Chapter 60Mine, No Matter the Blood
Mine, No Matter the Blood
Isabella
When I step back inside the clinic, freshly showered and dressed in clean clothes, I blink twice, not sure I’m seeing right.
Aslanov and Sawyer are sitting next to each other, deep in conversation. What really grabs my attention, though, is that Aslanov isn’t restrained anymore. He’s just... sitting there, free. Karpov, Ada, and Dominik are scattered around them, all quietly listening.
As I step through the doorway, every head in the room turns toward me. I feel like some exotic animal stepping into a cage, like they don’t know whether to approach or run.
Aslanov’s eyes find mine instantly. He rises to his feet, a little unsteady, but determined.
His body is still a wreck, covered in bandages and faded bruises, the slow, shuffling movements betraying the damage he’s healing from.
But his vitals have stabilized enough that we’d taken him off constant monitoring.
No more IVs snaking into his arms. No more machines tracking every breath.
His recovery is still fragile, still tentative.
He has to take his medications daily now: Olanzapine to keep the psychosis at bay, Gabapentin to help with the tremors and restless, endless insomnia that had haunted his nights.
We’d weaned him off Clonazepam since today, since he is stable enough; no one wanted him dependent on anything that could cloud his mind or slow his progress.
Aslanov walks toward me with a kind of quiet gravity, his eyes never leaving mine. Even injured and weak, he’s still taller than me by a good margin. I tilt my head back to look up at him, the motion stretching my neck as I take in the mess of him, and the strange calm in his expression.
‘‘What happened here?’’ I ask, my voice low and cautious. ‘‘Are you guys besties now?’’
I arch my neck a little further, trying to read his face, the way his mouth twitches as if he wants to say something but can’t quite find the words yet.
My chest tightens. Something’s wrong.
Something’s really wrong.
“I have to talk to you,” Aslanov says, his voice rough, almost hoarse. “I have to tell you something.”
The bottom drops out of my stomach. I knew it. I knew he was holding something back.
“Okay,” I mutter, my voice barely audible.
He doesn’t wait. He turns and starts down the hallway, limping slightly, the white walls of the clinic closing in around us.
I follow, my heart hammering painfully against my ribs.
We move through a couple of sterile corridors until he pushes open a side door, leading us into a little coffee break room.
The lights are dimmer here, softer. The hum of a vending machine fills the silence.
Aslanov walks over to the small couch pressed against the wall and sits down heavily, wincing slightly. He pats the spot beside him without looking at me.
I sit down, careful, feeling the air shift, heavy, electric.
He leans forward, elbows on his knees, hands clenched together so tightly his knuckles are white.
“Before I tell you,” Aslanov says, voice low, strained, “I want you to know... my feelings for you, they’ll never change. No matter what. Or who you are. Okay?”
I blink at him, thrown off by the sudden tenderness in his voice, by the fierce certainty burning behind his words.
“I don’t care about it,” he says fiercely. “Please... look at me.”
I do.
I turn toward him, and before I can say anything, he reaches out and cradles my face in his palms. His hands are warm, calloused, trembling just a little. He holds me there, like he’s anchoring me.
My heart starts pounding harder. A different kind of fear now, threading cold and fast through my veins.
“Okay,” I whisper, voice shaky. “Okay, what’s wrong?”
His jaw flexes, and for a second, he just stares at me, as if memorizing every detail. His thumbs brush gently along my cheeks, a small grounding motion.
Slowly, he drops his hands but keeps close, his knee brushing against mine.
“The list,” he says, voice low. “The one with the initials. Under N.K. and Lorenzo... the name that was crossed out.”
He pauses, like the next part physically hurts.
“Sal...” He grits his teeth. “His name was Salvatore. Salvatore Lorenzo. Like I told you today when we were seated at the table.”
My stomach twists sharply. I stare at him, trying to process.
“He was Antonio’s brother,” Aslanov says, voice steady but grim. “He used to be the head of the Gambino family. Until Lorenzo took over.”
A buzzing sound fills my ears. I don’t understand where this is going.
He presses forward, words coming slower now, heavier.
“Antonio Lorenzo...” he says. “His last family name... is Brown .”
I blink at him, heart stumbling into my throat.
‘‘This man you know under the name of Nick...’’ Aslanov’s voice drops into something almost broken, ‘‘...he’s Antonio. And he’s your fucking uncle, Isabella.’’
I freeze.
The air seems to rip away from the room.
I can’t move. I can’t speak.
But he doesn’t stop, he can’t stop now.
“That makes Salvatore your biological father.”
I flinch like he’s struck me.
‘‘You are Gambino blood, Isabella. Full blood. Your mother...’’
He hesitates, agony flashing across his face.
‘‘Your mother died giving birth to you. And your father... your father died tragically not long after.’’
I feel myself start to shake. Not from cold, from something deeper, something tearing apart inside me.
‘‘Antonio—’’ Aslanov’s voice trembles now, the first time I’ve heard it like that. ‘‘He gave you up to a friend of your biological mother. Someone he trusted. He didn’t want there to be an heir left. He wanted the bloodline hidden. Buried.’’
His hand reaches for mine but I yank away from him, the movement sharp, almost violent.
‘‘I am so sorry, my love,’’ he whispers.
