He leads me out of the vault, hand tight in mine.
We walk through the quiet halls, past the rooms where his brothers sleep—past Matteo’s door, and Dante’s, past all the men who will wake tomorrow into a different family and don’t know it yet.
At the end of the hall, the library sits dark and patient, one desk lamp burning the way it always burns. Alessio stops long enough to photograph the lamp, the desk, the cable path.
Tomorrow, we pull the thread.
Tonight I hold his hand tighter and pray to every god I gave up on that the data is wrong.
The data doesn’t care who I want to be innocent.
10
ALESSIO
The monitor humvibrates against the soles of my boots. A mechanical beast lives in these walls, feeding on the evidence I’ve collected for eleven years. Blue monitor light catches the sharp line of Amara’s collarbone. She doesn't look away from the data. She is the only thing in this room that doesn't feel buried.
Everything else is cold, sharp code, a blade pressed against a jugular. My jaw aches, a dull throb radiating into my temples. Letting her see the logs was a mistake. Letting her dig into the marrow of this family’s rot was worse, but she doesn't stop. She’s a relentless tide, and I’m already underwater.
I want her. Not the clean, patient kind of want, but a hunger that makes my teeth ache. I want to drag her away from the screens and back into the heat of my bed. My hands belong around her waist, my face buried in her neck until her scent chokes out the smell of ozone.
She chose to stand beside me. Every breath she draws in this fortress feels like something I have to keep safe. Every secret she uncovers is a thread tying her to my side. For eleven years, I’ve been the vault, carrying the part of the war I could not prove enough to share.
I’ve walked through the world with lead in my chest, watching my brothers marry and laugh and build lives on top of a foundation of lies. The silence used to be armor. Now it’s just a cage.
She focuses with a lethal, quiet intensity. I’m starving. I don't just want her; I need her. A feral, clawing thing lives in my gut, a possessiveness that turns my blood to fire. If the war touches her again, I will cut the threat out cleanly, no matter whose name is attached.
"Alessio." Her voice is soft friction against the silence.
I step closer, my chest brushing her shoulder. I step close enough to shield her if the room turns hostile, but not close enough to take the screen from her. "The logs don't lie, Amara." My voice is a low rasp, stripped raw. “The pings started in the family library. The old terminal should have been replaced years ago, but it stayed because Dominic preserved that room like evidence.”
"It’s more than just pings," she says, her fingers flying over the keys. She doesn't look at me. She’s too disciplined for that. "The traffic is encrypted with a localized key. Someone was sitting in that room, Alessio. Someone who knew the patrol shifts. Someone with the clearance to bypass the internal firewalls without triggering an alert. This wasn't a breach. This was a conversation."
A conversation. The words hit like a slammed door. For twenty years, while we were grieving, while we were hunting shadows and bleeding for every inch of territory, someone was talking to the enemy. Someone sat in the heart of our home, talking to the men who put my father in the ground and kept the war alive long enough to take my mother later.
I walk to the heavy oak desk in the corner. Files cover the surface, the edges frayed and yellowed. This is my true work. Not the patients I stabilize or the wounds I stitch. This room is my life. I reach into the bottom drawer and pull out a single sheet of paper. I’ve carried these names in my head for eleven years, but the ink makes them dangerous.
“There are five on paper,” I say.
Amara stands and walks toward me. She doesn't look afraid. She looks ready to stand in the line of fire. My heart hammers a frantic, rhythmic drum against my ribs. "Five what?"
"Five names. People who had the access, the history, and the proximity. I’ve been vetting them for a decade. One by one, I’ve tried to find a reason to cross them off. One by one, they’ve stayed." I lay the paper on the desk.
She leans over it, her dark hair falling over her shoulder. I want to tuck it behind her ear, to feel her skin under my thumb. I hold back.
“Old Man Fiore,” she reads.
“My father’s most loyal soldier,” I grunt. “He retired to Tuscany three years ago. He was there the night of the massacre. He took a bullet to the lung trying to reach my father’s crew. He’s spent twenty years coughing up blood and drinking himself into a stupor. He has the access, but the man can barely operate a remote control.”
"He could be a front," she says, her forensic mind working the angles. "A name used to hide the real actor."
"Maybe. But Rossi loved my father. I watched him cry at the funeral until he collapsed. If he’s the traitor, then loyalty is a myth." I point to the next name. “Bianco. He runs the supply chain. Everything in this compound goes through him.Wine, ammunition, everything. He’s meticulous. He knows the schedules better than Dominic.”
"And the motive?"
"Greed, maybe. He has a daughter in private school and a wife who likes expensive things. But his accounts are clean. Boringly clean. Either he’s a god at hiding money, or he’s just a man who likes his job."
She moves her finger to the third name. "Silvio."
