22. Bella
22
BELLA
“ D ad!” Bianca’s scream echoes off the stone walls as Matteo crumples to the ground. I’m moving before conscious thought kicks in, muscle memory from years of first aid training taking over as I drop to my knees beside my husband. The lab’s harsh fluorescent lights turn his blood almost black against his white shirt, but his eyes are clear and focused as they lock onto mine.
“I’m fine,” he growls, though the pallor of his skin betrays him. “Check Romano.”
“He’s dead.” Bianca’s voice trembles as she kneels on Matteo’s other side. Even in the harsh lighting, I see how she unconsciously mirrors his mannerisms, that DeLuca grace present in every movement. “Your shot…right through the heart.”
“Excellent.” Matteo tries to sit up, a hiss of pain escaping through clenched teeth. “You’re getting good at saving my life, piccola .”
My hands shake as I tear open his shirt, finding the wound high in his shoulder. The sight of his blood makes something primal rise in my chest—rage and fear warring for control. “Stop talking. You’re lucky—through and through, missed anything vital.” I snatch gauze from the lab’s first aid kit, pressing it against both entry and exit wounds. “Bianca, find me something to bind this with.”
She moves with that innate DeLuca grace, returning moments later with strips torn from Romano’s expensive suit jacket. Together, we work to stabilize the bleeding, our shared concern for Matteo temporarily erasing any tension between us. Her hands are steady as she helps me bind the wounds, and I see steel beneath her teenage facade—the same steel I’ve come to recognize in her father.
“Security team’s sweeping the building,” Matteo reports, his free hand covering mine where it presses against his wound. The heat of his skin grounds me, reminds me he’s alive despite the blood staining my hands. “But we need to move. The Calabrese family won’t be far behind.”
“You need a hospital,” I argue, though I already know it’s futile.
“What I need is to get my family somewhere safe.” His eyes move between Bianca and me, carrying that intensity that still makes my breath catch. “Both of you.”
The word “family” catches us all off guard. After everything that’s been revealed about parentage and succession, it should feel hollow. Instead, it feels more real than ever—like steel forged in fire, stronger for the tempering.
“Both of us?” Bianca’s voice sounds younger than her seventeen years, vulnerability bleeding through her usual ice princess facade. “Even though I’m not…”
“You are my daughter.” Matteo’s voice carries that tone that makes hardened killers obey without question. “Some bonds matter more than blood. Some choices define us more than the ones made for us.”
Tears spill down Bianca’s cheeks as she throws herself into his arms, uncaring of the blood. He holds her with his good arm, pressing a kiss to her dark hair. The gesture is so tender, so paternal, it makes my chest ache. For a moment, her profile against the fluorescent lights is pure DeLuca—the same commanding presence he has in that turned-away photo frame in his office.
The moment shatters as footsteps approach. Antonio appears in the doorway, gun ready. “Building’s secure, Boss. But we’ve got incoming—multiple vehicles approaching from the south.”
“Time to go.” Matteo starts to stand, but his legs buckle. Blood loss is taking its toll, though he’d never admit it.
I catch him before he can fall, pulling his good arm across my shoulders. To my surprise, Bianca mirrors me on his other side, careful of his injury. The trust in the gesture—both of them letting me help, letting me in—makes something warm unfurl in my chest.
“Together,” I say firmly, meeting both their eyes. “We move together.”
Before we leave, I pause by Romano’s body. His dead eyes stare at nothing, expensive suit now ruined with blood. The gun in his manicured hand still looks wrong, but I take it anyway.
In our world, you never know when you might need another weapon.
We make our way through the monastery’s winding corridors, Antonio’s team providing cover. The sound of gunfire erupts outside—staccato bursts that echo off ancient stone, announcing the Calabrese family’s arrival in bullets and blood. Each shot makes me flinch, memories of my father’s death still too fresh.
“Exit route?” I ask as we reach the ground floor, adjusting my grip on Matteo. His skin burns with fever against mine, though he’d never admit weakness.
“Underground tunnel system,” he manages through gritted teeth. Sweat beads on his forehead, and I can feel tremors running through his body. “Connects to the old wine cellars. Transportation waiting on the other side.”
“Of course there are secret tunnels,” Bianca mutters, but her grip on her father remains steady. Her hospital gown is spattered with his blood now, making her look even younger, more vulnerable. “What else don’t I know about this place?”
“Later,” I cut in as more gunfire sounds closer, close enough to shower us with stone dust from the ancient walls. “Stories later, survival now.”
