“We ease off enough to make Kozlov think the temperature has dropped.”
Relief hits hard and mean. It leaves me almost dizzy.
Walking to the table, Dario sets his glass down. “You’re serious.”
“I’m making a tactical adjustment,” my father says coolly. “Try to keep up.”
Paolo’s mouth twitches.
Lorenzo looks back at me. “In return, I want something real. Not your instincts. Not her tears. Not the glow of young love.” His tone turns razor-thin. “Something concrete from inside that house. A date. A location. A name attached to the shipment. Anything I can move on. And I want it soon.”
I nod once. “You’ll get it.”
His expression says he is not remotely interested in my confidence. “You are attached to this now, Luca. Entirely. If this goes sideways, if she plays you, if Kozlov turns this into a trap, it will be your failure to account for.”
There was a time that word would have slid under my skin and stayed there.
Now it just sounds like the truth.
“Understood,” I say.
He studies me for another long second. Then, very slightly, he inclines his head.
That settles it.
He sits. Picks up his espresso. Takes a sip like the last twenty minutes didn’t happen.
“You’ve changed,” he says without looking up.
I wait for the rest of it. The qualifier, the warning, the part where he tells me that’s not a good thing. It doesn’t come.
I don’t know what to do with that. So I take it with me and leave.
Dario catches my eye on the way out. He doesn’t look pissed anymore. He doesn’t say anything. Just holds the look for a second longer than necessary.
Back out on the casino floor, I pull out my phone. The text is simple.It’s done. He’s easing off.
My thumb hovers.
Because once that pressure lifts, there’s nothing stopping Kozlov from calling Natalia home.
I won the argument.
But I can’t shake the feeling that I just helped deliver her to the wolf myself.
34
NATALIA
A weekback in my father’s house, and I’ve perfected the art of being no one again.
It returned faster than I expected, the muscle memory of disappearing
I eat breakfast at the kitchen island while his men move through the halls like I’m invisible. I keep my door open because a closed door invites questions. I smile when spoken to, which isn’t often. I say “yes, Papa” and “of course” and “whatever you think is best,” and not a single person in this house looks at me long enough to notice that the girl who left for the Outer Banks is not the same one who came back.
Turns out I never forgot how to do this. I just forgot how much it costs.
A month of sleeping without Luca. Three weeks alone in the beach house, watching the ocean and waiting for a phone call I couldn’t control, and now seven days here. I still wake up reaching for a body that isn’t beside me.
