Chapter 24 Luca #2
Fucking Danny, I could kiss him right now. His backup pours through doors I didn’t even see, returning fire.
Romano’s men scatter, seeking cover behind industrial equipment and support columns. In the chaos, I see Romano himself disappearing through a back exit, two of his men flanking him. Antonio’s chair tips over as someone cuts his bonds, and he falls heavily to the concrete.
I don’t give a fuck about Romano escaping, and I certainly don’t care about Antonio. I don’t care about anything except the woman bleeding in my arms.
“Gigi, look at me.” I press my hand against the wound in her chest, trying to stem the bleeding, but there’s so much of it. Too much. “Baby, please, look at me!”
Her eyes flutter open, and they’re unfocused, glassy with shock. “L-Luca.”
I shush her, cradling her face with shaking hands. “Don’t talk,” I murmur, trying to keep the roaring panic at bay. “Save your strength.” I scoop her into my arms despite the way the movement makes fresh blood pulse from the wound. “Danny!” I roar. “Danny!”
He appears beside me, his face going white when he sees the blood. “Holy fuck—”
“We need to go. Now.” I’m already running toward the exit, cradling her against my chest like she’s made of glass. “Get the car. Hospital. We need to go!”
The choice surprises even me. Three years of planning revenge, and when I find out who the culprit is, when he’s right there escaping through that back door, I choose her instead. Choose getting her to safety over pursuing him, over everything my revenge-obsessed self would have demanded.
Because I’ve realized that losing her would destroy me more completely than Marco’s death ever did.
“I’ve got you,” I whisper against her hair as Danny runs ahead to bring the car around. “I’ve got you, cara. Just stay with me. Please, just stay with me.”
Her lips move, forming words I can’t hear over the ringing in my ears from the gunfire. I bend closer, desperate to catch whatever she’s trying to say.
“—sorry,” she whispers, her voice so faint I almost miss it. “I’m sorry—”
“Don’t.” My voice breaks. “Don’t apologize. You saved my life. You…” A sob works its way out. “Why would you do that? Why would you?”
“Love you,” she breathes, then her eyes roll back and she goes completely limp in my arms.
“No!” I shake her, terror making my whole body shake. “Gigi, no. Wake up. Wake up!”
Danny has the car running, back door open. I slide into the backseat with her still cradled against me, her blood soaking through my clothes, her breathing so shallow I can barely feel it.
“Drive!” I roar at Danny. “Fucking drive!”
The trip to the hospital seems to take no time at all but then way too much time. I keep my hand pressed against the wound, trying to keep pressure, trying to keep her blood inside her body where it belongs. But it keeps seeping through my fingers, warm and sticky and wrong.
“Don’t leave me,” I whisper against her temple, my own tears mixing with the blood on her face. “Please, Gigi. I know you hate me. I know I don’t deserve you. But please don’t leave me. I can’t—I can’t survive losing you too.”
Her pulse is thready beneath my fingers, barely there. Her skin is pale as death, her lips tinged blue.
“Drive faster!” I scream at Danny, my voice raw.
“I’m going as fast as I can!” comes his response, but there’s panic underlying it too.
“It’s not fast enough! She’s dying—she’s dying and I can’t—”
The hospital emergency entrance finally appears, thank Christ. Danny barely stops the car before I’m kicking the door open, stumbling out with Gigi in my arms.
“Help!” I scream. “She’s been shot!”
Medical staff swarm immediately. Nurses, doctors, someone bringing a gurney. They try to take her from my arms, but I can’t let go. I can’t release her to these strangers who might let her die.
“Sir, you need to let her go,” someone says to me.
I tighten my grip. “I can’t.”
“Sir,” another voice says loudly, “we can’t help her if you don’t—”
Danny’s hands are on my shoulders, pulling me back. “Boss, let them work. Let them save her.”
I release her onto the gurney with a sob that sounds inhuman even to my own ears. Watch as they wheel her away at a run, shouting medical terminology I don’t understand. A doctor in scrubs and a surgical mask turns back to me.
“Are you family?”
“Husband,” I manage faintly. “I-I’m her husband.”
“Name?”
“Marchetti.” I clear my throat, trying to pull away from the feeling of the world spinning. “Luca Marchetti. My wife is Giuliana.”
The doctor nods. “Wait here. We’ll update you as soon as we know anything.”
