Page 164 of Dagger in the Sea

“Greece?”

“I’ll be on the first plane home. Let me give you another cell phone number to contact me. I’m shutting this number down.”

“Go ahead,” she said, and I gave her my alternate cell number that only two other people had. Two special contacts who I’d need the second I landed in the USA.

Marissa and I said our goodbyes, and I ripped the battery from my phone.

“What’s wrong?” Alessio asked. “You look like hell all over again.”

My eyes shuffled around the room. Metal bed, shitty sheets. Hospital room. My mother was in a hospital room all alone, thousands of miles away from me. Husband dead and vulnerable. Vulnerable tohim. Him. Him.

“Turo?” Alessio grabbed my arm.

I flinched. “My mother. She’s been in an accident. I need to be there. I need—”

“Turo, you can’t go back to Chicago,” Alessio said.

I had to go back.

I had to see Erin for myself. I needed to let her know she wasn’t alone, because now she was all alone. All alone. And vulnerable to another hit from that fucker. It was up to me to protect her, and I had to let her know that I was there for her. He would try again, wouldn’t he? Of course he would. He didn’t like failing, and now this would be fail number two this week. He wanted to erase us, his mistakes, the two thorns in his side. And Mauro Guardino liked being the victor in any game.

Not this time.

Alessio put a light hand on my chest. “Hey, take a breath, man, come on.”

I gulped in air, focused on the feel of his hand on me, and the thick, dizzying red diffused from my vision. I pushed his hand away. “Get rid of this phone for me.” I gave him the pieces.

“Sure.” Alessio pocketed them. “You need another or—”

“I’ve got one.” I swallowed, but my mouth was dry. “I need to talk to Luca.”

“Are you sure about that?”

I shot him a hard look.

“Bene.”Alessio got on his phone, yapped in Italian and clicked off. “He’s on his way from the hotel.”

Adri stood in the doorway, and a strange sense of relief washed with excitement flooded through me. I hadn’t seen her since yesterday, since she and Luca had gotten me and Marko in her car and taken us to the hospital.

Alessio lifted his chin. “I’ll go wait for my brother outside.” He clapped me on the shoulder and left the room, giving Adri’s arm a squeeze as he passed through the door.

I held out my hand to her. My anchor. I needed to touch her, feel her. Suddenly, time was ticking away, clock tower bells tolling, and not in our favor.

“Turo,” she murmured taking my hand, brushing my cold lips with her warm ones.

I wiped the hair back from her face. “Adri, I have to go back to Chicago right away. My mother’s been in an accident. She’s in a coma, and her husband’s been killed.”

“No. I’m so sorry.” Her eyes narrowed, eyes that searched mine for details, details I wouldn’t give. “Was it really an accident?”

“I need to go find out.”

“You already know,” she murmured holding my gaze. She knew too. She knew that to have someone close to you hurt on account of you was a punishment, the worst sort of torture, a failure.

A smile flickered over her lips.

“What is it?” I asked.

“Dionysus went down to the underworld and saved his mother. He defied death and brought her out of Hades to Olympus to live with the gods.”

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