Chapter 7
Lorenzo
I’m still listening to Fran bitch about the dinner when my phone buzzes once—three short vibrations, my men’s emergency code. I dial Cesaro, not caring that Fran is pissed that I’m ignoring her.
“What is it?” I demand.
“The girls are at an old library on LaSalle, and they’ve got company,” Cesaro answers. His voice is too calm, which means it’s bad.
I don’t remember telling Fran to leave my home as I crossed the room or leaving the building.
The next thing I know, I’m in the SUV, the city lights slicing past in long, jagged streaks.
My pulse is a steady drumbeat in my throat, my hands flexing restlessly in my lap.
It’s a five-minute drive with the speed we’re going, but it feels longer.
Sienna disobeying me isn’t new. Sienna in danger is.
The sound of a gunshot reaches us before we even turn the corner. Then the second. Then screaming.
“Move!” I bark, shoving the door open before the SUV even stops.
The street outside is chaos as people spill from the building, some bleeding, some crying, all running. Cesaro and the others form up instantly, weapons drawn, clearing a path as I storm toward the entrance.
Inside, the smell hits me first—copper and gunpowder. Music still floats through the speakers somewhere, warped and broken, like the club is trying to pretend nothing happened.
My shoes crunch over shattered glass as I step forward, every movement too loud in the horrible quiet. My eyes scan the wreckage—fallen decorations, overturned chairs, streaks of red smeared across the marble.
And then I see gold.
Sienna.
Her dress glitters like sunrise spilled across the floor, only… wrong. Dimmed. Stained. She’s sprawled on the marble, blood blooming beneath her like a dark, terrible flower. Her skin looks too pale, too still, nothing like the vibrant girl who was laughing minutes ago.
And then I see Elizabeth.
She’s half on top of Sienna, as if she threw herself over her at the last second.
Her black dress is ripped, soaked through with crimson, the fabric clinging to her in places it shouldn’t.
Her blonde curls are matted with blood and her arm lies twisted at an angle that makes my stomach pitch.
She was shielding my daughter with her body.
For a heartbeat—just one blinding, brutal second—the world shrinks to the sound of my pulse pounding in my ears. Nothing else exists. No air. No thought. No time.
Just my girls broken on the floor.
“Get the shooters!” I snarl, voice cracking the silence. My men scatter instantly. I drop to my knees beside them. “Sienna—Sienna!”
Her eyes flutter weakly, unfocused. “Dad?”
“I’m here.” My voice shakes despite me. I press my hand over the wound in her chest, but there’s too much blood.
Elizabeth groans beside her, trying to move. I catch the faintest sound of her whispering Sienna’s name.
“Stay down,” I order her, one hand still on my daughter. “Don’t move.”
Her eyes flicker open, dazed but aware.
“I tried—” she rasps.
“I know,” I say, even though I don’t. Even though I can’t think beyond the rising terror clawing up my throat.
Sirens wail in the distance. Cesaro returns, shouting something about the shooters being contained, but his voice feels miles away.
“Get the car,” I bark. “Now.”
He nods, already moving.
I lift Sienna carefully, my hands slick with blood. Her head falls against my shoulder, her breathing shallow.
“Stay with me, tesoro,” I whisper. “Please.”
Elizabeth stirs beside us, reaching weakly for Sienna’s hand. I see the pain in her face and the fear, and something inside me breaks wide open.
“Get her too,” I order one of my men. “Now.”
As we rush out into the freezing night, I can still hear the music playing faintly from inside, horribly out of place.
Two girls wanted a night of freedom. Instead, I’m carrying the cost of it in my arms.
The next few hours blur.
Sienna is taken from my arms and rushed into surgery. Elizabeth disappears into the emergency ward on a gurney, blood streaked across her dress, still breathing—thank God—but pale enough to make my stomach twist.
And me? I’m pacing the cold, sterile hallway, seconds from losing the composure that’s kept me alive this long.
The walls here smell like antiseptic and loss. I’ve waited in rooms like this before after gunfights and betrayals, but never for my child. Never like this.
Cesaro arrives just after three, his coat dusted with snow. He looks like he’s been through hell too, but his tone is steady. “He’s patched up enough for you to question.”
I grunt, not trusting myself to speak.
He hesitates. “How’s Sienna? Any update?”
Before I can answer, the double doors at the end of the hall open, and the surgeon steps out. The man’s face says everything before he even opens his fucking mouth.
My throat goes dry.
“Mr. Conti,” he begins carefully, his voice too gentle. “We did everything we could.”
Everything stops. The world, the sound, the goddamn air.
