Chapter 9 - THE LAST DEBT
Elio tried to leave the hospital.
Janevra stopped him.
“You have stitches.”
“My father has Victoriao.”
“You were shot yesterday.”
“I’ve had worse.”
“Why do men in your family say that as though it’s reassuring?”
He swung his legs toward the floor.
Janevra pushed him back.
Elio stared at her.
Nobody pushed Elio Vieira.
Janevra did it twice.
“You are staying.”
“He’s your father.”
“Which is exactly why I’m going.”
“No.”
“Elio.”
“No.”
The word carried the old authority.
Janevra became still.
Elio saw his mistake immediately.
He closed his eyes.
“Please.”
Better.
Janevra sat beside him.
“My father spent my entire life making decisions for me. I’m not going to let him die because everyone still believes I’m incapable of saving myself.”
“This isn’t about capability.”
“Then what?”
His answer was immediate.
“I can’t lose you.”
Silence.
Elio looked at her.
The truth had finally escaped.
Janevra’s heart pounded.
“Then don’t.”
She kissed his forehead.
“Trust me.”
The words hurt him more than any bullet.
Because trust meant surrendering control.
Finally, Elio nodded.
Bruno accompanied Janevra.
So did Daario.
Carlo had taken Victoriao to an old Vieira shipping terminal scheduled for demolition.
Police could not move yet without risking Victoriao’s life.
But federal agents were waiting nearby because of Janevra’s evidence.
For once, the law and the Vieira family wanted the same man.
Janevra entered the terminal wearing a recording device.
Carlo stood beside the river-facing windows.
Victoriao knelt nearby.
Bruised.
Alive.
“You came.”
Carlo smiled.
“Of course.”
Janevra stopped twenty feet away.
“You wanted me.”
“I wanted the drive.”
“The files are already with investigators.”
Carlo’s smile disappeared.
“You foolish girl.”
“Sheltered girl,” Janevra corrected.
“What?”
“That’s what Elio called me.”
She smiled faintly.
“Apparently powerful men underestimate women when they’re busy talking about them.”
Victoriao looked at his daughter.
For the first time, pride appeared in his battered face.
Carlo raised his gun.
“You’ve destroyed decades of work.”
“No. My mother did.”
That landed.
Janevra continued.
“She beat you six years ago. You just didn’t know it.”
“I killed your mother.”
“You killed a woman after she had already made copies of everything.”
Carlo’s jaw tightened.
“She died terrified.”
Janevra refused to give him the reaction he wanted.
“No.”
“You weren’t there.”
“Neither were you.”
Carlo’s eyes narrowed.
“Daario told me.”
Something flickered.
Janevra saw it.
Carlo did not know Daario had changed sides.
Good.
“She knew what would happen,” Janevra continued. “And she kept going anyway. That isn’t terror. That’s courage.”
Carlo aimed the gun at Victoriao.
“Enough.”
Janevra’s heart slammed.
“Let him go.”
“Why?”
“Because this is between us.”
Carlo laughed.
“You sound like Elio.”
“No.”
Janevra looked directly at him.
“Elio would threaten you.”
“And you?”
“I brought witnesses.”
Carlo froze.
Doors opened around the warehouse.
Federal agents entered from one side.
Bruno’s men from another.
Carlo grabbed Victoriao and pressed the gun against his head.
“Nobody moves!”
Everyone stopped.
Janevra’s pulse thundered.
Carlo backed toward the river exit.
“You think you won?”
“No.”
Janevra kept him talking.
“I think you lost years ago.”
“Shut up.”
“You lost when Elio became a better man than you.”
Carlo’s face twisted.
“You lost when Daario realized you never loved him.”
“Shut up!”
“And you lost when my mother trusted that someday someone would finish what she started.”
Carlo’s finger tightened on the trigger.
Then a voice came from behind him.
“She was right.”
Daario.
Carlo turned.
That fraction of a second was enough.
Victoriao drove his elbow backward.
The gun fired into the ceiling.
Bruno moved.
Agents rushed forward.
Daario tackled Carlo.
Father and son crashed against the floor.
Carlo reached for the weapon.
Daario kicked it away.
Elio’s father looked up at the son he had hidden all his life.
“You ungrateful bastard.”
Daario stared at him.
Then laughed bitterly.
“Still waiting for you to call me son.”
Agents handcuffed Carlo.
It was over.
Almost.
Janevra ran to her father.
Victoriao held her.
For the first time since childhood, she let him.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered.
She closed her eyes.
“For which part?”
“All of it.”
Janevra pulled back.
“I don’t forgive you yet.”
“I know.”
“But you can spend whatever time you have left trying to earn it.”
Victoriao nodded.
It was not reconciliation.
But it was a beginning.
Janevra returned to the hospital before dawn.
Elio was furious.
“You went inside?”
“Yes.”
“You said Bruno would handle—”
“I said Bruno was coming.”
“That is not the same thing.”
“Technically—”
“Janevra.”
She smiled.
He stopped.
“What?”
“You’re yelling.”
“I am not yelling.”
“You’re emotionally raising your voice.”
“That isn’t a thing.”
“It is now.”
Elio stared at her.
Then he pulled her carefully against him.
Janevra froze.
His arms tightened.
“I thought I lost you.”
“You didn’t.”
His face pressed against her hair.
For several seconds, neither spoke.
Then Elio whispered the words he had been unable to say.
“I love you.”
Janevra closed her eyes.
Three months earlier, he had said she meant nothing.
Now his voice shook because she meant too much.
She pulled back enough to look at him.
“You have terrible timing.”
His expression fell.
Then she smiled.
“I love you too.”
Relief transformed his face.
He kissed her.
Softly.
Slowly.
When they separated, Janevra touched his cheek.
“So what happens now?”
Elio looked toward the sunrise beyond the hospital window.
“Now?”
His hand covered hers.
“We decide together.”
For the first time in her life, that word did not frighten Janevra.
Together.
But six months later, another question would change everything.
May you like
And this time, it would not begin with a bullet.
It would begin with two pink lines.
