HIS BUTTERFLY (BETWEEN TWO DONS) のすべてのチャプター: チャプター 91 - チャプター 100

"Some moments are so terrifying that your body forgets how to be afraid and just becomes it."SOFIA. I don't even have time to pull Isabella further back before the light hits us and there is a man standing there — big, masked, dressed in black — and his hand is already reaching in before I can do anything at all."No—"I grab Isabella and pull her behind me. Put myself between her and the hand reaching for us. Every instinct I have is the same one it has always been — her first. Always her first."Don't touch her." My voice comes out shaking but I make it loud. "Don't you dare touch her—"The man grabs my arm and pulls and I have no choice but to come with it or let Isabella's hand go and I cannot let her hand go so I come out of the wardrobe still holding her and suddenly the bedroom is full.Four men inside the room.Two more in the doorway.Six total.All masked. All in black. All holding weapons like they are extensions of their hands rather than things they are carrying.Isabel

"THE MOST PAINFUL BETRAYALS ARE THE ONES THAT WERE NEVER MEANT TO BE BETRAYALS AT All."SOFIAThe cramping comes and goes.Each time it comes it is slightly stronger than the last and each time I tell myself the same thing — stress, exhaustion, the body reacting to fear and each time it is slightly harder to convince myself of that.I focus on Isabella instead.She has stopped crying in the last little while. I don't know if that means she has fallen asleep or simply run out of tears or found some small way to manage the fear that six year olds find when adults can't. I keep talking to her through the wall every few minutes. Just small things. Just enough to let her know I am still here and still present and she is not alone.She answers each time.That is everything.The guards have changed once since Salvatore left. Two new men at the main entrance. One near the side door. They don't speak to each other much. They don't look at me much either which I have decided to take as an advan

"THE THING ABOUT DEATH IS THAT IT ONLY WORKS IF YOU ACTUALLY STAY DEAD."DANTE"You moved again," Elena says from across the room."I breathed," I tell her. "That's all.""Your breathing looks a lot like trying to sit up.""Your medical opinion looks a lot like something I didn't ask for."She crosses the room and looks at me with the particular expression she has been wearing for three days — the one that combines professional concern with the very personal exasperation of a woman who has kept me alive through more situations than either of us can count and is tired of her work being undermined by my complete inability to follow simple instructions."The rib," she says."Is fine.""Is cracked in two places.""Which means it is mostly intact.""Dante." She puts her hands on her hips. "The burns on your left shoulder need to stay dressed and still. The head trauma needs rest. Your blood pressure this morning was—""Elena."She stops.I look at her directly."How long have you worked fo

"SOME DEBTS CAN ONLY BE SETTLED ONE WAY."DANTEHe watches me walk back toward him.He doesn't look afraid.That is the thing about men like Salvatore. They spend so long being the most dangerous thing in every room they occupy that fear stops being something they reach for easily. They have had it beaten out of them by decades of being on the giving end rather than the receiving end.Or they are simply too old and too tired and too certain of how things will end to waste energy on it.He watches me cross the warehouse floor and his expression is the expression of a man who has already accepted what is coming and is simply waiting for it to arrive.I stop in front of him.I look down at him."My daughter," I say quietly.He says nothing."My daughter was in that room." I crouch down so we are at eye level. "Six years old. In a locked room in a warehouse because you decided that a child was a loose end." I hold his gaze steadily. "My daughter."Something moves in his eyes.Not regret.

“YOU CAN RUN, BUT YOU CAN NOT HIDE”MARCOThe airfield is small and private and grey in the early morning light. My car pulls to the side of the jet and I get out with the single bag I have been living out of for a week and I look at the plane and I feel the first thing in seven days that is close to relief.Just the sight of it.The particular relief of a person who has been holding their breath and can finally see the door.I walk up the steps.The jet is small and clean and familiar. I know every inch of this aircraft — the cream seats, the small table, the window that looks out over the left wing. I have been on this jet more times than I can count and it has always meant the same thing.Going somewhere.Getting away from whatever needed to be gotten away from.I put my bag in the overhead compartment.I sit down in my usual seat.I buckle the belt.And for the first time in seven days I let out a breath that is not entirely made of fear.Russia.Two weeks. Maybe three. Long enoug