No.
I’ve heard men beg for their lives, heard them cry for mercy with their last breath, but nothing—nothing—prepares me for that sentence.
“What do you mean?” My voice comes out quiet, dangerous. “You’re a surgeon. You fix things. So fix her.”
The doctor swallows hard. “The bullet severed an artery near her heart. There was too much blood loss before she arrived.”
He keeps talking about internal damage and efforts to revive but I don’t hear any of it. My mind goes blank except for one unbearable fact.
My little girl is gone.
Cesaro’s hand lands on my shoulder, grounding me. I shrug it off. My pulse is hammering, fury and grief twisting together until I can’t tell them apart.
The surgeon murmurs something else—an apology, I think—and slips away. The hallway falls silent again, except for the faint hum of fluorescent lights.
I stare at the door she went through, the one she’ll never walk back out of, and I feel the weight of it settle into my bones.
Sienna—my legacy, my blood, my reason for every monstrous thing I’ve ever done—is gone.
Cesaro’s voice breaks the silence. “Lorenzo.”
I turn toward him slowly.
“Do you want to see him now?” he asks.
For a long moment, I don’t answer. Then I nod once. “Yes.”
My voice is calm again. The storm’s gone quiet. But inside, something has shifted. Because now it’s not just about business. It’s personal. And before the night is over, someone will die for what they’ve done.
Cesaro doesn’t speak again. He doesn’t have to. He knows better than anyone that when I go silent like this that something inside me is breaking and once it breaks, it doesn’t heal.
When I finally turn away from the hallway, my body feels heavy, like I’m moving through water instead of air. I don’t even remember walking, don’t remember passing doors or people or the blur of white coats drifting around me.
I just arrive.
The next thing I know, I’m standing in the doorway of another ward, breath catching in my throat.
Elizabeth is sitting upright in a hospital bed, pale and dazed, her curls flattened in places where dried blood once clung. She’s wearing a fresh pair of scrubs because her dress—God, her dress—was destroyed. She looks so small in that bed. So breakable. So impossibly alive.
A nurse steps close, voice low as though afraid of shattering what’s left of me.
“She was shot in the side,” she murmurs. “But she will be fine.”
Two gunshots in less than a week, and she’s still here. Still breathing. Still fighting to sit upright as if she refuses to let the world knock her down.
I drag a hand through my hair, pulse hammering.
But Sienna isn’t.
Elizabeth looks up the moment I enter. Relief flickers in her eyes first. “Is she okay?”
The question cuts through me like a knife. I open my mouth, but for once, words fail me. Her expression shifts, the hope draining out before I can find a way to soften the blow.
“No,” she whispers.
I shake my head once to confirm her thought. “She didn’t make it.”
Her hand flies to her mouth, eyes filling with tears. “Oh, my God. This is my fault. I should have talked her out of going out.”
She looks so small there, trembling, the weight of it hitting her almost as hard as it’s hitting me. I sit on the edge of the bed, not trusting myself to speak. She doesn’t hesitate. She just reaches out, her good hand finding mine.
It’s a simple thing. Human. Real. And it breaks me in ways bullets never could.
“I’m sorry,” she says through quiet sobs. “I tried to protect her. I—she was right there, and—”
I tighten my grip gently, stopping her. “You don’t apologize for trying to save her. You were with her when I wasn’t.”
That truth tastes like poison.
We sit there for a long time, saying nothing, the silence thick with everything we’ve lost.
Finally, I stand. “They’ll want to move her to the morgue soon. You should say goodbye.”
Elizabeth nods, wiping her eyes. I help her to her feet, steadying her when she sways. Together, we walk down the hall, neither of us speaking.
When we reach the small, sterile room, I almost can’t bring myself to open the door. Cesaro steps forward like he’s going to offer, but I shake my head and do it myself.
The air inside is cold, sharp with disinfectant. Sienna lies on a bed with a white sheet draped over her from her shoulders to her feet. She’s still and pale, her dark hair spread across the pillow like a crown. For one torturous second I tell myself that she’s just sleeping. But I know the truth.
Elizabeth gasps softly, covering her mouth again. I can’t look away. My daughter. My light. My blood—is gone.
I reach out, brushing a strand of hair from her face. My hand doesn’t shake.
“She used to fall asleep in the spare chair in my office when she was little,” I say quietly. “I’d be working late, and she’d just climb up beside me, curl up, and tell me not to forget to eat dinner.”
Elizabeth doesn’t speak. She just cries quietly beside me.
I lower my head, pressing a kiss to Sienna’s forehead.
She’s cold now. Unfamiliar.