DOMENICO

The blood was irritating more than anything else.

I caught my reflection in the elevator mirror as the doors slid shut and assessed the damage with clinical detachment. The cut at the back of my skull had bled the way head wounds always did — dramatically, disproportionately, designed to look catastrophic when in reality it was an inconvenience. My shirt collar was ruined. The jacket would need to go to the cleaners. The evening, in its entirety, was a write-off.

I pressed two fingers against the wound and applied pressure. The elevator descended.

Elisa.

My own daughter had put a perfume bottle through my skull and walked my woman...