Page 51 of Cry of Blood and Joy
Gianna cradled one of his large hands in her lap, her fingers intertwining with his lifeless digits as if she could anchor his soul to his body through touch alone. She brushed back his blood-matted hair with infinite gentleness, her tears falling in steady droplets onto his pale forehead. Each tear caught the light before disappearing into his skin, as if the earth were drinking up her grief.
The sight of her anguish—her quiet sobs, the way her shoulders shook with suppressed emotion—sent fresh waves of guilt crashing through my chest like physical blows. Pain pulsed through my own battered body where Angelo had torn into me, where my ribs protested with each breath, but I welcomed the anguish. I deserved the pain.
How could I have been so sloppy? So unprofessional? In my line of work, emotions got people killed—innocent people, like the man lying broken in front of me. I’d built my reputation on cold calculation, on being the enforcer who never let personal feelings cloud his judgment. But the moment Joy’s safety was threatened, all that discipline had been swept away by rage.
If I wanted to find Joy—if I had any hope of bringing her home alive—I had to get my head back in the game. She was counting on me to be the professional she’d fallen in love with, not this reckless amateur who attacked first and asked questions later.
White light began to form around Serenity’s palms, starting as a faint glow before intensifying into something that seemed to pulse with its own heartbeat. The supernatural radiance cast everything in stark relief, making the blood on Dimitri’s face look almost black in contrast. She placed her illuminated hands on his still chest, and immediately the air around us seemed tohum with power—a low, thrumming vibration that I could feel in my bones.
Dimitri’s body suddenly arched off the sofa in a graceful bow, his spine curving as if electricity had shot through him. A low groan escaped his lips—the first sound he’d made since I’d nearly killed him. The sound was rough, pained, but undeniably alive.
Finally. I scrubbed my face. One good thing went right. He’d survive.
Gianna bit back a sob of relief, pressing her free hand to her mouth as fresh tears streamed down her cheeks. Her dark eyes were fixed on his face with desperate hope, searching for any sign of consciousness returning to those closed lids.
Dimitri’s chest began to rise and fall in a steady rhythm, the shallow, barely perceptible breathing gradually deepening into something more substantial. Color was slowly returning to his ashen complexion, and I found myself holding my own breath, waiting for his eyes to open.
Please let him be all right. Please let me not have fucked up beyond repair.
Dimitri’s body became bathed in an ethereal white light that seemed to emanate from his very pores, casting dancing shadows across the elegant sitting room. The supernatural radiance seeped slowly into his flesh like water being absorbed by parched earth, and his wounds began to close—torn skin knitting together, bruises fading from purple to yellow to nothing.
“Dimitri,” Gianna whispered. “Can you hear me?”
His eyes fluttered like butterfly wings before snapping open to reveal those familiar dark eyes, now sharp with awareness instead of the vacant stare of unconsciousness. He released a theatrical hiss, the sound dripping with his characteristic sarcasm, and a smirk tugged at the corner of his mouth.
“Loud and clear, babe.” He had the same unmistakable cocky drawl that charmed and infuriated people all his life. “I haven’t checked out yet, though I have to say, the service here is terrible. What was the freight train that slammed into me? And please tell me it was at least a sexy freight train.”
Gianna exhaled a deep sigh of relief before she turned to me with a glare of pure venom. “Enzo, the fool. He thought you had handed Joy over to Angelo.”
Dimitri’s eyebrows shot up in genuine surprise, and he winced slightly as he tried to sit up straighter on the blood-stained leather. “Me? Why me? I have been tracking the wily vixen but she covers her tracks well—thanks to Enzo.”
A lie,but if he said he had seen her, he would incur Angelo’s wrath from keeping it from him.
“Someone described you and Joy getting into your Corvette at The Bourbon Nights hotel,” I managed to say through gritted teeth, each word feeling like it cost me.
Angelo snapped his attention toward me, his expression shifting to one of recognition. “You mean that broken down flea bag on Rampart Street?” His green eyes and turned up sneer carried the disdain of someone who’d never set foot in anything less than five-star accommodations.
I nodded carefully, trying not to move any more than necessary. If I sat perfectly still, the pain from my broken ribs wasn’t quite as excruciating—just a constant, throbbing reminder of my spectacular failure in judgement.
Serenity gracefully moved from Dimitri’s side to sit next to me, her movements fluid and purposefully. She smiled at me with gentle compassion that I absolutely didn’t deserve. “Your turn, enforcer.”
I looked into her blue eyes, seeing nothing but kindness where there should have been judgment. The guilt was almostharder to bear than the physical pain. “Are you sure you can do this?”
Her smile widened, and there was something almost otherworldly about her expression—ancient wisdom mixed with divine purpose. “I’m a Nephilim. My father’s the archangel of healing. This is what I do.” Her hands hovered over my torn and bloodied arm, already beginning to glow with that same ethereal white light. “Besides, someone has to patch you up so you can go save your girl properly this time.”
The warmth from her approaching hands was already making my skin tingle with anticipation of relief, like the first touch of sunlight after a long, cold night. As Serenity’s palms made contact with my torn flesh, the sensation was unlike anything I’d ever experienced—not just heat, but something deeper, more profound. It was like liquid starlight flowing through my veins, chasing away every ache and injury with gentle persistence.
The white light emanated from her touch, spreading across my chest and arms like ripples in still water. My body responded to the divine energy—torn muscle fibers knitting back together with tiny, almost imperceptible tugs, blood vessels repairing themselves, bruised tissue returning to its natural color.
The constant, grinding agony in my ribs began to ease away degree by degree, like someone slowly turning down the volume on a radio. Each fractured bone shifted and fused. The sharp edges that had been stabbing into my lungs with every breath smoothed out until they were whole again. The relief was so profound I had to close my eyes and focus on not letting myself break down completely.
Soon, there was no pain at all—just the strange, floating sensation of a body that had been broken and was now completely restored. I took a deep, experimental breath andfelt nothing but the smooth expansion of healthy lungs against intact ribs.
“Better?” Serenity asked softly, her hands still glowing faintly as she pulled them back.
I sat up slowly, marveling at the complete absence of discomfort. “Like it never happened. Thank you.” The words felt inadequate for what she’d just done, but they were all I had.
Elena, Angelo’s longtime housekeeper, appeared in the doorway like a guardian angel. Her familiar face was exactly what I needed—I’d genuinely missed her warm presence in this house of supernatural chaos. Her silver hair was pulled back into a loose bun, soft tendrils escaping to frame her kind face in a way that spoke of hurried efficiency rather than vanity. She wiped her palms nervously on her crisp black dress, the gesture betraying anxiety that her composed expression tried to hide.
