Chapter 44
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
Lorenzo
The address burns in my mind as I drive like a man possessed through Chicago streets. Marina's building comes into view, and Dante grabs my arm.
"Fuck, something's not right."
Two black SUVs sit in front of the entrance.
My vision goes red. Everything inside me turns to ice and fire at once. Sophia is up there.
My Sophia.
I rip my Glock from its holster and yank open the glove box, grabbing the backup piece. The metal feels right in my hands. Necessary.
"We need to wait for—" Dante starts.
"Fuck waiting." I'm already moving, door flying open. "She's up there with them."
"Lorenzo, we should—"
"Take the front car. I've got the back."
I don't bother with stealth. Don't care about being seen. Anyone between me and Sophia dies tonight. Simple as that.
My footsteps echo off wet pavement as I approach the rear SUV. Through the tinted glass, I see nothing. No movement. No guards.
Empty.
The terror that grips me is worse than finding them occupied. Empty means they're already inside. Empty means I might be too late.
"Clear here too," Dante calls from the front vehicle. "I'm going in first. Already called for backup."
He doesn't wait for my response, disappearing through the building's entrance. I follow, every muscle coiled tight, ready to kill anything that moves.
Two shots crack through the stairwell.
"Clear!" Dante's voice echoes down.
I take the stairs three at a time, passing Dante standing over two Russians bleeding out on the second-floor landing. Their eyes are already glazing over. Good. Two less between me and her.
My legs burn as I climb faster than I've ever moved in my life. Third floor. Fourth. My heart pounds so hard it might crack my ribs. Fifth floor. Marina's apartment is 5C.
A Russian stands outside her door, ear pressed against the wood, gun hanging loose at his side. Amateur. Probably listening to whatever's happening inside, getting off on it.
He hears me coming, spinning around. His gun comes up.
I don't slow down.
The bullet whistles past my ear as I duck left, using the momentum to close the distance. His second shot goes wide because I'm already on him.
My hand fists in his greasy hair, using his surprise to slam his face into the wall. The drywall cracks. Not enough.
I pull back and drive him forward again. His nose explodes in a wet crunch.
Again. The wall dents deeper.
Again. Blood spatters across white paint.
Again. Teeth scatter across the hallway floor.
His gun clatters away as his legs give out.
Only when he stops twitching do I let him drop.
The door to 5C is closed. No sounds come from inside. No screaming. No crying. No voices at all.
The silence is worse than screams would be.
I shoulder through the door, both guns raised, ready to paint these walls with Russian blood.
A strangled sound comes from the bedroom. Not quite a scream. More like someone trying to breathe through crushed windpipe.
I cross the apartment in three strides, getting in the bedroom.
The scene that greets me stops my heart.
Daniil Morozov straddles my wife on the bed, both hands wrapped around her throat. Blood soaks the sheets beneath them, though I can't tell whose. Sophia's face has turned purple, her hands limp at her sides, no longer fighting.
She's dying.
My love is dying.
Daniil's head snaps toward me, his hands releasing Sophia's throat. She doesn't move. Doesn't gasp for air. Just lies there, still as death.
A smile spreads across his bloodied face. "Too late, Sartori."
I drop both guns. Don't need them for what I'm about to do.
Something primal takes over, something that existed before words, before civilization, before anything but rage. I become the monster I've always known lived inside me.
My fist connects with his jaw before he can stand. The crack sounds through the room, but it's not enough. Nothing will ever be enough.
I grab his collar, hauling him off the bed, away from her. My knuckles split against his cheekbone. Blood sprays across white walls.
He swings at me, catching my ribs. I don't feel it. Can't feel anything except the need to destroy him with my bare hands.
My knee drives into his stomach, doubling him over. I bring my elbow down on the back of his skull. He drops to his knees.
Not enough.
My boot connects with his face, snapping his head back. Teeth and blood fly from his mouth. He falls backward, and I follow him down, straddling him the way he straddled my wife.
My fists become hammers. Left. Right. Left. Right. Each impact makes wet sounds against what used to be his face. Bone crunches beneath my knuckles. Cartilage tears.