But I can’t hear him anymore.
Not really.
It’s like the world is screaming inside my head.
‘‘So my mother...’’ I choke out, voice cracking, ‘‘the woman who raised me... she’s not my mother?’’
He doesn’t answer. He doesn’t have to. The silence is answer enough.
‘‘I’m an orphan?’’ My voice shatters, splintering out of me like glass breaking.
My fists clench so tight my nails dig into my palms. I feel the sting of it but it’s distant, not real enough to anchor me.
‘‘And I’m...’’ My throat seizes. ‘‘I’m criminal blood?’’ I hiss the words, venomous and wild. ‘‘I’m from them ?’’
Aslanov moves toward me but I shove myself off the couch, stumbling back like he’s the one who poisoned me.
‘‘No,’’ I gasp, shaking my head violently. ‘‘No, no, no.’’
Tears I didn’t even realize were there are sliding down my face, hot and furious.
‘‘I’m not one of them,’’ I rasp. ‘‘I’m not, this can’t be true. This has to be a lie.’’
He rises slowly, hands outstretched, calm, like he’s trying to approach a wild animal.
‘‘You’re you ,’’ he says fiercely. ‘‘Nothing changes who you are.’’
But it’s too late, the words are already sinking their claws into me. Every cell of my body feels like it’s rejecting itself.
My blood feels wrong in my veins.
My skin feels foreign.
Everything I ever thought about who I was, ripped out from under me in a single breath.
“This is a lie,” I snap, the words tearing out of me. “He lied to you. He said it to make you believe it. To mess with you. You don’t know that it’s true.”
Aslanov’s face tightens, something flickering through his eyes, grief, guilt, but he doesn’t back down.
“I wanted to believe that too,” he says, voice rough. “I prayed it was a lie. I needed it to be a lie, Isabella.”
He takes a slow, careful step toward me.
“But Ada... Dominik... we just checked everything and it adds up. We didn’t just take his word for it. We did the research. Records, names, dates, all of it.”
I shake my head, backing away from him until my shoulders hit the wall.
“No, my whole life is a living lie,” I whisper, but it’s weak. Hollow.
“There was a girl who went missing,” Aslanov says steadily. “Born to a woman connected to the Gambino family by blood. Her husband, Salvatore, was killed not long after. The mother died giving birth. The child—you—was hidden away. There was no name, but the story is accurate.”
I can barely breathe. My lungs refuse to pull in air properly.
“It all matches,” he says, softer now, like he’s trying to offer me something solid to cling to. “Your birthday. The city. The hospital record, it was sealed, Isabella. Someone with power made it disappear. You weren’t adopted through any normal process. You just... appeared in the system one day.”
I clutch at my chest, my heart thundering, breaking apart inside me.
“You were placed with a friend of your biological mother’s. Someone who could pretend you were theirs. Hide you. Keep you away from the people who would have used you, hunted you.”
He stops a foot away from me now, his voice dropping to almost a whisper.
“You were never supposed to know. You were never supposed to find out.”
I stare at him, every part of me screaming inside.
‘‘The girl who went missing,’’ he says, final, brutal, ‘‘was you.’’
He steps closer, reaching out like he’s afraid I’ll shatter.
‘‘The baby... was you, Isabella.’’
My throat burns as I force the words out.
‘‘You told them before me?’’ I whisper, broken. ‘‘They know?’’
I can barely see him through the blur of tears clouding my vision.
‘‘Who else knows?’’ My voice cracks, sharp and desperate.
Aslanov answers fast, almost stumbling over himself.
‘‘No one,’’ he says fiercely.
But it’s not enough. It’s not nearly enough to stop the terror twisting inside me.
‘‘And the Gambinos...’’ I choke, wiping at my face with shaking hands. ‘‘The Gambinos and the Bratva, aren’t they... life-long fucking rivals?!’’
He hesitates for half a second too long, and the answer is written all over his face even before he speaks.
‘‘Yes,’’ he says quietly. ‘‘They are.’’
The room spins around me, the walls squeezing in. I press my palms against them, against anything solid, anything real, trying to keep myself from falling apart.
‘‘So I’m not just criminal blood,’’ I rasp, the words dripping like acid from my tongue. ‘‘I’m enemy blood .’’
I’m falling. Fast and hard and hopeless. The memories of the voices while I was in the basement all come back to me. It was him; Lorenzo.
But then Aslanov moves, all the softness gone in a breath, and suddenly his hands are on me, commanding, gripping my shoulders, grounding me like iron stakes driven into the earth.
‘‘Look at me,’’ he orders, voice low, sharp, leaving no room for argument. His palms are firm, unyielding, dragging my gaze back to him when I try to tear away.
‘‘You are mine . You hear me? I don’t give a fuck about blood. About rivals. About anything. You are mine , and no one will touch you.’’
I’m trembling, half-sobbing, but he doesn’t let go, doesn’t let me drift into that black panic clawing at my mind. He holds me there, pinned to reality by the brutal certainty in his voice.
‘‘They can burn for all I care,’’ he snarls, voice rough with something savage, something terrifyingly beautiful. ‘‘The Gambinos. The Bratva. The whole goddamn world. You stay with me . Right here. Right fucking now, for the rest of my damned existence.’’