21. Lina
Lina
I stare down at the thick ceramic mug on the Formica table.
The coffee inside is lukewarm, but I wrap my hands around it anyway, desperate for any warmth.
Outside the dirty window, Boston’s early-morning rain is relentless, turning the brick alleyways near South Station into slick mirrors.
My mother’s cardboard box, void of the letter, sits on the vinyl booth seat beside me, its yellowed edges slightly damp.
My whole life was a manuscript.
"You need a warm-up, sweetie?" the waitress asks, hovering over me with a glass pot.
Her nametag says Betty, and she has a blue brace wrapped tightly around her left wrist. She walks with a slight, heavy limp, her eyes carrying the kind of deep, patient exhaustion that only comes from decades of carrying heavy trays for strangers.
"No, thank you, Betty," I reply, offering her a small, tired smile. "The coffee is fine."
"You look like you've had a long night," she notes, leaning her hip against the edge of the booth. She looks down at my cardboard box, then back at my pale face. "And you look like you're heading somewhere you don't particularly want to go."
"I don't really know where I'm going," I admit, my throat tightening as a sudden, sharp wave of grief hits my chest. I run my thumb over the frayed edge of the cardboard.
"Well, South Station has buses going in every direction," Betty gestures toward the street terminal down the block. "But my advice? Don't just run away from life, It usually finds a way to follow you everywhere anyway."
"I'm not sure I have a choice," I breathe.
"We always have a choice, honey," she sighs, wiping a stray drop of coffee off the counter. "Even if it's just choosing which corner of the room to stand in. You stay as long as you need. I won't clear the table."
"Thank you," I whisper.
She walks away, her sneakers squeaking against the greasy linoleum.
I pull my yellow cardigan tighter around my chest. My mind is a chaotic, spinning loop of Gio’s face, of his dark, desperate eyes when he held me, of the diamond ring I threw onto his bedroom floorboards.
I look at the clock on the wall. It’s nearly seven in the morning.
I need to move. I can't sit in this diner forever, waiting for the blue screens of his monitors to track my credit card or my face. I slide two five-dollar bills onto the table, grab my canvas bag, and tuck my mother’s box tightly under my left arm.
I step out of the diner’s heavy doors, and the air hits my face like needles.
The sidewalk is narrow, crowded with commuters rushing toward the train station under a sea of black umbrellas.
I tuck my chin into my collar, my boots splashing in the muddy puddles as I walk quickly down the block, heading toward the regional bus terminal.
I just need to get to a different state.
Anywhere that isn't Maine, and anywhere that isn't New York.
Suddenly, two men step out from the shadow of a brick archway twenty feet ahead.
They are tall, broad-shouldered, and wearing heavy dark coats. Unlike the busy commuters, they aren't looking at the station. Their eyes are locked directly on my yellow cardigan, directly on my face.
My stomach plunges in a violent, terrifying drop.
No. Not again.
I instantly stop, my boots sliding on the wet concrete. I turn on my heel, intending to sprint back toward the diner, but a third man blocks the path behind me. He has a severe, scarred face and a heavy leather jacket, his hands shoved deep into his pockets.
"Lina Rossi," the scarred man smirks, his voice a low, rough growl that is easily swallowed by the rain. "Or should we say, Lina Salvatore?"
"Get away from me!" I yell.
"Your father wants to see you," the first man drawls, stepping closer, his hand reaching out to grab my upper arm.
"Don't touch me!" I scream as I swing the heavy corner of my canvas bag, slamming it directly into his face.
He grunts, his head snapping back as the canvas bites into his nose.
"Take her!" the scarred man barks.
Before they can grab my shoulders, a loud, screeching roar of tires echoes from the street corner. A dark sedan mounts the curb, slamming violently into the brick column of the archway, scattering the commuters in a screaming panic.
The passenger door of the sedan flies open.
"Lina! Down!"
It is Marco.
He lunges out of the vehicle, a heavy black handgun already raised in his right hand. Before I can even draw a breath, the street turns into an absolute war zone.
Bang. Bang. Bang.
The deafening, metallic reports of gunfire shatter the morning air, echoing off the high brick walls of South Station. Concrete chips and glass explode from the shop windows behind me, raining down on my shoulders.
The scarred man pulls a silver pistol from his coat, firing two quick rounds toward Marco’s car.
"Ambush!" one of Matteo's shooters screams, dropping behind a metal trash bin to reload.
"Enzo, cover the flank!" Marco roars, his gun barking as he drives one of the attackers back into the alleyway. "Get the New York shooters up here!"