His hands come up, trying to protect himself. I grab his wrist, twisting until it snaps. His scream cuts off when my fist crushes his windpipe.
Still not enough.
I keep hitting him. Can't stop. Won't stop. His face isn't a face anymore, just meat and bone fragments, but I keep going. Each punch is for every second his hands were on her throat. Every breath she couldn't take. Every—
"Lorenzo! Stop! He's dead!"
Dante's voice interrupts me. He's standing in the doorway, Marina's limp form in his arms, her shoulder soaked with blood.
"We need to go!"
I blink, looking down at my hands. They're covered in blood and gore, shaking uncontrollably. Daniil's body beneath me doesn't even look human anymore.
Sophia.
Everything else disappears. I scramble across the floor to the bed, my bloody hands hovering over her still form.
"No, no, no..." The word tears from my throat, raw and broken. "Sophia!"
Her name comes out as a roar. I pull her into my arms, her head lolling against my chest.
"Please, baby. Please." Tears burn my eyes as I press my ear to her chest, searching, begging for—
There. Barely there, but there. A heartbeat. Weak, thready, but fighting.
"She's alive!" I gather her against me, standing on legs that threaten to buckle. "She's still alive!"
Dante's already moving, Marina bleeding in his arms. "Hospital's eight minutes if we run every light."
I follow him down the stairs, taking them as fast as I dare while cradling Sophia like she's made of glass. Her weight feels like nothing. Everything. The only thing anchoring me to this world.
We burst onto the street where our car waits, engine running. Dante dives Marina into the passenger seat pulling back the seat so she can lay while I slide into the back, never loosening my hold on Sophia.
Dante gets into the drivers seat. Tires scream against asphalt as we tear away from the curb.
I hold Sophia tighter, pressing my lips to her forehead, tasting blood and tears—mine or hers, I don't know.
"Stay with me," I whisper against her skin. "You're the only thing keeping me alive in this fucking pitiful life. You hear me? You don't get to leave."
Her chest rises slightly. Falls. The pause before the next breath stretches forever.
Then rises again.
The waiting room reeks of antiseptic and fear. I've been pacing the same stretch of linoleum for thirty minutes, my knuckles wrapped in gauze that's already soaked through with blood.
Every doctor who passes gets the same treatment. I grab their coat, pull them close, make sure they understand exactly what happens if either woman in there doesn't walk out breathing.
"You save them, or I turn this place into a fucking morgue."
The latest doctor—some resident who looks twelve—nods frantically before scurrying away.
Good. Let them all be terrified. Fear makes people work harder.
Dante sits in a plastic chair, elbows on his knees, staring at nothing. Marina's blood still stains his shirt. He hasn't said a word since we got here, but his jaw keeps working like he's grinding his teeth to dust.
The automatic doors hiss open. Nico storms in with Nora right behind him.
"Where are they?" Nico demands, scanning the waiting area.
I nod toward the door.
Nora's face is pale but composed. "Pietro stayed at the compound with Bruno and Vittoria. He said—"
"Bruno." My hands curl into fists. "That fucking—"
"What the hell did Luna tell you?" Nico cuts me off, getting in my face. "Lorenzo, what the fuck is going on?"
I laugh, but it sounds more like breaking glass. "You want to know what she told me? Your precious brother Riccardo was fucking her. The whole time I was falling apart over her, thinking I loved her, he was screwing her behind my back."
Nico's face drains of color. "That's not—"
"She was pregnant when she left." Each word comes out harder, sharper.
"Pregnant with either mine or his kid. And Bruno—" I have to stop, my chest heaving.
"Bruno helped her fake her death. Helped her escape.
Knew everything and kept his mouth shut while I spent twelve years thinking I got her killed. "
"Jesus Christ," Nora whispers.
"I've got her locked in my office at Rosso's.
" My voice drops to something dangerous.
"And if Sophia doesn't make it, if she dies because of their lies, their secrets—" I meet Nico's eyes.
