Tous les chapitres de : Chapitre 41 - Chapitre 50

Lilith POVWe ran until my lungs were burning and my legs felt like they'd give out, Carlo leading us through a maze of backstreets that all looked the same in the darkness while sirens wailed behind us and I tried not to think about the people who'd been in that restaurant when the grenade went off."In here." Carlo pulled open a door to what looked like an abandoned apartment building and we stumbled inside, all three of us breathing hard while he locked the door and wedged a chair under the handle. "This building's scheduled for demolition next month, no one will think to look here.""Did we get him?" I asked between gasps for air. "Did the grenade kill Salvatore?""Not unless he's gotten slow in his old age." Damien was checking his shoulder and I could see blood seeping through his shirt where the stitches had probably torn during our sprint. "He'll have dove under the table the second he saw us, that's what I would have done.""So we just pissed him off without actually accompli

Damien POVMy father stood in the tunnel entrance backlit by flashlights from the soldiers behind him, and for a moment I was fifteen again watching him beat my mother to death while I did nothing because I was too scared to move."Salvatore." I kept my gun trained on his chest even though my hands wanted to shake. "I was wondering when you'd stop sending others to die for you.""I came to handle this personally because you've proven you can't be trusted to die quietly." He stepped into the chamber and I saw Matteo emerge from the south tunnel, my brother's face twisted with the kind of rage that came from wounded pride. "You were supposed to stay buried, supposed to let the world believe you were dead.""I was supposed to be a lot of things." I moved to put myself between him and Lilith. "But your son, your loyal enforcer, your perfect killer, none of those things stuck.""Because you were weak." Salvatore's voice was cold. "Your mother made you soft with her prayers and her bleeding

Lilith POVThree days passed in that clinic room and Damien didn't wake up, his body fighting infections and blood loss and trauma while I sat beside him counting every breath like they were prayers I didn't know how to say properly.Carlo came and went bringing food I barely touched and news from the outside world that felt distant and unreal, reports that the Moretti empire was collapsing exactly like Damien had predicted. Soldiers were scattering without leadership to direct them and rival families were moving in to claim territory that had been Salvatore's for decades, the whole criminal ecosystem of Sicily reorganizing itself around the vacuum we'd created."The police found the bodies in the catacombs." Carlo said on the second day while I was changing Damien's bandages. "They're calling it a gang war that ended with mutual destruction, no one's looking for survivors because they assume everyone involved is dead.""Good." I pressed fresh gauze against the wound that was finally

Lilith POVI woke on the fifth day to find Damien's bed empty and my heart stopped until I saw him standing at the window with his back to me, one hand pressed against the glass like he was trying to reach through it."You shouldn't be out of bed." I was on my feet before I'd fully processed being awake. "Russo said you need at least another week before you can move around.""Russo says a lot of things." He didn't turn around. "Like how I should accept that my memories might never come back and how I should focus on building a new life instead of chasing ghosts of who I supposedly was.""They're not ghosts." I moved closer but kept distance between us. "They're real and they matter and giving up on them means giving up on everything you fought for.""Maybe what I fought for was a mistake." His voice was quiet. "Maybe trying to be someone better was just arrogance, thinking I could wash away fifteen years of blood with prayer and good intentions.""It wasn't arrogance, it was hope." I

Lilith POVThe apartment building looked different than I remembered and it took me a moment to realize why, the front entrance was scorched black and the windows on our floor were boarded up from the fire the Moretti soldiers had set when they'd come for us."We lived here?" Damien stopped on the sidewalk and stared up at the damage. "This place looks like a war zone.""It became one." I was already regretting this decision. "Your father's men torched it the night they came to kill us, we barely got out through the fire escape.""Show me." He headed for the alley before I could stop him. "Show me how we escaped."The fire escape was still there, rusted metal that groaned under our weight as we climbed to what had been our floor. The window was broken and the frame was warped from heat but we managed to squeeze through into what remained of the apartment.Everything was destroyed, our furniture reduced to charred skeletons and the walls blackened with smoke that still hung in the air.