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STEFI

I wake up, disoriented and groggy, in a room with yellow walls.

My eyes roam around the space. Above my head is a glass chandelier that illuminates the space with soft golden light. Directly across me is a large window, but the white gauze curtains are closed, and I can’t see enough of the outside to know where I am.

I try to sit up, and a wave of pain washes over me, and a thin, urgent beeping fills the air. I look down and realize I’m in a hospital bed, surrounded by medical equipment. An IV is stuck in my right arm, and a large gauze bandage covers my midriff.

Bile fills my mouth. The last time I woke up in a hospital, I’d been strapped to the bed. I cried out, and a hard-faced doctor entered the room. “You tried to kill yourself,” he told me. “For your own safety, I’m placing you in a psychiatric hold.”

But am I in a hospital now? Bed aside, this doesn’t look like any medical facility I’ve been in. It’s too quiet, too peaceful. And it doesn’t smell like one.

What happened? I search my memory, trying to remember the chain of events that led me to this unknown place. Joao and I were in the van, watching four mercenaries walk into the Thai restaurant. I think I said something about Q, something about how shocked I was that they sold me out.

And then what? As hard as I try to retrace my steps, I draw a blank.

A tall man dressed in scrubs enters the room. “Oh good, you’re awake,” he says. “Don’t try to get up. You lost a lot of blood, and you’ve been sedated for the last two days. How are you feeling?”

I might not remember the chain of events that led me here, but I do remember what it feels like to be shot. “Like a bullet ripped through me.”

“You have that right,” he says. “You were extremely lucky. If you’d reached the emergency clinic ten minutes later, you’d be dead.”

I wriggle my toes experimentally, and the doctor notices. “No, you’re not paralyzed. Like I said, you were extremely lucky. I’ve already yelled at Joao, and now it’s your turn. The next time you’re going to do something dangerous, wear a vest. It won’t completely prevent you from dying, but it’ll increase the odds that you’ll stay alive.” He smiles at me to rob the sting from his words. “My name is Matteo Ferrini, by the way. I’m Antonio Moretti’s physician.”

“Moretti?” Ice drenches my spine, and I try to sit up again. “You’re saying I’m in?—”

“Venice,” Joao says from the door. His gaze locks onto me, and what he sees there must reassure him because he takes a deep, shuddering breath of relief. “You’re in my house in Venice.”

On some level, I’ve known ever since I woke up that I’m in Venice. Where else could I be? But my stomach still sinks. Joao knew how I felt about Moretti. How could he bring me here? I want to scream, but even my aborted attempt to get up has left me exhausted. “What happened?”

He comes up to my bed and brushes a strand of hair away from my face, his touch infinitely tender. “What’s the last thing you remember?”

“Q betrayed us. I saw the car with the four mercenaries, and then, nothing.”

“The kid on the skateboard had a gun in his backpack. He opened fire on us.”

“But he was just a ki—” I fall silent. I know better than most that in the hands of the right person, even children can be molded into deadly, lethal weapons.

He nods grimly. “One of Henrik’s. Looks like Pavel Dachev’s taken over the empire, and he’s lost no time putting the kids to work.” His expression promises murder. “Dachev made a mistake—he showed his hand too soon. He’s going to live just long enough to regret it.”

The doctor, Matteo Ferrini, is still in the room, pretending he’s not eavesdropping on our conversation. When he introduced himself, I didn’t put it together, but I remember now where I’ve heard his name before. He’s one of Joao’s neighbors, and like the rest of Joao’s friends, he probably hates me.

“When you got hit, I called Dante for help,” Joao continues. “They rushed over, and the kid got away. Chasing him wasn’t a priority—getting you to a hospital was.” He gives me a reassuring smile. “Don’t worry; your DNA isn’t in the system. Valentina was able to hack into the hospital’s network and erase all signs of your presence.”

And then, when I was stable enough to travel, they must have loaded me onto a private plane and flown me to Venice.