We find the tunnel entrance hidden behind a false wall in the chapel’s confessional—because of course the Catholic Church would have escape routes built into their houses of worship. The passage is narrow, medieval stone giving way to packed earth. Emergency strips along the floor cast everything in sickly green light that makes Matteo’s pallor look worse.
Our progress is slow with his injury, but no one suggests splitting up. We’ve all learned the hard way what happens when family separates. The tunnel air is thick with centuries of secrets, heavy with the weight of earth above us. Water drips somewhere in the darkness beyond the emergency lights, a steady rhythm like a dying man’s heartbeat.
“Wait.” Bianca stops suddenly, her body tensing. “Listen.”
Footsteps echo behind us, followed by voices—Johnny Calabrese’s distinct tone carrying through the tunnel like poisoned honey. The sound makes my skin crawl, remembering how he looked at me through my studio window, like I was something to be broken.
“Keep moving,” Matteo orders, though his voice is weaker now. “Antonio’s team will hold them?—”
“No.” I help him lean against the rough wall, my decision already made. “They’ll follow us straight to the exit.” I pull out Romano’s gun, checking the magazine. Six shots left. It’ll have to be enough. “Bianca, get your father to the cars. I’ll delay them.”
“Bella, don’t—” Matteo reaches for me with his good hand, blood seeping through his makeshift bandages. The sight steels my resolve.
“Trust me,” I whisper, echoing his words from our wedding night, from every moment he’s asked me to believe in him. “Like I trusted you.”
Before he can argue, I kiss him hard and fast, pouring everything I can’t say into it—how quickly I’ve come to need him, how afraid I am of losing him, how much I might just love him despite everything. When I pull away, I find Bianca watching us with an unreadable expression.
“Take care of him,” I tell my stepdaughter, this girl who’s become family in the strangest way.
To my surprise, she nods, something like respect flickering in those DeLuca eyes. “Take care of them.” She presses something into my hand—a small explosive device, clearly lifted from one of Antonio’s men. A smile curves her lips, and for a moment I see the woman she’ll become. “Make it count.”
The footsteps grow closer as Bianca helps Matteo deeper into the tunnel. I wait until they turn a corner, then set the charge where the passage narrows. The timer gives me two minutes—more than enough time to create a distraction that will either save my family or get me killed.
“I can smell your perfume, little artist,” Johnny’s voice echoes off stone walls, turning my blood to ice. “Jasmine, isn’t it? Like Sophia used to wear. Like all DeLuca women wear before they die.”
I back away from the charge, deliberately letting my footsteps be heard. My heart pounds so hard I’m sure it must echo off the walls, but my hands are steady on Romano’s gun. “Come find out.”
I make it thirty feet before they appear—Johnny and three of his men, their shadows stretching grotesque and massive in the emergency lighting. His smile reminds me of a shark scenting blood, all teeth and soulless eyes. The sight makes my finger tighten on the trigger, but I force myself to wait. Timing is everything.
He emerges from the shadows like a nightmare given form, three of his men flanking him. The emergency lighting casts his features in sickly green, highlighting the cruelty in his perfect smile. He moves with a predator’s grace, every step measured and deliberate.
“The artist princess,” he mocks, spreading his arms wide. “Giovanni’s precious daughter, who thought she could escape her birthright by hiding behind easels and paint.” His laugh echoes off the stone walls. “How’s that working out for you, sweetheart?”
My finger tightens on the trigger. “Better than being your puppet, Johnny. How’s it feel, being Carmine’s attack dog?”
Something ugly flashes across his handsome features. “You think you know so much, little girl. But you don’t even know how your father died, do you?”
The words are like a knife through me, but I force myself to stay focused. Keep him talking. Buy time. “Why don’t you tell me?”
“He begged at the end.” Johnny’s voice drops lower, silkier. “Not for his life—no, Giovanni was too proud for that. He begged for yours.” He takes another step closer, and I have to fight the urge to back away. “Want to know what his last words were?”
Forty seconds. My blood roars in my ears, but I make myself stand my ground. “You’re lying.”
“‘Not my bella mia ,’” Johnny mimics my father’s accent perfectly, twisting the endearment into something obscene. “‘Not my little artist.’ Such a disappointment you must have been to him—the heir to his empire, running away to play with paintbrushes.”
“Shut up.” The words tear from my throat before I can stop them. Thirty seconds.
