He caught the book with ease, but the second it was in his hand, he could see it for what it was. A Bible. He spread the book open, bringing it to his nose to smell it. The clean, inky smell of it, unchanged even through the zombie apocalypse. The weight, comforting in his hand. The words, familiar. He'd had a leather-bound copy in Italy, with gold-edged pages and a splash of blood on a few pages; that version had been in Latin, but the English did well enough for his purposes.
After all, it didn't matter to God what language you spoke.
He flipped through the pages, until he arrived at the Wisdom of Solomon, Chapter 9. The Prayer of Solomon. Then back to Chapter 3: "But the souls of the righteous are in the hand of God, and no torment will ever touch them. In the eyes of the foolish they seemed to have died, and their departure was thought to be an affliction, and their going from us to be their destruction; but they are at peace. For though in the sight of men they were punished, their hope is full of immortality."
Nico brushed his fingers up over the page. Yes, his Donna was second only to God in her graciousness and generosity. If things were different, if they were people other than who they were, he would have hugged her in appreciation.
Instead, all he said was, "È perfetto."
He straightened up, recognising that this was a switch from the book in his hands and into her matters. He closed the book and straightened his posture some. "Cleaning supplies, then?" He could clean for her. "We'll need proper bedding."