"Do not open it."
I was already halfway through the estate when Elena answered.
"I'm not."
Another knock came through the phone.
Three slow taps.
"Where are you in the apartment?"
"Kitchen."
"Move to the bedroom. Lock both doors."
"Matteo—"
"Please."
The word stopped her.
I almost never said please.
"Okay."
I heard her moving.
I called Luca from a second phone.
"Elena's apartment. Now."
"We're twelve minutes away."
"I'm six."
"You are not going alone."
"I'm already driving."
He swore.
Chicago traffic became irrelevant.
I crossed intersections with every terrible possibility replaying inside my head.
The photograph.
The message.
The knock.
I had let her leave because she was right.
I couldn't imprison someone to protect them.
But freedom didn't mean abandoning her to danger.
"Talk to me," I said through the phone.
"I'm here."
"Is the door locked?"
"Yes."
Another sound.
Not knocking.
Scraping.
Someone was testing the front lock.
Elena whispered, "They're trying to get in."
I accelerated.
"Window?"
"Fourth floor."
"Fire escape?"
"Outside the bedroom."
"Use it."
"What if someone's waiting?"
I hated that she was right.
"Can you see?"
She pulled aside a curtain.
"I don't see anyone."
"Go."
I heard the window open.
Cold wind filled the call.
Then a crash.
Her front door.
"Elena!"
"I'm outside."
Metal stairs clanged beneath her feet.
I was two blocks away.
"Keep moving."
A man's voice shouted somewhere behind her.
She gasped.
"They saw me."
"Run."
I abandoned the car in the street.
People shouted as I sprinted toward the alley.
I rounded the corner.
Elena was descending the fire escape.
A man appeared at the window above her.
He reached inside his coat.
I drew first.
"Don't."
He froze.
Our eyes met.
I knew him.
Thomas DeLuca.
My second cousin.
Forty-three.
Quiet.
Reliable.
An accountant.
Someone nobody ever considered dangerous.
Which was exactly why Gabriel had written:
Don't trust the obvious enemy.
Thomas smiled.
"You were always dramatic, Matteo."
Elena reached the ground.
I moved between them.
"Stay behind me."
Thomas raised his hands.
"Relax."
"You broke into her apartment."
"I needed the photograph."
"What photograph?"
"The one someone sent her."
Elena whispered, "You sent it."
"No."
Thomas descended one step.
"I came because someone told me she had evidence connecting me to Halston."
"Do we?"
I asked.
His smile disappeared.
There it was.
Fear.
"You've been very difficult to kill," Thomas said.
Elena's fingers tightened around my coat.
I kept my gun trained on him.
"You were part of it six years ago."
"I handled accounts."
"For Adrian?"
"For whoever paid."
Cold.
Simple.
Nothing personal.
Sometimes evil looked like rage.
Sometimes it looked like bookkeeping.
"Did you plant the bomb?"
"No."
"Who did?"
"Adrian arranged it."
"Did Halston order it?"
Thomas hesitated.
"Yes."
"Who poisoned Elena?"
"Not me."
"Peter?"
"He saw too much."
"Who killed him?"
"I did."
Elena inhaled sharply.
Thomas continued downward.
"Peter tried to warn Vincenzo. That created problems."
"Stop moving."
He stopped.
"You know what's funny?" he said. "Gabriel nearly discovered me because of a seventy-dollar accounting discrepancy."
I remembered my brother obsessing over details.
"He was always annoyingly thorough."
Thomas smiled.
Then Elena spoke.
"So why are you here?"
He looked at her.
"Because Adrian was careless."
"No. Why come personally?"
His expression shifted.
Elena had seen something I hadn't.
She continued.
"If you thought I had evidence, you could have sent someone. But you came yourself."
Thomas remained silent.
"You're leaving Chicago," she said.
His eyes narrowed.
She was right.
This was cleanup before escape.
Sirens sounded nearby.
Luca.
Thomas glanced toward the alley entrance.
Then suddenly reached behind his back.
I fired.
The shot struck his leg.
He collapsed on the stairs.
His weapon clattered onto metal.
Seconds later Luca's men flooded the alley.
It was over.
Actually over.
Thomas survived.
And under federal pressure, he talked.
A lot.
