Chapter 5
I should have felt nothing when I heard David’s name.
That was what I told myself.
He had stolen my savings.
Sold my grandmother’s ring.
Lied until truth felt like a foreign language.
Disappeared when rent was due and my hope was lowest.
A year should have been enough time to turn pain into indifference.
It wasn’t.
My body remembered him before my pride could stop it.
The way my stomach tightened.
The way my fingers went cold.
The way my mind whispered, What did he do now?
Dominic saw all of it.
Of course he did.
“You don’t have to come,” he said.
I laughed.
“I wasn’t invited.”
“I am inviting you not to.”
“That sounds like control in a nicer suit.”
Rosa made a sharp sound.
Leo watched from the stairs, dinosaur clutched to his chest.
Dominic’s jaw flexed.
“You are injured.”
“And apparently hunted, lied to, possibly kidnapped as a child, and tied to a man who may have sold me to your enemies. My shoulder is not the biggest problem.”
For one second, I thought he might smile.
He didn’t.
But something moved in his eyes.
Respect.
“You stay in the car.”
“No.”
“You stay behind me.”
“No.”
“Then what do you suggest?”
I held his gaze.
“I stand where I can hear the truth.”
Marco muttered something in Italian.
Dominic ignored him.
“Fine.”
Rosa stepped forward.
“Dominic.”
His face softened for her.
“She deserves answers.”
“She deserves to live.”
I looked at the old woman.
“So did the little girl you searched for.”
That ended the argument.
We drove through rain toward the industrial edge of the city.
Leo stayed with Rosa under protest.
He hugged me before we left.
Hard.
“If you are my aunt, come back.”
I crouched carefully.
“And if I’m not?”
He frowned.
“Come back anyway.”
“I will.”
I meant it.
The Bellandi warehouse sat near the river, surrounded by rusted fencing and broken pavement.
Dominic’s men moved like shadows.
Efficient.
Silent.
Terrifying.
I stayed near Dominic because I was not stupid.
The side door opened without a fight.
That worried me.
Inside smelled of oil, damp concrete, and old cigarette smoke.
Then I heard David.
“Please. Please, I told you everything.”
My knees nearly buckled.
Dominic’s hand brushed my lower back, steadying me without holding me.
We entered a lit room.
David was tied to a chair.
His face was bruised.
His expensive jacket was torn.
He looked older.
Smaller.
Still handsome in the weak, ruined way that once made me think I could save him.
Across from him stood a woman in a white coat.
Mid-forties.
Dark red hair.
Cold eyes.
She turned when we entered.
“Dominic.”
His voice went flat.
“Serena Bellandi.”
So this was the enemy.
Not loud.
Not monstrous.
Elegant.
A woman who could order death and still look bored.
Her eyes moved to me.
Then to my bandaged shoulder.
Then to the place beneath it where the tattoo hid.
“Valentina,” she said.
I hated that everyone knew that name before I did.
David’s head snapped toward me.
His eyes widened.
“Elena?”
I looked at him.
“Did you know?”
He started crying immediately.
That answered almost everything.
“I didn’t at first.”
The room tilted.
Dominic took one step forward.
I caught his sleeve.
“No.”
I needed to hear it.
David sobbed.
“I swear, I didn’t know when we met. You were just… you.”
“Poor?”
“Kind.”
I almost laughed.
He flinched.
“Then I found the ring.”
“My grandmother’s ring?”
“The one I sold.”
My throat tightened.
“What about it?”
“It had an inscription. Moretti. I took it to a fence. Word got back to Bellandi. They asked where I got it.”
Serena smiled.
“He was very helpful.”
I stared at David.
“You sold me.”
“I was in debt.”
“You sold me.”
“I didn’t think they’d hurt you.”
Dominic made a sound behind me.
A low, lethal inhale.
Serena looked amused.
“He was told to keep you close. To make sure you stayed poor, tired, alone. Easy to collect if needed.”
My whole past shifted.
Every lost job after David appeared at my workplace.
Every unpaid bill.
Every time he convinced me not to call social services about my sealed records.
Every time he said, “No one is looking for you, Elena.”
A hand closed around my heart.
Not love.
Grief.
For the woman I had been, manipulated in the dark by a man too weak to love anything more than his own survival.
I stepped closer to him.
David cried harder.
“I’m sorry.”
“No,” I said. “You’re afraid.”
His face crumpled.
I turned to Serena.
“Why not kill me years ago?”
Her smile faded.
“Because dead girls become legends. Broken women become nothing.”
Dominic’s voice sliced through the room.
“You should not have said that.”
Serena’s hand moved toward her coat.
Before anyone could fire, police lights exploded outside.
Sirens.
Shouts.
Serena smiled again.
“Oh, Dominic. Did you think you were the only one who could arrange an entrance?”
The warehouse doors burst open.
But the men entering were not police.
May you like
They wore police jackets.
And aimed straight at me.