Venice, the city run by a man who funded Henrik Bach’s operation for the last five years. If a young child shot me, it’s because Antonio Moretti’s money paid for his training.

I feel like crying. Yes, I’m still alive, but at what cost? Everyone is ignoring Moretti’s complicity, especially Joao. Although I knew it was going to happen, it still feels like a gut punch.

Like me, Joao grew up in Bach’s academy. Is my safety so important that he can ignore the fact that Moretti’s millions have probably paid for the abduction of God knows how many children? It’s a question I want to throw at him, but there’s no point. I already know the answer.

Joao would do anything to keep me safe.

But today, his protectiveness doesn’t feel like a warm blanket around my shoulders. It feels suffocating, like the padded walls of the psychiatric facility I was held in.

I avoid looking at my husband. “When can I get up?”

The doctor answers. “I like my patients up and moving as quickly as possible,” he says. “But you’ll have to take it very easy. For the next week, only three or four ten-minute stretches a day. After that, we’ll discuss a rehab program.” He gives me a stern look. “The bullet might have missed your major organs, but there was still a lot of tissue damage, and you lost a lot of blood. I’m familiar with your history and the way you were brought up, and it sounds like the doctors who worked on you in the past would have certified that you had recovered after only a week or two. But that’s not how I work. This injury will take six weeks of recovery at a minimum.”

“I can’t?—”

Dr. Ferrini continues over my protest. “If it were up to me, I’d keep you in the hospital, but Joao insisted you recover in his house.” He turns to my husband. “Infection is a real risk for the next couple of weeks, so keep that cat of yours away from her until the wound heals. And no sex, Joao. Everything that counts as sexual activity is completely off the table until I authorize it. Are we clear?”

Joao stares at the doctor as if he’s grown a second head. “She almost died, Matteo,” he snaps. “Do you think I’m going to fall on her like an animal in heat? Her recovery comes first. Of course I can control myself.” A cat’s plaintive meow sounds from the other side of the door, and a brief smile flashes across his face. “Mimi might have a harder time adhering to your rules.”

“Make it happen,” Matteo says unsympathetically before turning back to me. “Whenever you feel up to it, the padrino would like to see you.”

“Not until she’s ready,” Joao says, his voice hard. “Stefi’s recovery comes first.”

“I’m ready now.” My words are a lie. As furious as I am, I can barely keep my eyes open. The pain is the only thing keeping me awake. “You might all tiptoe around him, but I refuse to walk around in awe of your precious padrino. I know what he did. I’m going to confront him with the evidence, and I don’t care if he kills me. The rest of you might be able to ignore what Antonio Moretti did, but I can’t. I won’t.”

“Stef. . .” Joao sounds strained and desperately worried. “Please don’t stress yourself. You need to stay calm to recover?—”

I cut off the rest of his sentence. “I don’t want to talk to you.” I don’t want to see the dark circles under Joao’s eyes, evidence he’s barely slept a wink ever since I got shot. I don’t want to see the corresponding sleeplessness in the doctor either, proof that he’s been working around the clock to save my life. Maybe it’s stupid and self-destructive of me, but I can’t pretend Antonio Moretti wasn’t funding Bach’s network. I can’t lie to myself to stay safe.

My heart feels like it’s going to explode. “Stef, please,” Joao begins, but before I swallow the lump in my throat and respond to him, one of my devices connected to me starts to beep.

The doctor jumps to attention immediately. “Continue this discussion later,” he snaps. “She needs to rest, and this argument isn’t good for her.” He takes a vial from a tray. “This is a sedative,” he says to me. “It’ll also help with the pain. May I add it to your IV?”

“Do what you have to do,” I respond bitterly. “But stop pretending I have a choice in the matter. The bed is softer, and the amenities are nicer, but I’m still a prisoner here.”

Joao looks stricken. His face is the last thing I see before exhaustion tugs me under.