Page 109 of Of Lies and Shadows

Every minute that Francesca remains unconscious pushes me closer to the edge of madness.

The house feels like a tomb without her. Her absence echoes in every hallway, every room she once walked through, barefoot and half smiling. It’s not just me unraveling. The children are scared and grieving. Grieving a woman who isn’t gone but isn’thereeither. A woman they’ve come to see as their mother, who lies motionless in asterile hospital bed while their questions go unanswered.

The doctors are cautiously optimistic. They say her body is healing. That the surgery went well. That removing the spleen saved her life. But she hasn’t opened her eyes. She hasn’t spoken my name. And I can’t stop fearing that some part of her slipped away in that car, that she left me behind in the wreckage.

Lucia clings to Nina and cries at night. Alessio begs to see her, to hold her hand, to hear her voice and prove to himself she’s still real. But I can’t bring him here. Not yet. Not like this. Seeing her so still, so pale, it would destroy him.

And truth be told, I’m not home enough to offer comfort. I can’t be. I spend most of my time here, crumpled into a plastic chair that’s far too small for a man like me, because I need to be the first thing she sees when she opens her eyes. I need her to know she wasn’t alone. Not for a second.

I hold her hand through every shift change. I talk to her until my voice gives out. I press kisses to her fingers, her forehead, the inside of her wrist, desperate to breathe life back into her with each one.

But everything shifts when my phone vibrates against the plastic chair.

A single message, just a few words.I’ve got him.

Fulvio, the rat who betrayed me. The man who tried to murder my son. Who left Francesca bleeding out on a road she never should’ve been on. Who dared to touch what is mine.

I shoot up from my chair so abruptly that the nurse beside me startles, knocking over a clipboard.

“I’ll be back in a few hours,” I say, my voice like ice.

She nods, probably wondering what could make a man look like that, like he’s ready to raze the world. But she doesn’t ask, and I don’t explain.

Because no one needs to know that I’m about to spend the next few hours breaking someone, and I won’t feel a single drop of guilt, only joy, because vengeance has never felt so earned.

The warehouse reeks of rust and blood and dust. Familiar. Comforting, even, like the calm that comes before the storm, the kind of calm I grew up in. The kind that makes men into monsters.

They’re already waiting when I get there.

Bruno stands by the door, his arms crossed, eyes shadowed and hard. Vito leans against a pillar, pale and grim. The guilt hasn’t left his face since the moment he realized what Fulvio tried to do, what he almost succeeded in doing.

And in the center of the room, bound to a chair with blood crusting his lip and one eye swollen shut, is Fulvio.

My hand clenches around the grip of my knife as I step forward.

“She’s alive,” I say coldly, crouching in front of him. “You failed.”

He gives a raspy cough of a laugh, his lips curling despite the bruises. “What a pity.”

I see red. My hand lifts on instinct, but I stop, just for a second. Not for him but for her, for Alessio, and then I drive the blade into his side without hesitation.

He gasps, body jerking, the chair scraping across theconcrete.

“You tried to kill my son.”

He smiles, his teeth coated with blood. “A weak boy with a weak father who wept and hid behind a woman.” He spits on the floor, his saliva red on the concrete.

“My son is not weak; he’s strong—the kind of strength that scared men like you can never understand.”

“Men like me?”

“Yes, men who go after women and children.”

“I wanted to hit where it hurt, Dante Forzi, so you would get a taste of your own medicine.”

“You’re working with Salvatore,” I say. It’s not a question. “You betrayed us.” Then I stab him in the leg.

“You never gave me a choice.” Fulvio spits, his jaw trembling from the pain. “No matter what I did, I was always just a made man to you. Always overlooked. Always expendable.”

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