Page 208 of Merciless Daddy

“I have it.”

“Pietro. Double the ranch perimeter. Nobody enters or leaves without your approval. I want the driver questioned, but alive.”

Pietro’s eyes went dark.

“Understood.”

Yelena sat beside me on the edge of the bed, firebird notebook clutched to her chest.

The island was still beautiful outside. Sea. Sun beginning to rise. White curtains lifting in the breeze.

But the war had found us again.

Chapter 16

Yelena

Idid not want to be coming back to Chicago. The Bahamas still lived in my memory—it didn’t seem real that this morning I could have been there—in paradise—and now I was crashing back down to Earth.

Steel. Black water. Hard winter light caught on the river and made it look sharp enough to cut a hand.

Sal sat beside me in the dark cabin, one hand around mine. He had not tried to fill the silence. He knew better. The firebird notebook rested on my lap. I had written nothing in it during the flight.

I had stared at the first page instead.

I want a home with you.

The words looked reckless now. Like something a child who didn’t understand the world would say.

The city waited below with lawyers and armed men and my father’s statement calling me too damaged to own my own name.

Sal squeezed my hand once.

“We can turn around,” he said. “Just you and I? Get away from here. Leave it all behind.”

I looked at him. “And go where?”

“Anywhere. Nowhere.”

“That is a beautiful answer. It is also not an answer.”

“No. You’re right,” he said. “It isn’t.”

The Caruso townhouse stood on a quiet street behind a black iron gate and a row of bare trees. It looked like old money from the sidewalk. Brick. Tall windows. A dark green door with polished brass hardware.

It looked less romantic once the gate shut behind us.

Cameras tracked the driveway. Men in dark coats stood at the corners without pretending to be gardeners. The front hall had marble floors, antique mirrors, and a discreet metal detector built into the archway.

A prison could have expensive furniture.

I stopped just inside.

Sal watched me.

“Not the most comfortable place,” he said.

“No, but I understand why it exists. Why we have to be here.”