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She cares about me, which means she’s become attached to me. She’s too involved.
I resent myself for letting it happen and I’m going to stop it now. That’s why I left her. That’s why I’m staying away from her. It’s for her own sake. I’m not the man for her. I’m never going to be. She’s an FBI agent. I’m a trained killer. I’ll only mess up her life, put her in danger.
“I can’t stay with her,” I tell Orso.
Grae is probably going to kill me when he finds out I just vanished from Allie’s life. Then again, he’s going to kill me anyway if I stay with Allie and ruin her life.
That’s fine. I can live with a target on my back.
“Why not?” Orso asks me.
“I just can’t,” I answer.
I can’t care about her. I can’t change who I am or who she is. And I refuse to toy with her feelings or get her hopes up.
“So you’re running away?” Orso says.
I frown. “I’m not running away. I have something more important to do.”
“You already have a job. I thought you…” He stops to make a wheezing sound. “I thought you always finish the job.”
“I was never supposed to be with her,” I tell him. “She was never supposed to be my job.”
“But she is now,” Orso points out. “You have to finish it.”
“I’m not going to kill Alyssa Chandler,” I tell him again.
Why the hell is he so insistent?
Orso reaches for my hand. “Cain, don’t leave her side.”
What? Hasn’t he been listening?
“I have to.”
He shakes his head. “Don’t be a coward.”
Now he’s calling me a coward? Unbelievable.
“Don’t…”
He grips my hand as he wheezes again. Then he lets it go to clutch his chest as he gasps for air. The monitor beeps frantically as the numbers on the screen flash.
What the hell?
“What happened?” Andrea asks as he rushes back into the room.
At the same time, a man wearing glasses and a white blazer comes running out of the adjoining room.
“Move!” he shouts.
He looks at Orso’s monitor and the worry on his face turns to alarm. He looks at the nurse who followed him.
“Get me the crash cart! Hurry!”
The nurse grabs the cart from the corner of the room. I’m about to help her but the man holds his arm up.
“Get out,” he tells me and Andrea. “Both of you.”
“I’m not going anywhere,” Andrea says.
I leave. There’s nothing I can do for Orso anyway. Best leave it to the doctor to take care of him.
I stay outside the room, though. I can’t walk away without knowing Orso’s condition. Other people start to show up, too, crowding the hallway. They must have heard the commotion and now they’re fearing the worst. I can see the fear clearly on their faces.
The seconds pass. I hear the monitor stop beeping.
Is Orso dead?
Then I hear just one beep. I pick up a steady rhythm.
He’s alive.
Andrea comes out of the room.
“At ease, everyone,” he says with a smile. “Papa Bear is fine.”
I hear gasps of relief.
I, too, feel it in my chest, but I can tell from Andrea’s forced smile that the worst isn’t over.
I talk to him after the others have gone.
“How is he?” I ask him.
Andrea lets out a breath. “Molto malato. He had a cardiac arrest. The doctor said his heart may not be getting enough oxygen.”
That definitely doesn’t sound good.
“They will watch him closely, and if it happens again, they may perform surgery on his heart,” Andrea adds. “Not that it will save him, but it may buy him some more time.”
And Orso wants all the time he can get. He’s no quitter, though at this point, I’m wondering if he’s being more foolish than strong. Or maybe he’s just scared. Everyone is scared to die.
Except me, because I live my life with no regrets. Nothing unfinished. Which is why I have to kill the Ghost and Sergio Bianchi.
“Do you remember that night when Antonio died?” I ask Andrea.
“Which part?”
“The part after…” I swallow. “The part where you found me half dead and saved me. You said you didn’t find anyone else?”
“No.”
At the time, I thought he meant he didn’t find anyone else alive, but maybe he didn’t find any other bodies, which means Antonio’s killer got away. Somehow, just like me, he came back from the dead that night.
Ghost.
“I saw him,” I tell Andrea. “The man who killed Antonio.”
Andrea’s eyes grow wide. “You’re saying he’s alive? I thought you killed him.”
“I thought I did, too, but you didn’t see his corpse, did you?”
Andrea shakes his head. Just as I thought.
“I’m going to hunt him down and finish the job,” I tell Andrea.
To him, I’m just relaying a piece of information. To myself, I’m making a promise.
I’m not going to let my perfect record get tarnished.
“Okay.” Andrea nods. “But what about Alyssa Chandler?”
