Chapter 41: Message Delivered

Morning in Milan arrived like a careful intruder — slipping through the blinds in narrow shafts of pale gold, brushing across the dark oak floors of Adriano’s safe apartment without disturbing the silence. The air inside was still, untouched, holding onto the faint scent of last night’s rain.Beyond the reinforced windows, the city was waking up. A tram’s low rumble passed somewhere in the distance. Car horns flared and died away. Somewhere down on the street, the metallic clink of a shopkeeper rolling open his shutters carried faintly upward.Inside, the building was locked down as always — guards posted in the corridor outside, two more at the main entrance, cameras running in a continuous loop. This was Adriano’s stronghold in Milan, a place built for shadows and safety.From the bedroom, Siena stirred. Her eyes opened to the muted light pressing through the curtains, the sound of Lucia’s laughter filtering in from the next room — a soft, high melody, the kind only a child could ma

Last Updated : 2025-08-09

Chapter 42: The Woman with No Name

The apartment didn’t feel safe anymore. It felt measured.Siena sat on the edge of the low sofa in the living room, elbows on her knees, the photograph from the black package balanced between her fingers like a blade. Lucia’s small face stared back up at her from the glossy paper — lashes lowered, mouth parted in concentration over a children’s book. The closer she looked, the more the image refused to stay still; it kept pulling her inward to the single fact she could not make smaller: someone had been that close.The room breathed around her in slow, careful sounds — the distant hum of the building’s ventilation, the soft tick of the wall clock, footsteps muted in the corridor where the guards rotated posts every fifteen minutes. From down the hall came the low murmur of two voices — Marco briefing another man; the rustle of a tablet case being unzipped; the scrape of a chair as someone sat. Efficient noise. Loyal noise. None of it changed the picture in her hands.Adriano stood at

Last Updated : 2025-08-13

Chapter 43: Riccardo’s Voice

Night settled over the safe apartment like a heavy curtain, muting the city to a distant murmur. The lamps were turned low — one pool of amber on the sideboard, another a thin halo over the corner of the living room where Siena sat with her legs tucked under her, a blanket thrown across her knees as if warmth could argue with dread.The place was engineered for quiet. The HVAC hummed at a regulated whisper. In the corridor outside, guards rotated in soft-soled shoes that never quite made a sound. Somewhere below, the elevator locks cycled, checking and rechecking their own certainty. The windows, double-laminated and polarized, showed nothing of Milan except a suggestion of light, like the city had been reduced to a pulse.On the coffee table lay the black card with the golden serpent and, beside it, the photograph from the morning’s package. Siena had left them there deliberately, a boundary line in plain view. She refused to keep them out of sight. She also refused to touch them aga

Last Updated : 2025-08-14

Chapter 44: The Drop

The hour before dawn makes every room honest. Color drains to ash; sound thins to a thread. The safe apartment breathed in long, even measures — vents whispering, pipes settling, the city outside reduced to a pulse behind glass.Siena had stopped pretending not to sleep. Somewhere between three and four she’d let her body fold into the chair by Lucia’s bed, a throw blanket slid haphazardly over her knees, her head tilted against the high back. She kept one hand free, palm resting on the mattress, two fingers lightly touching the edge of Lucia’s blanket where the rise and fall would tell her more than any clock. The bandage over her palm tugged when she flexed; it itched the way healing does when it decides to, not when you ask.Lucia lay on her side facing her, hair looped into soft curls against the pillow, breath a quiet tide. A line of stuffed animals kept sentinel at the foot of the bed — fox, rabbit, a soft bear whose ear had been loved thin. The nightlight in the corner had surr

Last Updated : 2025-08-27

Chapter 45: White Noise

They transferred Lucia upstairs when the sun was still a rumor at the edge of the city. The elevator doors opened onto a quieter floor, the kind built for waiting rather than crisis — low voices, long corridors, daylight that would arrive slowly and take the edge off metal and glass. Observation Room 7 was small, rectangular, and cleared of everything that could make a mother feel in the way. A narrow bed. A recliner that pretended to be comfortable. A monitor mounted high, its screen already alive with thin lines and numbers. A rolling pole with a saline bag hung but capped — ready if needed, unnecessary if luck held. Lucia lay on her back, blanket tucked under her arms, a tiny adhesive band across the crook of her elbow where the cannula sat like a promise not yet called in. The pulse-ox clip glowed red against her finger, a little jewel that pulsed with each artifact of the heart’s work. The blow-by nozzle had been removed; the mask coiled at the base of the pole like a snake out