Chapter 18 Pia #3
“You’d have to catch me first,” I say.
His mouth curls. “Try it,” he murmurs. “I’m in the mood for sports.”
Good.Keep your eyes on me.Don’t look at the bolts.
I rock the chair once. Twice. Harder on the third, throwing my full weight into it. Pain spikes up my arms as the cuffs bite deeper. The back legs lift a fraction, then slam down.
Metal squeals. Wood complains.
The guard at the door straightens. “Sit still,” he snaps.
I don’t.
I rock again, harder. Sweat slicks my hair into my eyes. The chair groans in protest. Somewhere under my thigh, one bolt shifts with a tiny grinding sound I feel more than hear.
Come on. Come on. Come on.
“Last warning,” the guard barks.
“Or what?” I throw back. “You gonna scold me to death?”
I slam the chair down so hard the frame jumps.
The bolt finally gives.
The leg buckles.
Everything lurches sideways as the chair tips and goes over. My shoulder smashes into concrete first, then my hip. Pain detonates through the joint. The bulb overhead swings wildly, shadows crashing around the room like waves.
The chair hits the floor with a crack that rattles my teeth.
Wood splinters under me.
For a heartbeat, everything is chaos—shouting, boots, the scrape of metal.
Then there’s a beautiful sound.
Snap.
The slat bracing my wrists shatters. The frame around the cuffs broke, but they remained locked.
For a single, impossible second—
I’m free.
I roll hard, shoving my knees under me, dragging my bound hands down and under my thighs. My shoulders scream as I wrench my arms forward. Broken wood tears my shirt; splinters bite into skin. I don’t care.
Hands in front.
I get them there on a choked gasp, lungs on fire, vision sparking white.
“Stop her!” someone shouts.
Too slow.
I launch forward. The door is too far. The stairs are closer. I sprint toward them, half-running, half-stumbling, cuffs clanging, blood slick between my fingers.
If I can hit the first guard hard enough — If I can grab his gun — If I can get one clean shot—
Santino never has to walk into this.
“HEY!” the door guard roars.
A gun cocks.
The sound cuts through the warehouse like a blade.
I don’t stop.
I’m three steps from the stairs when something slams into my shoulder from behind. A fist tangles in my hair and yanks me back so violently my neck snaps, stars bursting behind my eyes.
“Enough,” a voice growls in my ear.
Cold steel presses against the base of my skull.
I freeze.
Not because I’m afraid of dying.
Because I’m afraid of dying before I can stop Santino from joining me.
My chest heaves. My shoes skid uselessly on the floor as the guard hauls me backward, dragging me on my knees. The cuffs cut deeper as he jerks my hands up high between my shoulder blades, shredding the skin at my wrists.
“Let go of me,” I scream, kicking back.
He laughs and shoves me down harder.
My knees slam into concrete. Pain explodes up my thighs.
Carlo’s shoes slide into view. Italian leather. Expensive. Clean. Like the floor didn’t just try to eat me alive.
He crouches slowly, unhurried, until we’re face to face.
“Run again,” he whispers, breath hot against my cheek, “and I’ll send the Bishop your eyes in a box.”
A shudder rips through me.
Not fear.
Rage.
Images slam into me — Guido, clutching his sketchbook like a life raft.Santino’s hands shaking when he thought I wasn’t looking.Romeo’s eyes in the tunnels, sharp and wrong.Giovanni’s coffin, lilies rotting on top like they knew who was inside.
I taste iron.
“You won’t touch him,” I rasp.
Carlo hums, amused.“That’s the idea, Bella. I touch you instead. He comes running. Everyone gets what they deserve.”
My whole body trembles.
The guard grinds the gun harder against my skull like he’s begging for permission.
Carlo studies me.
I let him.
Let him see what he’s made — not the girl from the night my father died,not the thief who thought she could outrun her last name,
but something meaner. Sharper. Built from every piece they tried to break.
“I’m not bait,” I say quietly. “I’m a fucking bomb. You sure you want him walking into range?”
Carlo smiles, slow and delighted.“Explosions make the news,” he says. “Kings die in them. Everyone wins.”
Everyone except the people I love.
