind a boulder half my size and peered over the edge of the small cliff I’d found.
Thirty yards below, torches were lit on the edge of a clearing. Black figures dressed in hooded capes stood in a circle around a large, flat, rectangular stone, chanting words I didn’t understand. Their faces were completely covered by stark white bauta masks with overaccentuated noses, protruding chins, no mouths, and cutouts for eyeholes. Parallel to the large rock, one man wore a blood-red cape, standing out among all the rest. His hood wasn’t up like the others. Instead, he wore a wide-brimmed black hat on the top of his head, pinned up on both sides and in the back to form a triangular shape. Under that, a thick drape of red, gold, and swirling black fabric dropped to his biceps and the middle of his back like a veil. And when he turned, I saw his mask wasn’t white. It was gold.
My spine stiffened, and fear shot through me as I ducked behind the rock so he wouldn’t see me. Fingers shaking, I braced them on the stone and peered around the edge, trying to see what was happening. Two hooded black figures on the far side of the clearing stepped back, opening the circle. Four women, dressed in short, white, nearly see-through cotton dresses and black cat-style eye masks, moved into the circle.
Their feet were bare, their shoulders lifted, their heads held high. They didn’t seem scared but…something about the way they were paraded into the middle of the circle felt wrong. Something about the way the men in masks surrounding them watched their every movement felt sinister. My heart raced as I held my breath and watched, wondering what was going on.
The women circled the flat black slab, stopping when one stood on each side. Each faced the stone and reached out her hands, forming a circle inside the circle. The women’s lips began to move, and I heard a new chant rising from the clearing. Soft at first, then growing in strength and intensity and speed. The red-cloaked figure stepped forward and slowly walked around behind the women as they chanted. When the women’s chanting reached a crescendo, he halted behind one on the far end.
The women’s voices cut off. The other three women turned to look at the fourth, standing in front of the man in red. They released each other’s hands and stepped back, away from the rock slab. And before I realized what was happening, the man in red reached for the remaining woman’s flimsy white dress and tore it from her body.
The scrap of fabric fell to the ground at her feet. With a hand between her shoulder blades, he pushed her forward. The woman bent over the end of the stone—no, altar, I realized—and arched her back. And as she did, I caught sight of an elaborate leopard-print tattoo across her right hip and up her rib cage.
The men in black forming the circle began to chant again. My stomach pitched, and my mouth grew dry. The red-cloaked figure stared down at her from behind the grotesque gold mask. The chanting grew louder until it was a roar in the small valley, until I felt it stirring in my veins. Then, in a rush of movement, he parted his cape to reveal his rigid erection and slammed into her.
Shocked, I gasped and shot back, falling on my butt in the dirt. Realizing what I’d done, I quickly covered my mouth with my hand so I wouldn’t give myself away, but I couldn’t force my legs to move. I couldn’t make myself look away either.
The woman’s groans echoed through the small valley as the man continued to ram into her in time with the chants. Slowly, I became aware of movement around the circle. The other three women were now also naked, writhing and rubbing against the men standing still in black as if possessed by their chants, by what they were watching, by some unseen, depraved force.
I wasn’t sure what I was seeing. All that registered was that it was something I was definitely not supposed to be seeing.
I scrambled back, my fingernails and heels digging into the dirt as I tried to push myself up. The red-cloaked man continued to pummel the woman, and she screamed as if she couldn’t get enough. But something about the whole scene felt wrong, and as I pushed myself onto my hands and knees and stumbled for my footing, I realized what that was.
The sounds coming from that woman were the same sounds I’d heard in that house Gio had taken me to on Long Island. The same sounds I’d heard in that orgy room. The same sounds I’d made myself that night.
Possessed sounds. Uninhibited sounds. Drugged sounds.
Nausea swirled inside me as I braced an unsteady hand against the rock at my side and leveraged myself upright, trying not to alert anyone below to my presence. I didn’t know if that woman was drugged. I didn’t know if any of them were. I didn’t want to stick around to find out.
The trees swam around me. My whole body shook, but I dug my feet into the ground and forced my legs into a sprint, wanting only to get as far from this nightmare as I could. Wanting to forget everything I’d just witnessed.
I made it as far as the path before panic made me stumble. I hit the ground with a grunt. Voices echoed behind me, down in the clearing. Shouts and groans and a muffled rumble of words—no longer chanting.
