Family

As we split up, foreheads against each other, breathing each other's air, she said, The doctors told me you had hardly escaped a surgical operation. The bullet tore--cut your lung, your spleen. On the table they lost you twice. Sanna was screaming at them in Italian. Conti punched a wall. Mom wouldn't stop praying. Dad... Dad just held me while I cried."

I shut my eyes, and imagined it--my father losing his temper, my brother smashing up, her parents seeing the shambles of the life we had led. The feeling of guilt in my stomach was more like the surgical scars.

"They're all here?" I asked quietly.

She nodded. "Down the hall. They wouldn't leave. Sanna is arguing with the hospital administrator regarding security. The fact that Conti is guarding the door like Fort Knox. Mom and Dad are going to get coffee and make a show that they are not terrified.

I exhaled shakily. "Family."

"Yeah," she said, voice thick. Our beautiful messed-up family.

A silence fell upon us--still, dead, full.

I looked at her--really looked. The bruises on her face, the cut she had received on her cheek in the fight with the mountain, the shaking of her hands, even now. She had been in hell on my account. Because of who I was. She was dragged into the kind of life I had.

And she was still here.

Still holding my hand.

And now gazing back at me as something worthy of salvation.

"How bad is it out there?" I asked eventually. "The leaks. The warrants."

Her expression darkened. "Bad. The feds are everywhere. They have frozen the majority of the accounts. Every house they can get is raided. But the lawyers of Sanna are on the offensive--they are disputing the chain of evidence--they say that the leaks were the result of an unlawful hack. The sheriff is dead and his credibility is shot. Some of the charges may be permanent and some may not. It's... messy."

I nodded slowly, processing. "And Isabella?"

"Safe. Mom and Dad are with her now. She is frightened, and yet she is talking to us. She wishes this over as we do, too.

I squeezed her hand. "We let her go. Soon. No more leverage. No more hostages. We end this clean."

Candice searched my face. "You sure? Without her--"

"I'm sure." I put her hand to my lips and kissed her joints one at a time. I have wasted too much time hiding behind people. I'm done. We face what comes--together. No more pawns."

The tears filled once more but she smiled despite them. You are turning soft, d'Agostino.

"Only for you," I murmured.

She bent, and kissed me to herself--slow, tenderness, full of all that we had so nearly forgotten. As she drew back she laid her forehead against mine.

"I love you," she whispered. "More than the empire. More than safety. More than anything."

I shut my eyes, and allowed the words to sink, and to sew up some of me that I had no notion was still bleeding.

"Love you too, piccola. Always have. Always will."

There were voices outside the door, Sanna talking back to someone in Italian, Conti laughing to himself, quietly, and the murmur of Dad. Family. Disheveled, disfigured, damaged family.

Alive.

All of us.

For now.

I turned my head sufficiently to look through the window. The dawn was coming out--blind gray light crawling over the sky, and making the world soft as it had not been in months.

I turned about and saw Candice, at the woman who had passed through fire on my behalf, who had held me when my heart had ceased, who had made a choice of me when the entire world had dictated to her that she must flee.

And vowed I mute oint--there, there, broken and bleeding and breathing:

I would give her every drop of my heart to ensure she did not regret doing it.