They don't trust my plan, but they'll have to. It's their only way.
Rico leans forward.
"The garbage trucks come through between ten and eleven. Last pickup's at eleven thirty. After that, the streets are quiet until morning."
"And the church?" Enzo asks.
"Santa Cecilia," Dante says. "First rehearsal's at six in the morning. That gives us a window between eleven thirty and six—seven hours."
"We'd need less than that," Luca adds. "Two hours to pack the shipment and access the tunnel. Forty minutes to traverse it. Another hour to load and transport from the exit. We could be done by two in the morning."
"Assuming nothing goes wrong," Rico says skeptically.
He's right. If Gerard's men intercept them, it would be a blood bath.
My hands wring in my lap.
What if I'm setting them up and I don't realize it?
Will Dante still feel the same way about me?
Will his men respect me?
Can I live with his soldiers' blood on my hands?
They continue discussing logistics, entry points, exit strategies, how to disable the camera Dante found monitoring the tunnel access, and I sit and listen.
My hands are shaking and the room feels too hot too.
Especially when they pick the men who will take the shipment.
I don’t want to know their names because if this goes wrong, I'm going to have nightmares about it.
The conversation moves fast and I catch maybe half of what they're saying.
Technical terms I don't understand.
References to people and places I've never heard of.
But I don't interrupt.
I just listen and try to absorb it all.
Dante glances at me occasionally, checking to make sure I'm alright.
Making sure I'm not overwhelmed.
His attention makes my heart race even faster.
Everything's different now that he's told me he loves me.
Every look, every gesture, every word carries weight it didn't before.
I yawn without meaning to.
The exhaustion from the past few days is catching up with me.
I'm exhausted by it all.