Panic turned to a bone-melting fear that I’d been spotted. I clawed my way to my feet and shoved my legs into a run. Rocks and twigs stabbed into the soles of my feet but I didn’t slow my steps. A rustle sounded to my right, sending my adrenaline soaring. I panted and tried to run faster
up the hillside. Told myself not to look back. Told myself to keep going no matter wha—
A hand closed around my arm and yanked me off my feet. I screamed as I slammed into something hard. Another hand quickly slapped over my mouth, muffling the sound, and hauled me back against a large, hard body.
I was jerked off the path and into the trees. I thrashed and kicked, trying to break free. Tree limbs scraped my arms and legs as the man—I knew it was a man from his size and hold—pulled me deeper into the forest. Something solid cracked against my elbow. Images of what I’d seen swirled in my brain, and I fought harder. I shrieked beneath the hand at my mouth and struggled away from the breath on my neck. Whoever held me was whispering, but I didn’t want to hear what he had to say. I shook my head, trying to ignore his harsh words near my ear, trying not to listen to his voice because I didn’t want to hear his vile chants or—
Something inside me faltered because I recognized that voice. It was deep. It was familiar. It almost sounded like—
“It’s me, Natalie,” the voice hissed near my ear. “It’s Luc. Stop fighting me, dammit. They’re going to hear you.”
I went still as stone.
“That’s right,” Luc whispered behind me. “I’m not trying to hurt you. I’m trying to help you.”
Disbelief formed a ball of pressure in my chest. I gripped the arm clamped tightly against my chest, afraid to believe what I was hearing. “Luc?” I mumbled beneath the hand still covering my mouth. “My Luc?”
“Yes, your Luc.”
All the fear inside me broke. I sagged back into him as my adrenaline crashed. His hold on me loosened, and I heard him whisper, “Angioletto,” but a relieved sob was already wedging its way up my throat, preventing me from responding.
Turning quickly, I pressed my face against his chest and wrapped my arms around his waist, holding on as the shakes consumed me. His arms closed around me like steel bands, and he held me to him, pressing his big hand to the back of my head, cradling me against him while he bathed me in his strength. I heard his voice at my ear telling me I was safe, telling me everything was going to be okay, but it didn’t help. Squeezing my eyes tighter, I burrowed in closer, needing his warmth, needing the goodness inside him to push away the darkness I’d just witnessed.
My hands shifted at his lower spine as I tried to get closer. Fabric brushed my fingers. Something hard bumped against my elbow. Sensations I didn’t understand drew me back from the edge of hysteria. I tried to focus on what I’d felt and straightened my fingers where they rested against his lower back. Soft, silky fabric skimmed my hand. Fabric that sent a new sense of dread spiraling through me.
I didn’t want to see. I didn’t want to know. But I couldn’t stop myself from looking. Shifting my hands to his ribs, I pushed back. His whispered words died on his lips, and his muscles flexed, preventing me from easing away. For a heartbeat, I thought he wouldn’t let me go, but then he released me.
My heart beat hard and fast as I moved a step back and looked at him in the dim light. A black cape, just like the ones I’d seen in that clearing, hung from his shoulders and fell down his back to his heels. My gaze drifted to his arm, where a white bauta mask was hooked over his elbow.
“No.” Bile pushed up my throat all over again, and I stumbled back, not wanting to believe what I was seeing was real. “No.” I covered my mouth with my hand and shook my head violently, trying not to gag. “No, no, no.”
“Natalie.” Luc moved toward me, his muscles coiled and tight, his eyes as hard as I’d ever seen them. “Don’t move.”
My heart thundered against my ribs as I stared at him in shock and disbelief, and my skin grew hot and tight with a hysteria that sent my horror into overdrive. I grappled for some kind of explanation for the cape and mask, for something to tell me what I was seeing wasn’t real. But it was real. It was right in front of me.
He was wearing the same outfit the men in that circle were wearing. He was one of them. He was one of those men who’d taken part in that…cultlike ceremony.
“Natalie,” he said in a low voice. “Just listen.”
I couldn’t. Sickness shot up my throat. I couldn’t listen to any more of his lies. I turned and sprinted before he could stop me.
* * *
Luc slammed into me before I ran more than twenty yards. The air whooshed out of my lungs. My feet left the ground. I grunted as I flew forward and only barely had time to lift my hands before I smashed into the dirt.
Pain shot up my hands and into my arms, and I groaned. My pajama bottoms tore. Something sharp stabbed into my calf, sending a burn across my flesh. I struggled beneath him and rolled, trying to break free of his hold, but he was too big. Too strong. He flipped me to my back with ease and grasped both of my flailing arms, pinning me to the ground.
“Stop it,” he growled. “Natalie, Dio dannato, stop fucking fighting me.”
