Chapter 6 - The Promise
Max’s surgery lasted seven hours.
Cassie sat in the waiting room with her hands locked together.
Luca sat across from her.
They had not discussed LM-17.
Not yet.
Whatever existed between them had been suspended beneath fluorescent hospital lights.
At 4:16 a.m., the surgeon appeared.
“The kidney is functioning.”
Cassie broke.
Marge caught her first.
Luca turned away, giving her privacy.
Cassie saw him through her tears.
“Luca.”
He looked back.
She crossed the room and hugged him.
This time there was no hesitation.
“He’s okay.”
“I know.”
“He’s really okay.”
Luca closed his eyes.
“Yes.”
Later, while Max slept, Cassie learned the donor had been a forty-two-year-old man killed in a construction accident.
The message had not come from the donor.
It had been attached to a compatibility registry created years earlier.
Miguel had enrolled Max in a private matching program when Max was a toddler.
Cassie stared at the date.
Her father had known.
“He knew Max would get sick.”
A genetic specialist confirmed it.
Max’s kidney disease was hereditary.
Miguel had carried the same mutation.
He had arranged long-term screening and donor matching before his death.
Cassie sat beside Max and cried for the father she had spent years resenting.
The drunk.
The gambler.
The irresponsible man who had left them debts.
Except pieces of that story were falling apart.
Luca stood at the doorway.
“My father knew about the program,” he said.
Cassie looked up.
“How?”
“Vittorio funded it.”
Her expression hardened again.
“Using LM-17?”
“Maybe.”
That afternoon, Luca brought documents from his family archives.
LM did not stand for Luca Moretti.
It stood for LifeMatch.
Program 17.
The signature beneath the transactions was Luca’s because Vittorio had placed several charitable trusts in his son's name.
The eight million dollars had funded medical treatment.
Cassie exhaled shakily.
“So Niccolo told the truth.”
“Partly.”
“That's usually how good lies work.”
Luca looked at her with something close to pride.
Nico entered.
“We found Keane.”
The doctor had been arrested trying to cross into Canada.
Under questioning, Keane confessed to fraud.
But when detectives asked about the crashes, he demanded immunity.
What he eventually revealed changed everything.
Antonio Bellini had not betrayed Vittorio.
He had discovered the assassination plan and tried to warn him.
The route had already been compromised.
Antonio followed the cars.
He reached Miguel first.
Miguel was alive.
Barely.
Before dying, he gave Antonio the locker key and begged him to protect Cassie.
Antonio hid the key inside Max’s teddy bear.
Then he disappeared because the real traitor threatened Nico.
Luca stared at his oldest friend.
Nico sat down slowly.
“My father wasn't a traitor?”
“No,” Cassie whispered.
For a man who joked through gunfire, Nico suddenly looked eight years old.
Luca put a hand on his shoulder.
No words.
None were necessary.
Keane provided the final name.
Niccolo Moretti.
Cassie closed her eyes.
Luca did not react.
Not visibly.
“He ordered the crashes?”
“Keane says yes.”
“Why?”
“Vittorio planned to leave the criminal business.”
Niccolo would lose everything.
The money.
The power.
The organization.
So he removed his brother and framed Antonio.
But there was one problem.
Keane’s testimony alone was not enough.
Niccolo had protected himself for thirteen years.
The ledger connected him to financial crimes, not murder.
They needed a confession.
Cassie knew what that meant before Luca spoke.
“No.”
“Cassie—”
“You are not walking into his house hoping he confesses.”
“He'll talk to me.”
“And then kill you.”
“He won't.”
“You don't know that.”
Luca stepped closer.
“I know him.”
“So did your father.”
The words hit hard.
Cassie regretted them immediately.
“Luca—”
“No. You're right.”
He looked through the window at Max.
“My father thought blood meant loyalty.”
Cassie stood.
“Then don't repeat his mistake.”
“What do you suggest?”
She looked at the ledger.
Then at the burner phone Keane had surrendered.
A plan formed.
One Luca clearly disliked as she explained it.
“No.”
Cassie almost smiled.
“You say that to me a lot.”
“Because your ideas are insane.”
“My idea gets him talking.”
“My answer remains no.”
Cassie stepped closer.
“You told me I spent too long rescuing everybody.”
“Yes.”
“You've spent your whole life doing the same thing.”
“That is different.”
“Because you're a man with an expensive suit?”
“Because people shoot at me.”
“They've already shot at me.”
He had no response.
Cassie touched the scar near his shoulder from the bullet graze.
His eyes dropped to her fingers.
“You don't get to decide what risks I'm allowed to take,” she whispered.
“I know.”
“Then trust me.”
“That is exactly the problem.”
“What?”
“I do.”
The words hung between them.
Luca lowered his forehead to hers.
“I trust you enough to be terrified.”
Cassie’s breath caught.
He kissed her.
Slowly.
No possession.
No demand.
He gave her every opportunity to move away.
She didn't.
For the first time in years, being held by someone did not feel like losing control.
When they separated, Nico cleared his throat from the doorway.
“I hate to destroy whatever extremely tasteful moment this is.”
Luca glared at him.
“But Niccolo just called.”
Nico held up the phone.
“He has Rey.”
Cassie froze.
“And apparently Rey has something we need.”
May you like
“What?”
“A recording made the night your father died.”
