"No backup," I say. "The drive is slag. The full chain is gone."
Matteo steps closer. The tension in the room is suffocating. The air thickens with the unspoken betrayal of the family's strategy. "You destroyed the target. We spent six months tracking that data, Enzo. We walked into a wired trap to secure it. And you blew it to pieces."
"The data had her signature," I state. The words are heavy, immovable stones. "Rourke knew her name. He was uploading the files to the South Side. If the transfer completed, she became a target."
"She is a civilian," Matteo snaps, his eyes flashing with anger. "She is a cover story. A fake fiancée for the operation. You do not compromise the family's security for an asset."
My voice drops to a register Matteo has never heard from me. I step into his space, closing the distance between us. I am inches from my brother, challenging his authority for the first time in my life.
"She is not a cover story," I snarl. The rage spikes, hot and violent in my veins. "She is not an asset. She is my woman. She is mine. I will not allow a single piece of data to exist that puts her in danger. I will burn every ledger in this city. I will blow every operation to hell. She is untouchable, Matteo. Do you understand me? Untouchable."
Matteo stares at me. The anger in his expression slowly morphs into something else. Shock. Then, a quiet, profound realization. He searches my eyes, looking for the cold, calculating Fixer he has always relied on.
He doesn't find him.
Dante steps forward, a slow, grim smirk spreading across his face. Dante understands. Six months ago, Dante stood in the Costa compound covered in blood and demanded the same protection for Gemma. Dante knows what it looks like when a Costa man finally surrenders to the obsession.
"He's not gone, Boss," Dante says quietly. "The Fixer just found a variable he won't trade. Leave him be. He did what he had to do."
Matteo looks at Dante, then back to me. He holds the silence for five long seconds. The emergency strobe lights flash across his stoic features. Finally, Matteo nods slowly. He accepts the truth. The Costa family still has its most ruthless strategist—only now every contract he draws runs through one woman, and that makes him more dangerous, not less.
"The timer," Matteo says, his tone snapping back to the immediate threat. "We have sixty seconds before this entire floor drops into the river. Move."
We run.
We sprint through the maze of maintenance corridors. The concrete floor beneath our boots shudders. Deep, structural groans echo through the facility as the explosive charges begin their final sequence. Dust rains down from the ceiling in thick sheets. I do not look back. I do not regret a single destroyed file.
We hit the stairwell. Dante kicks the reinforced door open, and we take the concrete steps three at a time. The air grows colder, cleaner, as we ascend toward the street level.
My lungs burn. My muscles ache. But the only thing driving me is the desperate, consuming need to get back to the compound. I need to see her. I need to touch her. I need to prove to myself that she is real and safe.
We burst through the emergency exit doors and spill out into the rain-soaked alley behind the transit hub.
Ten seconds later, the ground drops out.
A massive, concussive shockwave slams into our backs. The sound is deafening, a localized earthquake tearing the foundation of the building apart. A massive plume of dust and smoke violently erupts into the Chicago night sky. The pavement beneath our boots ripples as the entire subterranean level of the transit hub collapses in on itself, burying Rourke, the destroyed laptop, and the last traces of the operation under thousands of tons of concrete.
The trap is neutralized. The data is gone.
Matteo's armored SUV is idling at the end of the alley. Turi's extraction team is waiting, weapons drawn, scanning the perimeter for any surviving Bellanti soldiers. There are none.
I slide into the back seat of the SUV. Dante climbs in beside me, wiping concrete dust from his tactical rig. Matteo takes thepassenger seat. The driver slams the gas pedal, and the armored vehicle tears out of the alley, tires screaming against the wet asphalt.
The drive back to the North Side compound is a blur of neon lights and relentless rain.
I lean my head against the reinforced glass of the window. My pulse throbs in my ears. The adrenaline crash is setting in, making my hands shake slightly. I clench my fists, forcing the tremors to stop. I am covered in dust and the stench of cordite. I look down at my hands. These hands used to draft contracts, calibrate ledgers, and build impenetrable financial walls.
Tonight, they shattered bone and destroyed the very walls I built.
I reach into my tactical vest and pull out my encrypted phone. I stare at the blank screen. No notifications. No alerts. The operation is officially burned to the ground. The fake engagement contract is null and void. There is no legal obligation keeping Natalia at the compound.
Panic, cold and sharp, spikes through me.
What if she leaves?
What if she realizes the danger and demands to go back to her sterile apartment? What if she strips my mother's ring from her finger and walks away from the chaos I dragged her into?
A low sound rises in my throat. I won't let her. I will lock the compound gates. I will stand in front of the door. I will offer her everything I own, every dollar to my name, every drop of blood in my body. She cannot leave. She is the only thing anchoring me to the earth.