Panic and terror crashed into me, and I kicked and twisted and flailed my head as hard as I could, desperate for the moment he loosened his grip and I could break free. “Let me go,” I snarled. “Let me go, dammit.”
He slapped a hand over my mouth and lowered his full weight onto me, trapping me between the hard earth and his even harder body. I gasped beneath his palm as his weight pushed the air out of my lungs. He must have heard me wheeze for breath, because he eased up on my chest. I sucked in air, but before I could lash out again, he leaned close to my ear and whispered, “Don’t make a sound. Someone’s on the path. They must have heard us. If they find us, they’ll kill us both.”
His words sent a chill down my spine, and the ramifications of what I’d seen—what I wasn’t supposed to have seen—hit me full force.
I stilled my fight and strained to listen over the roar of blood in my ears. Above me, Luc held himself immobile, his head angled toward the path. My gaze lifted to him, and in the dim light, I saw the anxiety in his features as he waited. When the low murmur of voices reached my ears, my eyes flew wide, and a new sense of terror engulfed me.
Luc looked down at me and shook his head, telling me to stay still. Dread shot straight into my shattered heart. My shallow breaths echoed in my ears, and against me, I felt his heart speed up with a rush of adrenaline. I swallowed hard beneath his hand, and the urge to run again rushed through me, but I resisted, not wanting to do anything to draw attention. After what seemed like an agonizing lifetime, footsteps receded on the path until the only sound I heard was my own pounding heart and the hoot of an owl high above.
Slowly, Luc lifted his hand from my mouth and eased off me, but he didn’t let me go. He wrapped his fingers around my wrist in a viselike grip and pulled me to my feet. With one glance over his shoulder toward the path, he said, “Come on. We need to get you back to the villa before anyone sees you.”
I was too scared to do anything but let him lead me through the trees back up the hill. My arms and legs shook as we picked our way through the dark forest, careful to stay off the path. Rocks and twigs and tree roots stabbed into the soles of my feet, and I stumbled several times, but Luc was right there to catch me, pulling me up next to him and keeping me close.
I wanted to jerk away from his hold but didn’t trust myself not to trip and fall, and my head was spinning with confusion over his actions. Somewhere inside me, I recognized he was trying to keep me safe, but every time I looked at that cape hanging from his neck, sickness surged up my throat.
Shivering in the cool air, I blinked to keep the trees in focus, but images of that clearing, of those masks and capes, swirled in my head. And the sounds of the woman’s groans and drugged-out screams echoed in my ears as we walked, melding with those voices, chanting louder and louder with every step.
My body swayed, and in a daze, I realized my adrenaline was crashing. I was in some kind of shock, but I couldn’t stop it from happening. My head grew light, and the forest spun.
I must have stumbled, because Luc turned back to me, muttered, “Cazzo,” and swept me into his arms.
I pressed a hand against his chest and tried not to lean into him, but my muscles weren’t working. Darkness surrounded me like thick, cloistering smoke. I closed my eyes, breathing slowly through my nose so it couldn’t pull me under.
“Hold on, Natalie,” Luc whispered somewhere close. “I’ve got you. Everything’s going to be okay.”
I didn’t know how anything would ever be okay again. Everything I thought I knew was a lie. Wood scraped, and I felt soft fabric beneath me. Something brushed my lips.
“Drink,” Luc said. “It’ll help.”
I opened my mouth. Cool water passed over my tongue, and I swallowed. Grasping what I realized was a glass at my lips, I took it from him and tipped my head back, drawing in large gulps that didn’t come close to quenching my sudden thirst.
“Go easy,” Luc whispered, still close. “I don’t want you to get sick.”
I ignored him and sucked back the familiar liquid until my senses slowly returned and the darkness receded. When I couldn’t drink anymore, I lowered the glass.
I was back in my room in the villa. The red comforter lay beneath me on the massive bed. A gentle breeze blew through the open balcony doors, rustling the gauzy fabric at each of the four posts. The room was dark, but across the space, I spotted the comfortable chair I’d lounged in earlier in the day, and the large stone fireplace I’d wanted to fill with wood and light just to see it blazing with warmth.
I shivered, unable to remember what it felt like to be warm. Everything inside me was cold. Ice cold. I didn’t know how I’d gotten here. I didn’t remember climbing the trellis or Luc carrying me in through the door and up the stairs. All I remembered was seeing Luc in that black robe, holding that mask that made me want to vomit.
My gaze drifted to where he knelt in front of me, his hands resting on the thighs of my ripped and filthy pajama pants. He was still wearing that vile cape. I didn’t know where the mask was, but I didn’t care. Sickness swirled inside me again, and I closed my eyes, breathing deeply to fight it back.