Then they’re pushing through double doors, and she’s gone. Just…gone. Disappeared behind those doors like she might never come back.
I stand there in the middle of the emergency room, covered in her blood, and realize I’m shaking so hard I can barely stand. My hands—Jesus, my hands are covered in her blood. Dark and drying now, coating my fingers, under my nails, turning the cuffs of my shirt stiff.
“Come on,” Danny says, gentle but firm. “Let’s get you cleaned up.”
“No.” I wrench away from him, staggering toward the chairs lined against the wall. “I need to be here. When they come out, I need to—”
“You need to sit down before you collapse,” Danny interrupts, guiding me forcefully into a chair. “I’ll get you some water. Just…stay here.”
He disappears, and I’m left alone with my thoughts and the blood on my hands.
The guilt crashes over me in waves, each one more devastating than the last.
This is my fault. All of it.
If I’d been faster, if I’d moved sooner, I could have shielded her properly. But I was too slow, too caught up in my own rage and grief to react quickly enough.
If I’d told her the truth from the beginning—if I’d admitted that the plan changed, that I fell in love with her, that I couldn’t go through with killing her—she wouldn’t have kept Romano’s secret. We could have dealt with him weeks ago, before it came to this.
If I’d never kidnapped her in the first place, if I’d pursued justice through legitimate means instead of revenge through destruction, she’d be safe at home right now. Alive and whole and untouched by my world’s violence.
I did this. I brought her into this nightmare. I made her a target by marrying her, by making her visible to my enemies. I put her in Romano’s crosshairs as surely as if I’d pulled the trigger myself.
And she saved me anyway.
Even knowing what I planned to do to her. Even hating me for the betrayal, for the lies, for everything I’ve put her through, she threw herself between me and a bullet.
She chose to save me.
Why? Why would she do that? She was supposed to hate me. She said she could never forgive me, that even surviving tonight wouldn’t change what’s broken between us.
So why would she sacrifice herself for me?
Love you.
Her last words echo in my mind, and the sob that erupts from me is loud enough that several people in the waiting room turn to stare.
I don’t care. Let them fucking look. Let them see what I’ve become—a man covered in his wife’s blood, praying to a god he doesn’t believe in that she’ll survive the wounds I’m responsible for.
Danny returns with water I don’t drink. He sighs but sits beside me in silence, not offering empty platitudes or false hope. Just…being there.
Hours pass. The initial adrenaline fades, leaving behind bone-deep exhaustion and terror so complete it feels like drowning. My hands have finally stopped shaking, but only because they’ve gone numb. The blood on them has dried completely now, flaking off in small pieces when I flex my fingers.
Her blood. On my hands. Where it belongs.
“She’ll make it,” Danny says quietly, though his voice lacks conviction. “She’s strong.”
“She took a bullet to the chest,” I interrupt, my voice low. “At close range. The odds—”
“Fuck the odds,” Danny says fiercely, his eyes flashing. “She’s survived everything else you’ve put her through. She’ll survive this too.”
The accusation in his tone is deserved. I have put her through hell. And now she might die because of it.
I lean forward, pressing my hands to my face, not caring that I’m shedding blood flakes everywhere. Maybe I should wear it. Maybe I should carry this stain forever as a reminder of what my revenge cost.
More time passes. Too much time. Emergency surgery shouldn’t take this long, should it? Even I know that. The longer they’re in there, the worse the damage must be.
Or maybe she’s already dead, and they’re just trying to find a way to tell me.
The thought makes me want to vomit.
“This is taking too long,” I hear myself say, my voice cracking. “Danny, this is taking too fucking long.”
“She’s probably in recovery,” he tries to reassure me. “They have to stabilize her before—”
“It’s been hours.” I’m on my feet now, pacing like a caged animal. “Where the fuck is the doctor? Why hasn’t anyone come out to tell us anything?”
I scan the emergency room with increasing agitation. Doctors and nurses move past in their scrubs and surgical masks, but none of them approach us. None of them make eye contact.
Something’s wrong.
“I’m going to find someone,” I announce, already moving toward the nurses’ station. “This is bullshit. I need to know what’s going on with her.”
A blonde-haired nurse looks up as I approach, her blue eyes widening slightly at the sight of me—wild-eyed, covered in blood, and clearly on the edge of violence.