Santino bleeding out on this floor because of a message I didn’t send.Guido lost. Again.Romeo left alone with whatever poison he’s hiding.Giovanni still winning from the grave, his war chewing through the next generation like dessert.
No.
“No,” I say out loud.
Carlo’s eyes narrow. “No?”
I lift my chin as far as the fist in my hair allows.
“You don’t get to write the ending,” I tell him. “Not this time.”
He laughs softly.“Sweetheart, you’re kneeling on my floor with a gun to your head. You don’t even get to write the next five minutes.”
Maybe he’s right.
Maybe I will die here.Maybe Santino does too.
But if there’s even a crack in this plan—one weak guard, one bad angle, one second of distraction—I’ll find it. I’ll rip it open with my teeth if I have to.
Because I will not let Santino die for me.I will not let Romeo tear this family apart while the rest of us are bleeding.I will not let Giovanni’s shadow be the last thing any of us see.
There has to be a way to end this.
I just have to stay alive long enough to light the fuse.
The Demand
The ringing slices through the room like a blade.
Sharp. Shrill. Wrong.
For a second, nobody moves. Even the gun at the back of my head goes still. The sound ricochets off concrete and rusted beams, bouncing around the warehouse like it’s hunting something to cut.
Carlo sighs, annoyed, patting his pockets.
The phone keeps screaming.
My stomach drops.
Please don’t be him.Please don’t be him.Please don’t—
Carlo pulls a cheap black burner from his jacket and looks at the screen.
His mouth curves. “Speak of the devil,” he murmurs.
My heart stutters.No.
He flicks the call open and leans back on his heels like he’s settling into a good show. “Yes?” he drawls.
Silence holds for a beat.
Then a voice fills the room.
Not loud. Not shouting.Just controlled. Tight. Dragged over broken glass.
“If you touch her,” Santino says, “I’ll bring God down on your heads myself.”
Every hair on my body stands up.
For a second, the warehouse disappears and I’m back in the tunnels—his hand at my throat, confession on his lips, violence coiled under his skin like a living thing. The Bishop. The man who swore he belonged to God and has been bleeding for me ever since.
Carlo’s eyebrows lift, delighted.“Ah,” he says. “Bishop.”
He taps the speaker icon and sets the phone on a cracked metal table like a centerpiece.
Santino’s breath ghosts through the line, steady and quiet. No tremor. No hesitation.
He sounds like a judgment.
“If a single bruise appears on her that I can trace to you,” he says, “I will burn your operation down to foundations and salt the ground over the ashes. You understand me?”
My lungs forget how to work.
He shouldn’t be here. Shouldn’t be doing this. He should be in his church, safe behind stained glass and lies, pretending he can still tell the difference between faith and murder.
Carlo laughs, low and mean. “Bring yourself instead,” he says. “We can discuss building codes in person.”
Silence.
It stretches long enough that the guard behind me shifts, uneasy.
“Santino,” I whisper, useless, because he can’t hear me. My voice doesn’t make it past the gun at my skull or the fist in my hair holding my head bowed like some fucked-up offering.
The line crackles once.
Then his answer comes, calm and lethal.
“I’m already outside.”
The bottom drops out of my world.
I sway on my knees.
Of course he is.Of course, the idiot priest walks into hell the second someone leaves a door open.
Carlo’s grin sharpens.“Outside?” he repeats. “How sweet. Pray for a second, then. I’d hate for you to enter without saying hello to your God.”
He nods to one of his men.“Check.”
The guard at the door cracks it, peering through the filthy inset glass.“One man.” “It’s him.”
A sound tears out of me.“You fucking—” My voice shreds. “Send him away. Tell him you were lying. Hang up the phone, Carlo.”
Carlo looks down at me like I’m an interesting stain.“Oh, Bella,” he says. “That’s not how this works.”
He taps the table with two fingers, and the guard shuts the door again. The bolt slides home with a heavy clank that lands right on my chest.
“Santino,” Carlo croons into the phone, “we have your little sinner all dressed up and waiting.”
I jerk against the hand in my hair.“I swear to God, Santino, don’t come in here,” I rasp, even though I know he can’t hear me. “Turn around. Leave. Please.”
