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“Oh, God… Vinny.” Her words are muffled against my shirt. “Is he… please tell me he’s alive.”

“He is, baby.” I cup the back of her head. “He’s at the hospital.”

She nods against my chest. Once, twice, the motion jerky with leftover adrenaline.

Even though there’s nothing I want more than to give my wife time to calm down, we have to go. I need to know my son’s okay, and we need to get the fuck out of here.

“Can you walk?” I ask, but at the same time as the question leaves me, her knees buckle. I quickly scoop her up, carrying her bridal-style out of the house.

Outside, the shooting has stopped. My men move through the property with the efficiency of people who’ve done this before, securing weapons, checking rooms, dragging the dead into one place so someone else can deal with them later.

The buyer and one of his men lie near the rear porch, at least that’s who I’m assuming they are. Or were. They’re dressed in suits instead of the clothes of the other men. Stepping over them, I move toward my car that’s now parked right in front of the door, and Gio’s already running toward us.

“We need to go,” he urges.

I carefully get into the back seat without disturbing Kira more than I need to. Paolo’s already there, half lying across the seat while one of my men keeps both hands pressed against a blood-soaked dressing at his abdomen.

His eyes flutter open when I slam the car door shut, and Gio immediately takes off like a bat out of hell. “W-we did i-it,” he wheezes, his voice weak.

“We did,” I confirm.

Kira lifts her head, and her mouth opens, but no words come out. Her head slumps back against my shoulder, and she loses consciousness.

Fuck.

Fuck.

Fuck!

Kira comes around several minutes into the drive, confused and nauseous, but Paolo doesn’t move again before we reach the hospital.

The emergency department is chaos. Doctors, nurses, and the bustle of a place where bad things happen every day and nobody has time to be gentle about it.

Paolo’s immediately wheeled away so they can prep him for surgery. I’m not allowed to follow, which is for the best since I still have Kira in my arms. When they try to take her from me, I bare my teeth and tell them to show me where to go.

My wife is still pale and disoriented as I lay her down on the treatment bay the nurse tells me to use. She blinks slowly while a nurse cleans the wound.

“The cut’s superficial, but because you lost consciousness, we’ll want a CT to rule out any intracranial bleeding,” the nurse says.

“No,” Kira murmurs, shaking her head. “No, no, no. There’s nothing wrong with me. Nuh-uhh. No intracranial bleeding. No brain injury. I’m fine.”

I wish I knew what I could say to put her at ease. But honestly, after what her mom suffered through, I fully get that she keeps chanting ‘No, no, no’ over and over.

I stay with her until they take Kira for the CT, where I’m not allowed to follow, anyway. The second the doors close behind her, I spot Gio farther down the hall. He lifts a hand, waving me over.

A doctor in dark blue scrubs stands beside him, and one look at his expression has my stomach tightening.

“Paolo?” I demand before either of them can speak.

“Your son is still in surgery,” the doctor says. “He’s lost a significant amount of blood. We’re controlling the bleeding, but his antibody profile is making replacement difficult. We have compatible units for now, and the blood bank is searching for more, but if he continues losing blood, our supply could become a problem.”

Fuck.

I know exactly how much of a problem this could become. Why the hell didn’t I think of it sooner?

“How long do you have?” I ask, already knowing what I need to do.

“That depends on the bleeding and how much more he needs. Right now, he’s stable enough for us to keep working. But if you or any other relatives have previously been identified as compatible donors, that would—”