"Before what?" I cut him off. "Before Alessandro gets impatient and decides she's worth more dead than alive? Before something goes wrong with the baby because she's terrified and stressed and surrounded by men who want to hurt her?"
"We have a plan?—"
"The plan takes three hours. Three hours is too long. He's unstable, Romeo. You heard him. He wants revenge, and every minute we make him wait increases the chance he does something we can't come back from."
"So what are you suggesting?" Dante's voice is quiet.
I look at the warehouse layout our hackers have pulled up. It has four main entrances—all of which will be heavily guarded. But there's a maintenance entrance on the north side, partially hidden by an old loading dock. It's small and probably locked, definitely not designed for assault entry. But it could work.
"I'm suggesting we don't wait." I look up at Romeo. "You, me, and three of our best. We go in now, fast and quiet, and hit them before they're expecting it."
"That's suicide." Romeo's voice is flat. "We'll be outnumbered at least three to one, probably more. No backup, no exit strategy."
"But we'll be there in thirty minutes instead of three hours." I meet his eyes. "And that might be the difference between Giulia living or dying."
The silence stretches out. Then Romeo nods sharply. "I'm in."
"No." Dante's voice cuts through the room. "I'm not authorizing this. You'll both be killed, and Giulia will still be?—"
"I'm not asking for authorization." I'm already moving toward the weapons cache, Romeo beside me. "I'm telling you what I'm doing. You can shoot me after, if we survive."
"Luca—"
"She's my wife!” I pivot, my words raw and angry. "She's carrying my child. And she's in that warehouse right now, thinking I hate her, thinking I might not even come for her. So I'm going. With or without your permission."
Dante stares at me for a long moment, and I can see him weighing options. “Fine,” he says harshly. “I’ll pick three men to go with you. And Luca?" He waits until I meet his eyes. "Bring my daughter home."
"I will. Or I'll die trying."
—
It takesfifteen minutes to gear up and brief the team.
The men don’t hesitate when Romeo explains the situation. They're all veterans—men who've fought beside us for years and know what they're walking into. They check their weapons and gear up, their faces grim and determined. Romeo pulls me aside while the others are loading into the vehicles.
"Savannah's at home," he says quietly. "I left her a note and told her I love her. Told her that if something happens, she should know I died doing what I had to do."
The words hit me hard. Romeo saying goodbye to his wife makes this real in a way the tactical planning didn't, makes it sink in that we might not come back from this. That the odds are very much against us.
"You don't have to do this. This is my fight. My wife. My?—"
"She's my sister." Romeo's voice is firm. "And you're my brother. So yeah, I do have to do this." He claps me on the shoulder, then moves toward the vehicles.
I stand there for a moment, the weight of everything pressing down on me. I think about Giulia this morning, and how she told me to be safe. I think about the ginger tea I left on the counter every morning. Such a small thing, such an inadequate gesture. But it was all I could offer when I was still too afraid to admit I was softening, that the walls I'd built were crumbling.
I think about the night she started cramping, the terror that consumed me when I found her in the bathroom, pale and scared and bleeding. The way I carried her to the car, the way I held her hand in the hospital, the way I couldn't leave her side even though I told myself it was just obligation. I think about the ultrasound and that rapid flutter of sound that was our baby's heartbeat, the way something inside me shifted when I heard it. The way I almost told her that everything was going to be okay, that we were going to figure this out together.
I think about all the things I never said to her.
I forgive her. I love her. And I desperately need a chance to make this all right.
If I die tonight—and the odds are very much against us surviving this—Giulia will never know any of it. She'll think I died still angry, still unable to see past the deception to the desperate, brave, terrified girl underneath.
Which means there's only one outcome available to me: I have to survive. I have to get to her.
And I will make sure she knows that I love her.
28
