Page 43 of Devil’s Gambit

He starts toward me, and my body goes into full panic. Heart hammering so hard I can feel it in my throat. Skin suddenly clammy with cold sweat. The room seems to tilt.

"Sal, please?—"

The elevator dings.

We both freeze. Sal spins toward the sound, body tensing but not reaching for his weapon.

"Fuck! They found us!" His voice cracks with paranoia. "They're here, they're?—"

Joey steps out, holding a bottle of Jameson like a peace offering. "Just me, boss. Got your whiskey."

"Jesus fucking Christ." Sal exhales hard. "Put it on the counter and get back to your post. Don't come in here again unless the building's on fucking fire, understand?"

"Yeah, boss."

Joey retreats. Sal turns back to me, but I'm already moving.

The wine bottle is in my hand before I think about it. Heavy, expensive crystal. It swings through the air with every ounce of rage I've suppressed for years.

The bottle connects with his eye socket with a wet crunch. Glass shatters. Wine explodes across everything—the white furniture, the pristine walls, my burgundy dress. Sal screams, stumbling backward, his hands going to his face where blood is already flowing between his fingers.

"Fucking cunt! You fucking bitch!"

He's disoriented, blind with pain and wine. I grab for his waist, fingers finding the gun and yanking it free from his holster. The metal is heavy, cold, and certain in my trembling hands.

"I'm leaving." My voice doesn't sound human. Too high, too desperate. "I'm walking out of here, Sal. Right now."

He laughs.

Actually laughs, blood running down his face, staining his teeth pink, making him look like something from a nightmare.

"No, you're not." He finds another wine glass and starts drinking like I'm not pointing his own gun at his head. "You know why, Bella?"

"Your men won't?—"

"HEY!" His voice carries through the penthouse, loud enough that Joey and Rico have to hear.

"If my bitch wife tries to leave, if you see her anywhere near that elevator—shoot her!

Kneecaps, shoulders, I don't give a fuck.

Just keep her pretty face intact. I want to see her eyes when you dump her body in my bed! "

My finger finds the trigger. The metal is cold, certain now. One pull. Just one pull, and the man who terrorized me for years becomes nothing but a memory.

But my hand won't stop shaking. The gun wavers, and I see myself after—riddled with bullets from his men, bleeding out on this white carpet while Sal's corpse grins at me with those pink-stained teeth.

I think about Marco crawling through flames. Hendrik standing between me and monsters. Both are dead because of me. Because of the choices I made.

I can't do it. Can't add another death to my conscience, even his.

The gun falls from my numb fingers and clatters across the floor.

"There she is." Sal retrieves it, ejecting the magazine with practiced ease. Empty. No bullets. "You think I'm stupid enough to carry a loaded gun with you here?"

He tosses the empty gun aside and presses a bar towel to his bleeding eye. On the TV, another building burns. Another piece of his empire becoming smoke. The reporter mentions confirmed casualties now—security guards who didn't evacuate in time.

"You can't hurt me here." My voice comes out steadier than I feel, building with each word.

"This hotel is full of people. Witnesses.

You touch me, and I'll scream. I'll scream so loud every guest on this floor will hear.

The hotel will call the cops. And then the FBI will know exactly where you're hiding.

Dante will know. They'll pull you out of this hole like the fucking coward you are. "

"Maybe you're right." He's still drinking. "Too sober to get properly pissed about you calling me a coward. Too tired to care what you think."

He collapses onto the white leather couch, looking older than his years. Looking like a man watching everything he built reduce to ash on live television.

"You want to know something funny?" He doesn't wait for an answer. "The empire's gone. Every fucking building, every territory, every connection. All of it, gone. You know what I have left?"

I stay silent, pressed against the door.

"You." His good eye finds mine, bloodshot and desperate. "Just you, Isabella. We're in this together now. Husband and wife. Like those first months, remember? Before you became so fucking cold. When you used to smile at me like I was more than a meal ticket."

His voice cracks slightly. The great Sal Calabrese, getting emotional over ancient history.

"I gave up everything for you. Every deal I made, every throat I cut, every empire I built—all so you could live like a queen. And what did I get? That frozen face. That rigid body, every time I touched you."

He drinks again, wine and blood running down his chin.

"But tomorrow? Tomorrow, we start over. I've got a man with a plane.

Private airfield outside the city. Panama.

New names, new lives, new everything." His smile is all teeth and promise.

"And there? No FBI. No Dante. No one to stop me from taking what's mine.

What's always been mine. You better get comfortable with that idea real fucking quick. "

The words hit like physical blows. Trapped. Not just tonight but forever. On some island where screaming in English won't bring help. Where Sal can finally become the complete monster he's always threatened to be, with no witnesses, no consequences.

I look at his phone on the counter, an ancient flip phone, probably without GPS.

But who would I even call? 911 is probably blocked on burners like his.

Dante? Even if I could call for help, I heard the receptionist say, ‘the Meridian,’ but this chain has locations all over the city.

I couldn't tell anyone which one. Just another hotel room in a city full of them.

Tears come now. Real ones that ruin the makeup Domenico's people applied, making me look like his "perfect victim." The makeup runs in dark streams down my cheeks.

I stumble to the kitchen on legs that feel disconnected from my body. There has to be a way out. Has to be. My hands find another wine bottle. The weight of it is familiar now. I could try again.

But I couldn't even pull the trigger. I’d held a gun to his head, finger on the trigger, every reason in the world to end him, and I couldn't do it.

My mind races through other possibilities—a shard of glass across his throat while he sleeps, quick and arterial.

Pillow over his face, holding it down until he stops struggling.

The kitchen knives, sharp and waiting in their wooden block.

But if I couldn't pull a trigger, how could I feel his life leave his body under my hands?

How could I watch the light leave his eyes?

And his men are right outside. Waiting. Ready.

I look out the windows. Forty-two floors down, the city spreads like a map of places I'll never see. Anonymous lights, anonymous lives. Dante is down there, burning the wrong buildings, hunting for me in all the wrong places.

The only way out might be through.

The thought tastes like surrender, but what choice do I have?

I uncork the wine with shaky hands and pour a glass that sloshes over the rim. The burgundy liquid could pass for blood in the crystal. I drain it in three swallows, the alcohol burning down my throat. Pour another. Drink that. Then pour another.

If I have to play his wife again, if I have to pretend, I need to be numb. Need to not feel his hands on me, his breath on my neck, his weight crushing everything good I've ever?—

I tip the bottle back, drinking straight from it. The wine runs down my chin, staining the burgundy dress darker. In the reflection of the window, I look like what I am—a woman drinking herself toward surrender. A woman preparing to play a role she thought she'd escaped.

Tomorrow, he wants to fly away. Disappear to an island where my screams won't matter.

Tonight, I need to survive. Need to find another way. Need to be smart.

I look at Sal, slumped on his expensive couch, watching his empire burn while blood dries on his face.

Then I pour another glass.

And prepare to become what I have to be.