"I'll kill them both. Slowly. I don't give a fuck if Bruno's my brother.
I'll make him watch while I take Luna apart piece by piece, then I'll do the same to him. "
"Lorenzo—" Nico starts.
"No!" The word explodes out of me. "I kept Giuseppe's secret to protect everyone. Carried that weight for twelve years so it wouldn't destroy our family. And Bruno? He acts like I'm the villain while hiding that our brother was fucking the woman who ruined my life?"
I slam my fist into the wall. The drywall cracks.
"If Sophia suffers because of them, if she—" I can't finish the sentence. Can't even think it. "They'll vanish. Both of them. Like they never existed."
Nico runs his hand through his hair. "This is fucked. This is so fucked."
"Sir?" A nurse appears in the doorway, looking terrified. "Mrs. Sartori is out of the surgery room. She's... she's alive."
My knees almost buckle. "And Marina?"
"Still in surgery, but stable."
I'm already moving toward the door. "Take me to my wife."
"She's unconscious—"
"I don't care." I tower over the nurse. "Take me to her. Now."
The nurse nods quickly, leading us down a hallway that seems to stretch forever. Each step feels like walking through quicksand.
She's alive. Sophia's alive.
But alive doesn't mean okay. Doesn't mean she'll wake up. Doesn't mean she'll forgive me for Luna, for the danger I brought into her life.
The nurse leads me into a room. Sophia lies in the hospital bed, so still she could be a corpse if not for the slight rise and fall of her chest.
"The bruising around her neck will fade," the nurse says, checking monitors. "She was without oxygen for approximately forty-five seconds. We ran a full neurological panel. No signs of permanent damage."
My legs threaten to give out. I grip the doorframe. "The blood. She was covered in blood."
"Not hers." The nurse adjusts an IV line. "We found defensive wounds on her hands—scrapes, a broken nail—but the blood belonged to her attacker."
She fought. My girl fought.
"And..." I force the words out. "Was she... did he..."
"No sexual assault." The nurse's voice softens. "We performed a full examination. There's bruising on her arms where she was restrained, but nothing else."
Relief crashes through me so hard I have to lean against the wall. "Leave us."
"Sir, I need to—"
"Get. Out."
She scurries away, closing the door behind her.
My legs shake as I cross to Sophia's bed. I collapse into the chair beside her, my knees finally giving up the fight to keep me upright.
Christ, look at her. Purple and black fingerprints circle her throat like a necklace. Her lips are slightly parted, a tube feeding oxygen into her lungs.
I reach for her hand. It's cold, and I wrap both of mine around it, trying to push warmth into her skin.
"Sophia."
This feeling in my chest—it's trying to claw its way out through my ribs. Like my lungs forgot how to work, like I need to crack open my chest and give her my heart, my breath, everything that keeps me alive.
Is this love? This desperate, violent need to trade places with her? To take every bruise, every moment of terror she felt, and wear it myself?
I've faced terror. I've seen so much death. But seeing her like this? It's ripping me apart from the inside. Every breath she takes feels like it's coming from my own lungs. Like if she stops, I stop.
I want to breathe for her. Want to open her mouth and push air from my lungs into hers, keep her alive with my own breath if that's what it takes.
"I'd die for you." The words scrape out of my throat. "You hear me? I'd fucking die for you, and I don't even understand why."
No, that's a lie. I do understand.
It's the way she threw bread at my face when I pissed her off. The way she stands up to me when everyone else cowers. How she looks at me.
This must be what love feels like. This rabid, feral thing that makes me want to burn down the world just to keep her warm. Makes me want to tear apart anyone who even thinks about hurting her.
I love her. Not want her, not need to possess her.
I fucking love her.
Love her enough that I'd rip out my own heart and shove it in her chest if hers stopped beating. Love her enough that every second she doesn't open her eyes feels like drowning.
"Wake up." I lean forward, pressing my forehead to our joined hands. "Wake up so I can tell you. So I can make this right. You're everything, you understand? You're my whole fucking world, and I didn't even know it until I almost lost you."