“Widett Circle,” I announce.
Dave is already on his phone, reaching out to our contacts in the area.The Boyle family has resources, connections, and an army of men ready to move at his command.
But as we race toward our headquarters to plan our attack, I can’t silence the voice in my head that whispers the truth I’ve been running from my entire life.
Everyone you love dies.
Everyone you try to protect ends up hurt.
And this time won’t be any different.
I close my eyes and see Serena’s face, illuminated by starlight on a Brazilian beach, whispering promises of forever.
Then I see Abeera’s hand, covered in dust, reaching through rubble, fingers going still.
The two images blur together until I can’t tell which nightmare is which.
And somewhere in the darkness behind my eyelids, my wife is waiting for me to choose.
Save her.
Or prove, once and for all, that I was never meant to save anyone at all.
25
Serena
The door creaks open, and someone flicks the switch, turning the overhead lights on.The brightness stabs my eyeballs, so I shut my eyelids to ease the discomfort.
I don’t know how long I’ve been here.Time has ceased to exist in this pit of darkness.My arms ache from the chains holding me to the bed frame, and my stomach has stopped growling long ago, resigning itself to emptiness.
I squint against the halo of light around my father’s head when he stops by the bed.I struggle to understand how the man who tucked me in at night became the monster who trades in human flesh.
“Carina,” His voice is soft as he approaches, as if I’m still the little girl who worshipped him.As if he didn’t have me dragged from my car, drugged, and chained to a bed in a cold dungeon.
I watch him settle into a chair by the narrow mattress.My father looks tired, the silver of his hair catching the light.For a moment, he’s just Giovanni DiLorenzo, sixty-three and worn down by the weight of the years.
Then I remember the manifests.The names.The photographs.I remember that somewhere along the way, Dad’s mortal sins turned his soul pitch black.
“I need to know something,” I say, my voice rough from disuse.
He raises an eyebrow, as if surprised that I’m speaking to him at all.“Go on.”
“Did Mom know?”
The question hangs between us, heavy and sharp.I hold my breath.Because if my mother knew, if the woman who raised me to value compassion and integrity was complicit in this horror, then everything I’ve ever believed about love and family dies in this room.
Giovanni’s expression shifts.Pain flickers across his features before he schools them into neutrality.
“No way,” he says.“Your mother would’ve walked away the instant she found out.She would’ve taken you and your siblings and disappeared.Claudia was never a hypocrite.She believed in honor.”A bitter smile twists his lips.“Real honor.Not the kind we dress up with oaths and rituals in the Syndicate.”
Relief floods through me, so overwhelming that tears prick my eyes.Mom didn’t know.She died innocent of this particular sin.
But the relief is immediately followed by confusion.If my mother’s morality was real, if my father loved her enough to recognize her principles, then how the fuck did he end up here?
“So what happened to you?”The question comes out sharp.“How could you dishonor her like that?The man who kept her rose garden alive, who named his legitimate empire after the town where she was born… How did you become a trader of human flesh?”
Giovanni is quiet for a long moment.He stares at his hands, which are trembling slightly.This man, who built an empire on fear and blood, can’t meet his daughter’s eyes.
