My pen glides slow and deliberate through Rocco’s name. One clean stroke. Final.
I smile.
There is a kind of power in doing what no one believed you would live long enough to do.
Lia enters then, as she does every morning. My soft, loyal friend who carries the quiet fatigue of someone who’s cared for me for years.
“What’s put that look on your face, Miss?” she asks, sliding onto the chair by the bed.
“Rocco’s dead,” I say simply, handing her the paper.
She reads, hand flying to her mouth. “And—Signor Enzo… the paper says?—”
“I saw.” My voice is flat.
I don’t add what I want to add—that I hope his blood painted the floor, that I hope his last breath rattled like mine did, that I hope his golden throne splintered. No need. Lia understands all too well what this means to me.
I close the notebook. There is work to do. A war to finish. A life to reclaim. I will do it all on my feet, even if I have to drag my broken body through fire to get there.
Almost five years. That is how long I have been languishing here, rotting in this bed for the convenience of other people.
For what? So greedy bastards could pad their ledgers? So my husband could get a new wife who overlooks all his infidelity? For my family to cash in on my absence?
My child is almost five, and the last time I saw him he was less than a week old. How isanyof this fair?
Life had to beat me stupid before I understood: fairness does not run this world. Power does. Those who hold it define what counts as right.
They stole my life. They stole my child.
Weak as I still am, I cannot afford any mistakes. Before I show myself again, I must become stronger. I have already started physical therapy, forcing my limbs into obedience, pushing my body until the pain is familiar—so when the time comes to implement my plan, my body will not be the thing that betrays me.
I look at the list—four names uncrossed now—and the line of my mouth hardens. Their hour will come, and this time I will show no mercy.
It is funny, in a bitter way. I had judged Enzo for his ruthlessness, but the world keeps proving I cannot win without it. So I will change my tactics. I am going to become just as ruthless, if not more so.
They should have killed me when they had the chance. Now I am out for blood. I lost almost five years of my baby’s life, five years I will never get back.
And nothing cuts deeper than the knowledge he callsthatwoman mamma.
2
ALLEGRA
The newsabout Enzo’s injury continues to churn in my mind. Perhaps karma is real after all.
“Can you help me down?” I ask Lia, swinging my legs over the bed and lowering myself to the floor. She takes my arm as I land, steadying me. I’m shaky but upright.
“I need to get dressed,” I tell her. She frowns.
“But, Miss?—”
“I need to go to the hospital. See with my own eyes if he’s actually dead,” I lie. What I really want is to see Enzo and the state he’s in—maybe I’ll cross a second name off the list today.
“But—” Lia protests again, so I look at her, sharper than I mean to be. “I’m going.” My tone is biting. She exhales and helps me into my clothes.
I’ve taken small trips before, short excursions meant to remind me that the world still exists beyond these barren rooms. They were attempts to feel anything besides the slow rot of waiting.
Today is different.