“My wife,” I say, forcing the words through clenched teeth. “Giuliana Marchetti. She was brought in hours ago with a gunshot wound. I need to know what’s happening with her surgery.”
The nurse’s brow furrows as she types something into her computer. “Marchetti, you said?”
Did she not fucking hear what I just said?
“Yes,” I say again, fingers curling against my leg. “Giuliana. With a G. She was—they took her through those doors.” I point at the double doors. “Hours ago. I need to know if she’s—if she’s going to—”
The nurse’s frown deepens. “Sir, I-I’m not showing any active surgeries under that name.” She looks up at me, confusion clear in her eyes. “Are you sure she was taken to surgery? There’s no record of her.”
“What?” The word comes out strangled and my entire body feels like it’s locked up in horror. “What do you mean there’s no record? I watched them wheel her back there! She was shot in the chest, she was bleeding—”
Danny is beside me now. “She was wheeled in by doctors and nurses,” he says urgently. “We watched them take her through those doors.” He points again at the double doors. “For emergency surgery. Multiple gunshot wound to the chest.”
The nurse stands, her face going pale. “Sir, those doors—” She gestures at where we’re pointing. “Those don’t lead to an OR. That’s just a hallway that connects to the parking garage.”
The world stops.
“What?” Danny says sharply. “What do you mean it doesn’t lead to an OR?”
“There are no operating rooms back there,” the nurse repeats, her voice rising with alarm. “It’s just storage and—” She stops, understanding dawning in her eyes. “Oh my god. We need to call security right now.”
My phone rings.
The sound cuts through the chaos of the emergency room. Everyone freezes—me, Danny, the nurse—as I fumble for the device with blood-stiff fingers.
FaceTime. Unknown number.
I know who it is before I answer and know with sick certainty what I’m about to see.
I accept the call, and Gigi’s face fills the screen.
She’s in the back of a car. I can see the leather seats and the tinted windows. Her face is ashen, sweat beading on her forehead, and she’s making small sounds of pain that tear me apart to hear. The wound in her chest is visible, blood still seeping through hastily applied bandages.
Then the camera shifts, and Salvatore Romano’s face appears. That smug smile, those cold blue eyes, looking at me like I’m an insect he’s about to crush.
“Luca,” he says pleasantly, like we’re old friends meeting for drinks. “I told your wife to come only with you and unarmed. I was very specific about those terms.” He clucks his tongue. “And you disobeyed me.”
“You fucking—” I can’t finish the sentence, rage choking me.
“Such vile language,” Romano tuts. “Your lovely wife is alive,” Romano continues, the camera shifting back to show Gigi’s pale, pain-wracked face.
“For now. But without proper medical attention, that gunshot wound will kill her, and what a painful death it will be.” His smile widens. “Unless you give me what I want.”
“Name it,” I snarl. He could ask for god himself and I would deliver him to Romano. “Anything. Just tell me what you want.”
“Justice,” Romano says simply. “For your crimes against my organization. For the disruption you’ve caused. For daring to threaten me.” The camera focuses on his face again. “You’ll come to me. Unarmed and lone. And you’ll face the consequences of your actions.”
“Where?” My hand grips the phone so hard I’m surprised the screen doesn’t crack. “Tell me where.”
“You’re a smart man, Luca. You’ll figure it out.” Romano’s smile is serpentine. “I have a doctor on hand to prevent your wife’s imminent death, but I believe you have only a few days before her condition becomes…irreversible. I suggest you hurry.”
The screen goes black.
I stand there in the emergency room, the phone still clutched in my hand. I’ve lost everything that matters.
Again.
Romano has Gigi. He’s had her this entire time, from the moment those fake doctors and nurses wheeled her through those doors. He planned this; the ambush, the shooting, even the “rescue.” All of it orchestrated to bring me to this exact moment.
Broken. Desperate. Willing to do anything to save her.
Danny’s voice seems to come from very far away. “Boss? Luca, what did he say? Where is she?”
I can’t answer. I can’t force words past the grief and rage and terror blocking my throat.
Because I know what Romano wants. He wants me to come alone, to walk into another trap, to sacrifice myself for her.
And I’ll do it. Without hesitation. Without question.
I’d burn the entire world down to save her.
Even knowing it’s probably already too late. Even knowing that this time, I might not be able to save anyone. Not her. Not myself.
I’ve lost everything again.
And this time, it’s entirely my fault.