ログインLia’s POV
I sat carefully on the edge of the bed beside him, still holding his hand. Matteo leaned his head against Dante’s good side, his small body finally starting to relax. Lola stayed silent at the window, her arms crossed, looking out at the dark city. For a few quiet minutes, with Dante looking at me like I was the only steady thing in the room, I let myself breathe.
His fingers stayed loose around mine. Every so often his thumb brushed slowly ac
Lia’s POVIt’s been a month.Victor and Dante were both feeling a lot better. Victor had been discharged from the hospital a week ago, and the color had finally started coming back to his face. He moved slower than before, but he was steady on his feet again. Some mornings I still caught him pressing a hand against his side where the wound had been, like he was checking that it was really closed. Dante’s arm was almost completely healed. The thick bandages were gone, replaced by a lighter wrap that he only wore at night now. He could use his hand for most things again. The deep ache in his shoulder still showed sometimes when he reached too high or turned too fast, but he no longer winced with every small motion. There were days he almost looked like himself again.We all stayed in Victor’s mansion instead of the penthouse.The mansion where Rob had shot him.It was a big, quiet place with high ceilings and lon
Lia’s POVI sat carefully on the edge of the bed beside him, still holding his hand. Matteo leaned his head against Dante’s good side, his small body finally starting to relax. Lola stayed silent at the window, her arms crossed, looking out at the dark city. For a few quiet minutes, with Dante looking at me like I was the only steady thing in the room, I let myself breathe.His fingers stayed loose around mine. Every so often his thumb brushed slowly across my knuckles, like he needed the contact to stay grounded. His eyes were still a little glassy from the pain medication, soft in a way that made my chest ache. He kept glancing at me, then at Matteo, then back at me again, as if checking that we were both still real.The hospital room was dim except for the soft light above the bed. The air smelled clean and sharp, like antiseptic mixed with the faint scent of the soap they used on the sheets. Somewhere down the hall a cart rattled pa
Lia’s POVAnd I thought about what happened in this room. The way his whole body had jerked. The way his eyes had flown open. That grip on my hand that shouldn’t have been possible.My sons. My sons. Something’s wrong. I can feel it.I had felt it too. Right at that same second. Both of us at once.He knew.Somehow, from all the way down wherever he was, he knew.He felt his son dying.I looked at his hand in mine and my eyes went blurry and I let them.“I don’t know how to tell you,” I whispered.Because that was the thing sitting on my chest now, heavier than everything else. Someone was going to have to tell him. When he woke up — and he was going to wake up, he had to wake up — someone was going to have to sit in this beautiful quiet room and say the words out loud.Rob is dead.Your youngest son is dead.He shot you, and then he took your grandson, and then he died in the woods, and none of it can be undone.Maybe it would be Dante. Maybe it should be Dante.But Dante was upstair
Lia’s POVHe settled back against the chair and I watched the relief hit him, whether he wanted it to or not. His head tipped back. His good hand went loose on the armrest. All that tension he’d been holding just to stay upright let go at once, and that told me more about how bad it was than anything he’d said out loud.I crouched down in front of him so we were level.He reached out and took my hand and brought it to his mouth and pressed his lips to my knuckles. Held them there a second longer than he needed to.“I love you,” he said.“I love you too.” I put my free hand on the side of his face. His skin was still too cool. “So come back and tell me again.”“I will.”Then he turned his head and looked at his son.“Matteo.”“I have to go with the doctors for a little while so they can fix my shoulder,” Dante said. “But I’m coming back. Soon. Okay?”Matteo’s chin wobbled. “Promise?”“I promise. I have never broken a promise to you, have I?”“No.”“And I’m not starting today.” Dante’s
Lia’s POVI hugged Dante again.That was all I could think to do. He had just shaken his head — one small movement, that was all, no words at all — and I understood everything from it. Rob was dead. Rob was gone. The man who had shot his father and then kidnapped his nephew, but he was also Dante’s little brother, and both of those things were true at the same time.So I put my arms around him and held on and didn’t say anything, because there was nothing to say that wouldn’t have been stupid.He was warm. He smelled like blood and gunpowder and wet earth. I could feel him breathing — slow, careful breaths, the kind you take when breathing hurts. Under my hands his back was solid and tense, every muscle held tight like he was still bracing for something that had already happened.He didn’t cry.I think that was the part that hurt me most.I felt so sad for him.I hated Rob. God, I hated him — for what he did to me, for what he did to Victor, for what he did to that little boy today. P
Dante's POVIt took Callum and both medics to get me up. When I stood, the world tilted sideways for about two seconds and then straightened out.I kept Matteo on my hip the entire way out of those woods. My right arm under him, his legs around my waist, his face buried in my neck. Every step jolted my shoulder. I didn't care. Callum walked beside me with one hand hovering near my back the whole time, ready.The walk out felt three times longer than the walk in.We passed the police tape they'd already strung between two trees. Past officers standing in small groups. Past a man in a windbreaker photographing footprints in the mud.I did not look toward the middle of the clearing when we passed it.Neither did Matteo. I made sure of that with my hand on the back of his head.The ambulance was parked in the motel lot with its back doors already open, lights turning silently.They wanted to put me on the stretcher. I sat on it. That was as far as I'd go."He rides with me," I said."Sir,
I spun around with a sharp intake of breath, my hand flying to my chest.Victor stood just a few feet away, watching me with those piercing blue eyes. He was so quiet I hadn't heard him approach at all. He'd changed since earlier—now he wore a dark suit, perfectly fitted, the kind that probably cos
When I finally got to my room, I stopped in the doorway and just stared.It was beautiful. Really, genuinely beautiful. The room was spacious and airy, with high ceilings and large windows that looked out over the water. The last light of the evening was painting the Mediterranean in shades of oran
Those blue eyes. God, those blue eyes.Up close, they were even more intense than I'd noticed from across the room. They were the kind of blue you saw in pictures of the Mediterranean—deep and clear and impossibly bright. They held a sharpness to them, an intelligence, like he was taking in everyth
Lia’s POVThe words hit me like a physical blow. Like he'd reached across the space between us and punched me in the stomach.Better than I ever did.I thought about all the times I'd tried to please him. All the times I'd gotten on my knees for him, wanting to make him feel good, wanting him to wa







