Page 3 of Blood Debt

I glance at the coffin, then back to the sea of faces.

“I will burn them one name at a time. One city at a time. I don’t care how many masks they wear. I don’t care how far I have to go.”

Silence settles again.

“I will not stop.”

I step back, nod once to the officer near the aisle, and return to the front row. The tension in my neck finally breaks as I sit. My breath escapes like smoke through my lips.

Luca hasn't moved.

His eyes remain fixed on Isla’s coffin, lips parted like he’s caught in the moment before a scream.

Outside, the cemetery waits. Sunlight pierces the gaps between dark clouds.

They lower her into the earth as the anthem plays—slow, haunting, full of finality. I stand beside Luca, my limbs too stiff, my hands too cold, my chest empty. The priest scatters soil onto the wood.

My throat closes as the first shovel of dirt lands with a hollow thud.

She’s gone.

There’s no hiding from it now.

I don’t cry.

I just watch—numb and silent—as the grave swallows my best friend.

****

Conti Family Residence, Appia Antica

The rain starts again just as we pull into the long gravel drive. The kind that coats the world in silence instead of washing it clean.

The Conti home stands half-shadowed under cypress trees. It’s old stone, sun-warmed once, but now cold and quiet with grief. Every shutter is drawn, every light glows with low amber. Mourners trail inside slowly—some in pairs, others alone—coats damp, shoulders bowed. No one speaks above a whisper.

Inside, the rooms are dim and tightly packed. There’s a table near the fireplace with trays of finger foods no one touches. Cups of coffee and untouched wine rest like props in people’s hands. A photograph of Isla sits on the mantle—this one is candid. She's laughing, turned halfway from the camera, her hair caught in the wind.

It’s the only real thing in the room.

I stand near the corner, half-wrapped in the coat I still haven’t taken off, nodding occasionally as someone touches my shoulder, offers a hushed condolence, or whispers a memory of her like it might undo the last forty-eight hours.

They move on. I stay where I am.

That’s when I see him.

Tony Bellucci standing in the hallway near the back door. Not in uniform, but in a dark wool suit, his collar askew, tie loose like it was pulled halfway off in the car. He’s holding a half-empty glass of whiskey, untouched. He looks every bit his age—early sixties, his salt-and-pepper hair cut close to his scalp, a permanent weariness etched into the deep lines of his face. His build is lean, ex-military, the kind of man who never forgotdiscipline even after decades behind a desk. His dark blue eyes catch mine,

Tony, a senior intelligence officer, a man who clawed his way up the ranks through wars no one will ever write about. Isla and I reported to him directly.

“Serafina,” he says softly, stopping just in front of me.

I straighten. “Sir.”

He doesn’t correct me. His eyes are sunken, ringed with fatigue. He looks older than yesterday. A lot older.

“I shouldn’t have sent her,” he says, voice low, like he doesn’t want to wake the ghosts in the walls. “I should’ve known it wasn’t clean. The moment the Bureau redirected the ops channel to private handling—I should’ve pulled her.”

I hear him, but his voice blurs into the background. Because all I can see is Isla’s smile the day I begged her to take the assignment.