“Did you leave something in the vault?” I snap. “Anything they could use? A journal. A file. A fucking scrap of paper—Pia, think.”
She blinks once.
Too hard.
Like something just hit the back of her skull.
I see it. That tiny, betraying flicker.
My stomach drops straight through the floor.
I grab her arms.
Not to hurt. Not to comfort.
To keep her in the moment.
“What aren’t you telling me?” My voice comes out low, furious, frayed at the edges. “Don’t you dare look at me like that and pretend this is nothing.”
She swallows.
Her lips part.
Close.
Open again—
And a sound cuts through the tunnel like a knife.
“S-Santino?”
The voice hits me like a bullet.
Small.Fragile.All wrong in a place built for ghosts and killers.
My head snaps toward the left passage.
The blood trail.
My pulse detonates against my ribs.
No.
No, no, no—
“There’s a child down here,” Pia breathes.
I don’t answer.
I’m already moving.
Slow. Silent. Every muscle pulled so tight it feels like I might snap too.
The voice comes again, closer. Shaking.
“Santino…?”
God.
