An armed Andretti on her porch asking to be trusted.
“I’m trying to keep you safe,” I say.
Her fingers tighten on the edge of the door. “Then start by taking it off.”
I nod and reach behind me slowly, pulling the Glock from my waistband and keeping it pointed at the deck. Natalia goes very still. I can feel all of her attention locked on my hand, on the weapon, on whether I’m about to do something that proves every bad instinct she has about me is right.
Instead, I turn it in my hand and hold it out to her grip-first.
“Take it.”
She doesn’t move.
“Luca—”
“Take it,” I say again, my voice rough. “I want you to feel safe around me.”
Her eyes search my face for a long second. Then she opens the door a little wider and takes the gun from my hand.
The second her fingers close around it, my gut clenches. I just put a gun in Natalia’s hand and left myself standing here empty, and all I can do now is hope she sees it for what it is.
She looks down at it. Then back up at me.
“Is it loaded?”
“Yeah.”
Her mouth tightens. “How do I unload it?”
“Magazine first,” I say. “There’s a release by your thumb.”
She finds the release and the magazine drops into her palm.
“And the chamber?” she asks.
“Pull the slide back. Hard.”
She tries it, but not far enough. The slide barely moves.
“More,” I say, keeping my voice gentle. “All the way.”
This time she does it. The round kicks free and hits the porch boards with a sharp metallic clink that seems way too loud.
Both of us look down at it.
Then Natalia bends, picks it up, and sets it on the deck railing beside the magazine.
The gun hangs empty at her side, and I stay exactly where I am, careful not to crowd her with so much as a breath. After a second, she looks at the weapon in her hand, then at me, then back at the weapon again, like she’s trying to decide what this means. What to do with it. What to do with me.
“You realize,” Natalia says, “that you just handed your only weapon to the daughter of the man who wants your entire family dead.”
I look at her. She’s almost smiling.
I shove my hands in my pockets. “Not my worst decision this month.”
The almost-smile twitches. It doesn’t quite land. But it’s close. Closer than anything I’ve gotten since she walked out of that hotel room in Vegas.
She sets the gun on the railing next to the ammo. “If you come inside,” she says, serious again, “that stays there.”