Within forty-eight hours, prosecutors had enough information to arrest another eleven people tied to Halston's network.
The conspiracy that killed Gabriel and Sofia was finally dismantled.
Yet something else remained unresolved.
Me.
And Elena.
She stayed at a federal safe location while giving statements.
I didn't see her for three days.
Three days shouldn't have mattered.
They did.
The estate became too quiet again.
I slept badly.
Not because I feared danger.
Because I missed the sound of her breathing.
On the fourth morning, Rachel Monroe called.
"Elena is cleared to return home."
"Good."
"That's all?"
"What do you want me to say?"
"I don't know. Maybe behave like a normal human being."
"I'm hanging up."
"She refused witness relocation."
That stopped me.
"Why?"
"Ask her."
The call ended.
Elena returned to her apartment that afternoon.
I stood outside the building for nearly ten minutes before going in.
Matteo DeLuca.
A man who had faced armed crews, prosecutors, rival families, and assassination attempts.
Terrified of knocking on a housekeeper's door.
Eventually I did.
Elena opened it.
She wore jeans and a blue sweater.
Her hair was loose.
She looked beautiful.
Not dramatically.
Not like Sofia.
Like Elena.
That distinction mattered.
"Hi," she said.
"Hi."
We stood awkwardly.
"Are you going to come in?"
"Do you want me to?"
A small smile.
"Yes."
I entered.
Her apartment was tiny.
Books stacked near the couch.
A chipped coffee mug beside the sink.
A photograph of her mother on the shelf.
Real.
Warm.
Nothing like my estate.
"I heard about Thomas," she said.
"He's cooperating."
"So it's finished?"
"As much as these things finish."
She nodded.
Silence again.
I hated it.
So I did something I had avoided most of my life.
I spoke without knowing exactly what came next.
"You were right."
Elena stared.
"Can I record this?"
"Don't ruin it."
She smiled.
I continued.
"I was afraid."
Her smile faded.
"I thought if I kept you close enough, controlled enough, protected enough, nothing could happen."
"Matteo—"
"I did the same thing with Sofia."
She went still.
"I called it protection. Sometimes it was. Sometimes it was control."
I looked toward the floor.
"The night she died, she wanted me to leave Chicago with her."
"You couldn't have known."
"No."
I lifted my eyes.
"But I've spent six years pretending guilt was loyalty."
Elena said nothing.
"I loved Sofia."
"I know."
"I will always love her."
"You should."
That answer almost broke me.
Most people would have wanted me to bury the past for them.
Elena didn't.
"But you're not Sofia," I said.
"No."
"And what I feel when I'm with you isn't the same thing."
A trace of hurt appeared.
"That's probably good," I added.
She waited.
"Sofia was part of who I was then."
I moved closer.
"You are part of who I'm trying to become now."
Her eyes filled.
I had practiced no speech.
Maybe that's why the words sounded true.
"When I found you in my bed, I thought you were a threat."
Elena laughed through tears.
"Very romantic."
"I'm new at this."
"Clearly."
"I hadn't slept beside anyone in six years."
"I remember."
"I slept five hours."
"Five and a half."
I stared.
"You checked?"
"You snore."
"I do not."
"You absolutely do."
For the first time in days, I laughed.
Then the room became quiet again.
"Elena."
"Yes?"
"I don't want you to return to work."
Her eyebrows rose.
"That's not going well."
"Wait."
"I'm listening."
"I don't want you working for me because what I want from you makes that unfair."
Understanding spread across her face.
"What do you want?"
"You."
One word.
No strategy.
No negotiation.
Just truth.
"I don't know how to do this normally," I admitted. "But I'd like to learn."
She stepped closer.
"Are you asking me on a date?"
"I've negotiated international contracts with less difficulty."
"That wasn't an answer."
"Yes."
"Where?"
"Anywhere you choose."
"No private restaurant?"
"No."
"No security team sitting six feet away?"
"They'll sit twenty feet away."
She laughed.
"Ten."
"Fifteen."
"Deal."
She reached for my hand.
No fear.
No hesitation.
And when our fingers intertwined, something inside me finally loosened.
Six years earlier, death had convinced me love was something that could only be lost.
Elena was teaching me another possibility.
Love could also be chosen again.