I help Amara out of the car, my grip on her arm too tight, too desperate. I lead her through the foyer, past the portraits of our fallen parents. The irony nearly chokes me. We’re honoring the dead in a house protected by the man who first opened the door.
"Alessio, you’re spiraling," Amara says softly as we reach the hallway. She stops, forcing me to look at her. Her eyes are wide, searching my face. She doesn't look surprised. She’s spent too long looking at the cold reality of people to believe in loyalty. “You recognized the logic in that warehouse. You knew who opened those gates. It wasn't Vane. So why are you still carrying it alone when the brothers just walked into his trap?”
"Not now, Amara," I say, my voice cracking. "I just need... I need a minute."
I leave her there and head toward the basement. Toward the holding room where we are keeping him.
The air grows colder as I descend. The hum of the compound’s generators vibrates up through the floor. Turi is sitting on the narrow cot behind the reinforced glass, a book forgotten on his lap. Rico stands guard at the door, Turi’s devices bagged on the table, the signal to this level killed. He looks old. He looks fragile. He looks like the man who held me after Riza was killed, when I finally understood grief could come back for the same family twice.
“You’re back early,” he says, his voice a gentle rasp. He doesn't look up, but his shoulders are stiff. He knows. “So the gate opened.”
I stand in the doorway, my hands curled into fists. I want to roar. I want to demand to know how much my mother’s life was worth to him. I want to know if he thinks about my father’s blood every time he looks at me. But I keep my hands steady.
"The gates were open, Turi," I say, my voice flat and dead.
He finally looks at me. There’s a world of grief in his eyes.
"The world is a dangerous place, Alessio," he says, his voice trembling. He stands up, his joints popping, and walks toward the glass. He presses a hand against it. It’s the same gesture he’s used a thousand times.
Now, it looks like a predator reaching through a cage. "You carry so much. The weight of this family, the secrets of the dead. You’ve always been the strongest of them. The one who could see the truth when the others were blinded by rage."
"I see it now," I whisper.
"Then you know that sometimes, we do things we hate to protect the things we love," he says, his voice a low, urgent plea. He’s looking at me with a terrifying, warped affection. “Your mother... she was the light of this family. I owed money. I was desperate. And I told myself selling the routes would buy her safety.”
The confession is a jagged truth wrapped in the velvet of his grief. He sold the routes to the Bellantis to cover a gambling debt, then told himself it might buy her safety. He’s been living in the ruins of that decision for twenty years, trying to atone by feeding us scraps of intelligence, acting as the anonymous savior who kept us from falling into the holes he helped dig.
"You should get some rest, son," he says, turning back to the shadows of his cell. "The morning will be here soon. And the war... the war is almost over."
The recorder over the glass catches every word. I make myself walk away before I do something that can't be undone. I go to my private workroom.
The room is cold, the monitor hum a constant, irritating drone. I stand in front of the whiteboard where I’ve spent eleven years tracking the shadows of our past. The list is there, five names on the board, six in my head. Corvi. Silvio. Leo. Bruno. Turi.
I stare at Turi’s name. I remember the way he smelled of peppermint and tobacco when he tucked the younger boys into bed after the massacre. He became the only father I had left. And he’s the monster I’ve been hunting.
I grab the lighter from the desk. I pull the copy off the wall. The original stays locked in the drawer because I am grieving, not stupid. The fire catches quickly, the orange glow devouring the names one by one. Rossi disappears into ash. Marco curls into black soot. Silvio and Leo are gone in a flash of heat. I watch the fire devour the decoy names. I tear Turi’s name free before the flame reaches it. I let the burning paper fall into the metal trash can.
I don't need the list anymore. I have the answer.
I lean my forehead against the cool edge of the metal filing cabinet. I'm empty. The door slides open behind me. I don't have to look to know it’s her. The scent of her—crisp and clean, like rain on a city street—fills the space. Amara doesn't say anything at first. She walks over to the trash can, looking down at the smoldering remains.
"You burned the list," she says.
"I don't need it," I say.
"Because you know."
I finally look at her. She’s leaning against the desk, her arms crossed. She’s not afraid of the darkness I'm drowning in.
“It was him,” I whisper. “The routes. The first door. The leaks he hid under warnings. The tips that saved us because guilt couldn’t undo what debt started. He’s been trapped between both sides for twenty years, Amara, hiding the sin with one hand and trying to save us with the other. He sold my parents to the Bellantis to cover a debt, and then he spent the rest of his life trying to buy back his soul with our blood."
Amara closes her eyes for a moment, a small sigh escaping her lips.
"What are you going to do?" she asks.
"I'm going to finish the war," I say, my voice hardening. "I'm going to kill Vane. I'm going to dismantle the Bellantis. And then... then I'm going to deal with the rot inside this house."
"You can't do it alone, Alessio," she says, stepping toward me. She reaches out, her hands framing my face, her thumbs brushing over my cheekbones. Her touch is the only thing that feels real. "You’ve been carrying this for eleven years. You built this room to hide from the truth, but the truth is out now. You don't have to be the only one who sees it."