"I'm on it!" Enzo’s gravelly voice bellows from the driver's seat of the sedan. He leans out the window, his shotgun unleashing a thunderous blast that rips through the side of a parked van.
I scramble backward, my boots slipping on the wet asphalt. I am caught completely in the crossfire. Commuters are screaming, diving behind concrete barriers and dropping their umbrellas as bullets chew through the brickwork above my head.
I dive behind a heavy metal newspaper dispenser, curling my body into a tight ball, my hands locked over my mother’s box. A stray round punches straight through the metal of the dispenser, only inches from my temple, showering my hair with green plastic and paper shreds.
A shooter in a dark gray coat spots me. He steps out from behind a concrete pillar, his gun pointed directly at my chest as he advances.
"I have the girl!" he shouts. "Keep the guards pinned!"
"Don't move, stronzo!" Marco bellows from across the street, but he is pinned behind his car door by a volley of automatic fire from the alley.
I look up at the shooter. The barrel of his gun looks like a giant, black mouth. My throat goes completely dry, my heart stopping, my mind registering the absolute, freezing certainty that I am going to die right here on a wet Boston sidewalk, clutching a cardboard box of lies.
A roaring engine screeches from the end of the block, and a massive, black armored SUV crashes directly through the metal barriers of the pedestrian plaza, smashing into the shooter’s gray coat with a sickening, heavy thud.
The impact flings his body twenty feet across the pavement, where he hits the concrete and goes completely limp.
The driver's door of the SUV is kicked open with a violent force.
Gio.
His face is completely feral, a mask of absolute, lethal rage. But beneath the rage, his dark eyes are wide, blown-out with panic.
"Lina!" he bellows, his voice a raw, broken roar that cuts through the screech of tires and the gunfire.
"Gio!" I scream, my voice cracking.
A shooter in the alleyway levels his rifle at Gio's chest. Gio doesn't even flinch. He raises his SIG Sauer in a single, fluid motion and pulls the trigger three times.
All three rounds hit the shooter in the chest, the impact dropping him instantly into the mud of the alley. Gio doesn't stop. He vaults over the hood of his SUV, his boots hitting the wet concrete as he sprints toward my newspaper dispenser.
Another bullet tears through the fabric of his white shirt, leaving a bright red streak of blood across his ribs. He doesn't even slow down. He doesn't look at his side. He only looks at me.
"I have you!" he roars, reaching my dispenser and lunging down beside me.
Before I can push him away, his massive hands grab my waist, yanking me up against his hard chest with a force that knocks the wind out of my lungs. He spins his body, covering my head and back completely with his own frame as another volley of automatic fire chews through the newspaper dispenser.
"Let go of me!" I sob, my fingers clawing uselessly at his wet, blood-stained shirt. "You lied to me! You monster, let me go!"
"Not now, Lina!" he growls, his jaw clenching so hard the muscle in his cheek is a hard knot. He fires two more rounds over my shoulder, driving the last shooter back into the alleyway. "You want to scream at me, you do it in the car! But you are going to live to do it!"
"Gio, left flank!" Dante’s voice screams from the street as a second armored Suburban pulls up, his Beretta firing rapidly to cover our exit.
"Clear the lane!" Gio commands, his voice a low, vibrating vibration that rattles my ribs.
He doesn't wait for my legs to move. He scoops me up in his arms, holding my small body and my mother's box tightly against his chest. He sprints the remaining ten yards to his SUV, the bullets snapping through the wet air around us like angry wasps.
He tosses me into the front passenger seat, sliding in right beside me and slamming the heavy, armored door shut.
The lock clicks with a solid, armored thud.
Marco hits the gas from the driver's seat of our vehicle, the tires screaming against the asphalt as we rocket out of the plaza, leaving the sirens and the smoke of the Boston street behind us.
I collapse against the leather seat, my chest heaving violently, my hands shaking so badly I can barely hold onto the cardboard box in my lap.
Beside me, Gio is leaning his head against the headrest. His white shirt is ruined, soaked with rain and stained with a blooming, dark crimson red along his ribs where the bullet grazed him.
He is bleeding, his breath coming in shallow, ragged gasps, but his dark, heavy eyes are locked onto my face.
"Lina," he murmurs, his hand rising slightly toward my cheek before he freezes, his fingers shaking, his knuckles covered in dark, wet blood.
"Don't," I whisper, my voice trembling with a mixture of terror, anger, and a deep, raw grief that makes my chest ache. I pull my yellow cardigan tight around my shoulders, refusing to look at his bloody hand. "Don't touch me, Giovanni."
He slowly lowers his hand, a small, dark twitch of pain crossing his granite face before his mask of cool, enforcer slides back into place.