Carlo clucks his tongue.“She’s being dramatic,” he says. “But for the sake of transparency…”
He nods at the guard holding me.
The gun lifts a fraction.
“Stand her up,” Carlo orders. “Let the bishop hear how pretty she screams.”
Rage scorches through me.“Touch me and I’ll bite your fucking fingers off,” I snap.
The guard laughs and yanks me upright anyway. My knees threaten to buckle, but pride locks them. My arms are wrenched high behind me, cuffs grinding into bone.
“Careful,” Carlo says. “I need her mostly intact.”
He leans toward the phone.“Are you still there, Bishop?”
“I’m listening,” Santino says.
That voice.
It’s wrong.
It sounds hollow.
“Santino,” I try again, louder.
The words cut off on a gasp when the guard jams the barrel into my ribs, right under my breast, hard enough to bruise.
“Quiet,” he snarls against my ear.
Carlo’s smile widens at the sound.“Did you hear that?” he purrs. “She’s excited.”
The air on the line changes.
Santino doesn’t raise his voice.He doesn’t have to.
“Move that gun one inch higher,” he says, “and I will peel the skin off your hands while you’re still breathing. I will make you watch yourself fall apart.”
The guard goes still.
For a heartbeat, nobody breathes.
Carlo’s eyes glitter.“There he is,” he says softly. “The Rivas I’ve been waiting for.”
I shake my head, desperate.“Don’t come in here,” I force out, fighting the pressure of steel and terror and the way my throat wants to close. “This is a trap, Santino. It’s about the ledger. It’s about your family. Walk away. Please—”
Carlo snaps his fingers.
The gun drives harder into my ribs, cutting my plea off with a strangled sound.
Carlo says, "Cute." He adds, "She thinks you can save yourself."
On the other end of the line, Santino inhales once.
When he speaks, it isn’t to Carlo.
“Pia,” he says quietly.
My whole body locks.
He can’t see me. The call has to be catching the hitch in my breath, the scrape of boots, the way everyone went still. Somehow, he just knows I’m here.
“I told you,” he says, voice low and devastatingly steady, “I don’t run from ghosts. Or from men who think they can use you to control me.”
Tears sting my eyes.
“Don’t do this,” I whisper. “I am not worth—”
“You don’t get to decide what you’re worth to me,” he cuts in.
It hits like a slap.
Carlo watches my face like he’s tracking every crack. “Beautiful,” he murmurs. “Say that again when you’re on your knees here, Bishop.”
Santino ignores him.
“Listen to me, Pia,” he says, words carved from stone. “Whatever happens next, this is not your fault. You hear me?”
I swallow, hating the wobble in my voice.“You’re an idiot,” I say.
“Probably,” he answers. “Open the door, Vescari.”
Carlo’s expression smooths at the use of his last name—flat, offended.“Well,” he says, straightening. “Since you asked so nicely.”
He nods to his men.“Let him in. Guns up. Eyes on. If anyone but the Bishop crosses that threshold, drop them.”
The guards move, all muscle memory and malice. Bolts scrape. Safeties click. The door groans as it opens, bleeding a slice of night into the warehouse.
Cold air knifes across my face.
For a second, all I see is darkness.
Then, a silhouette fills the doorway.
Broad shoulders. Shirt collar open. A hint of the collar at his throat. A man who looks like a priest and walks like a fucking war.
My heart slams against my ribs so hard it hurts.“Santino,” I breathe.
He steps inside, one foot over the threshold, eyes black in the dim light as they go straight to me. They flick to the gun at my ribs, the fist in my hair, the phone on the table, then back to my face.
The air in the warehouse changes—thicker, sharper, charged.
Carlo’s smile turns feral.“Welcome to the party, Bishop,” he says. “Let’s see how much you bleed for her.”
He snaps his fingers, delighted.
“Close the door,” he adds, never taking his eyes off Santino.
The heavy metal slams shut behind him with a final, echoing boom.
And all I can think, as the sound seals him in with us, is that I’ve just watched the only man who ever tried to save me walk straight into my execution—
and maybe his own.