"I found her." Though there's no need to elaborate, he does it anyway. "Eliza."
The name cuts through me like it always does when it surfaces. I've spent three years trying to forget her. It took effort but I pushed her to the back of my mind. I thought I'd buried what remained of her cold dead heart beneath Katya's warmth.
In the weeks it took me to recover from the attack, when the full extent of what had been done to my face was being mapped and assessed by a dozen different doctors, I'd cared little for the wounds themselves.
It was the interior damage that threatened to bring me down, the sense of betrayal.
A woman I'd trusted enough to consider making my bride had led me into a trap. She'd walked away without a backward glance.
"I didn't know you were still looking for her."
"Someone had to."
It's said quietly but there's an edge to his tone. The admonishment is aimed at my brothers. He believes it's their fault I chose not to share the details of my attack with them. He thinks it's because they were never supportive enough for me to trust them with my secrets.
That couldn't be farther from the truth. It's precisely because I know they would have dedicated themselves to making Eliza pay that I told them nothing.
They've done extraordinary things over the last three years, unencumbered with a mission to avenge me. I'm proud of all they've achieved. It wouldn't have been possible if their sole focus had been bringing me Eliza's head on a platter.
I only told Adriano what really happened because he caught me in a moment of weakness at the hospital.
"What have you learned?"
"She's been living in Sydney." He turns his glass slowly in his hand. "She left Rome the night of the ambush, went to the UK for a while then moved to Australia via Ireland. She goes by Elena Marek now."
Eliza Moretti to Elena Marek. It's not such a big difference but enough for her to hide behind for three years.
"And?"
"She works at a café run by Italian immigrants. Cash in hand. She lives in a shabby apartment. Her landlord's a sleaze, not the type to ask for references or bank details."
"Smart girl."
"Yep, she knew how to stay off the radar."
I take a sip of Scotch. The rich smoky flavor soothes me. "So how did you find her?"
"How does anyone find anything these days?" Adriano asks. I shrug and he shakes his head. "Social media. Her boss put a picture on Instagram."
Hmm. It amazes me how naive people can be. Three years of hiding undone by a single photo carelessly shared with the world. I almost feel sorry for her.
"Do we know why she worked with the Hungarians?"
The men who carried out the attack had come from Budapest. Small-time criminals, they stumbled into a significant opportunity when they found a woman willing to hand me over for the right price.
I'd denied them access to the docks at the port of Civitavecchia six months before the attack. It was a business decision, one of dozens I'd made that year. I hadn't thought of it again until I was lying in a hospital bed trying to understand why someone had come after me like that.
"Still working on the why," Adriano says.
"Have you picked her up yet?"
"Wanted to speak to you first."
I look at him. Although Adriano technically works for the family, he's been operating independently for years now, moving between cities, following whatever catches his attention, sending healthy transfers to Damiano each quarter that buy him the latitude to do as he pleases.
The fact that he spent three years quietly running a search he told no one about is either loyalty or stubbornness. With Adriano, the two are often indistinguishable.
"You're here for long?" I ask, buying time while I try to decide what I want to happen next.