“He died thinking he’d failed you.” Johnny’s smile widens, showing too many teeth. “Thinking his only child was too weak to carry on his legacy. And he was right, wasn’t he? Look at you now—Matteo’s pet artist, playing at being donna when we both know you’re just a scared little girl with paint under her nails.”
I think of my father’s proud smile at my first art show. Of his hands steady on mine as he taught me to shoot. Of all the lessons he gave me that I never understood until now.
“You want to know what my father really taught me, Johnny?” My voice comes out steady, cold. Fifteen seconds. “He taught me to see the whole canvas. To look for weaknesses. To understand that sometimes the most dangerous player is the one you underestimate.”
Johnny laughs loudly at that. “And you think that’s you ?”
Thirteen seconds.
“Trying to delay us while they escape?” He tsks, the sound obscene in the ancient tunnel as he notices me checking my watch. “Brave, but ultimately pointless. There’s only one exit, and my men are already there.”
I check my watch. Ten seconds. “Sure about that?” Adrenaline makes everything sharper, clearer. I catalog details like I would for a painting—the way his suit is perfectly pressed even now, how his signet ring catches the dim light, the slight tremor in his gun hand that betrays his cocaine habit. “You people never learn, do you? Always underestimating what we’ll do to protect our family.”
“Family?” Johnny laughs, the sound bouncing off stone walls like broken glass. “You’ve been married two days. What do you know about family?”
“I know that real family chooses each other.” Five seconds. I shift my weight, preparing to move. “Blood is just genetics. Love? That’s a choice.”
Understanding dawns on Johnny’s face just as the timer hits zero. I dive around the corner as the explosion rocks the tunnel, the concussion stealing my breath even as I roll away from falling debris. Centuries-old stone and earth cascade down, cutting off half of Johnny’s scream.
Through the settling dust, I hear him coughing, raging. “You fucking bitch! I’ll find you! I’ll make you watch while I kill them both—your precious husband and his bastard daughter!”
“No.” My voice carries over the sound of shifting rubble. “You won’t. Because my father taught me one more thing, Johnny.” I pause, thinking of Papa’s last lesson—the one he taught me without words. “He taught me that real power isn’t about violence or territory or blood. It’s about love. About family. About what we’ll do to protect the people who choose us.”
His answer is lost in another crash of falling stone, but I’m already running, following the emergency lights toward the exit. My lungs burn with every breath, stone dust coating my throat, but I don’t slow down. Not with Matteo bleeding, not with Bianca still weak from drugs, not with everything we’ve fought for hanging by a thread.
I emerge into predawn darkness to find Matteo’s security team waiting, guns trained on bodies that used to be Calabrese’s men. The sight should horrify me—these men I’d probably served drinks to at my wedding, now cooling in the dirt. Instead, I feel nothing but relief.
“Mrs. DeLuca.” Antonio helps me into the waiting SUV where Matteo and Bianca occupy the back seat. “All clear?”
“Johnny’s trapped on the other side of about ten tons of rock.” I slide in beside my husband, immediately checking his bandages. “He’ll dig out eventually, but…”
“But we’ll be long gone.” Matteo pulls me close with his good arm, pressing his lips to my temple. His skin still burns with fever, but his eyes are clear as they meet mine. “You impossible, brilliant woman.”
“I learned from the best.” My voice falters as the events of the night catch up with me. The monastery, Romano’s death, Johnny’s trap, Matteo’s blood still staining my hands. “Both of you.”
From her place on Matteo’s other side, Bianca reaches across to squeeze my hand. No words are needed—we’ve forged something stronger than blood in that tunnel, something that can’t be broken by secrets or lies or DNA tests.
“Where to?” Antonio asks from the front seat as we speed into the lightening sky.
Matteo’s good hand finds mine, his wedding ring pressing against my palm like a promise. “Home,” he says simply. “Take us home.”
As dawn light paints the sky in shades of gold and crimson, I think about how many meanings that word can have. Home isn’t just a place—it’s people, it’s trust, it’s love despite darkness. Or maybe because of it.
The SUV speeds toward safety as the sun rises behind us, turning the monastery into a dark silhouette against the morning sky. We may have escaped its ancient walls, but I know the secrets buried there will follow us. Some truths refuse to stay buried, no matter how much stone you pile on top of them.
But that’s tomorrow’s battle. For now, I have my husband’s blood on my hands, my stepdaughter’s trust in my heart, and a future that’s terrifying and beautiful and ours.
For now, that’s enough.