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The padrino sighs. “Tell me everything.”

I narrate the text and show it to Enzo, who studies it before addressing Marco. “I assume you have a plan?”

Marco sets his phone on the desk between them. “I’m going to call him. I need you all to hear what he says. And if we can keep him talking long enough, I want a trace on the line.”

Nico crosses over to a laptop on the side table, where he connects a tracking device to a phone system I don’t fully understand. My medical training has prepared me for many things, but not for hanging out in a crime lord’s study while the man I love prepares to bargain for my friend’s life.

Before he places the call, Marco glances at me, quick and certain, and I realize he’s asking if I’m ready. I’m not, and I never will be. But I nod anyway because Jenna has no one else and running away from this moment would mean losing a part of myself I’m not willing to give up.

He dials and puts the call on speaker. Blood rushes in my ears. Four rings. Five. Then a voice I’ve only heard in nightmares rumbles through the line, smooth and cold and familiar in the worst possible way.

“Marco.” As soon as Bruno’s voice booms across the study, every man in the room goes still. “I wondered when you would call.”

“Then let’s not waste each other’s time.” Marco’s tone remains level and controlled, but his jaw muscle jumps with every word. “I want the nurse. Tell me what you want.”

Bruno’s soft laugh raises the hair on my arms and churns my stomach. “You want the girl back? Bring me the doctor and her brother’s notes about me. Come alone to the address I text you, or I will start sending Nurse Jenna back in pieces. You have until midnight tomorrow.”

“You said forty-eight hours.”

He scoffs. “That was for her. She told you about it, though, so I’m moving up the deadline.”

My heart crashes, and I suck in a breath. Marco shakes his head, signaling for me to keep calm, but his hand curls into a fist on the desk.

The timbre of his voice doesn’t change. “And the address?”

Bruno offers a dramatic and mocking reply. “You’ll have it an hour before the exchange.”

“Wait.” The command spills out of my mouth. Marco’s head whips toward me with sharp, questioning eyes, but I’m already bending toward the phone. “I want to speak to Jenna. I need to know she’s alive.”

After a slight pause, Bruno speaks again, his tone softer, almost amused. “The doctor has a spine. I didn’t expect that. Very well. You have two minutes.”

I hear shuffling on the other end, then a muffled voice, and finally, Jenna. I have to press my hand over my mouth to stifle a sob.

“Lucia? Lucia, is that you?”

“It’s me, Jenna. I’m here.” I grip the edge of the desk because my legs are threatening to give out. “Have they hurt you?”

“I don’t know where I am. It’s cold and dark, and I can’t see anything.” She starts crying. “Please, Lucia, please get me out of here. I’m so scared!”

“I will. I promise you, Jenna. I promise.” The reassurance feels useless and paper-thin against her obvious terror, but I need to say it. I want her to know someone’s fighting for her. “Can you tell me anything about where you are? Sounds, smells, anything?”

“I can hear water nearby.” She’s weeping now, everything pouring out in a rush. “Like a river. It smells like mold and old wood. And there are train horns in the distance too.”

I hear sharp laughter in the background. This is all suspicious, Bruno allowing her to give us clues uninhibited could mean the bastard’s taunting us. It feels like he’s laying breadcrumbs to draw us exactly where he wants us to go.

“Please hurry. He said he would hurt me if you didn’t do what he says. He showed me a knife, Lucia. A big one.”

My vision blurs with tears, but I blink them back because crying won’t help Jenna or Marco. Tears won’t bring me any closer to finding my friend. “I’m going to fix this. But I need you to stay strong for a little longer. Can you do that for me?”

“I will try, but please, please come soon.”

“Time’s up.” Bruno’s tone slams shut like a door, and I hear Jenna’s muffled groans as she’s pulled away from the phone. Her voice fades into a desperate wail that cuts through me like broken glass. “You have your confirmation, Doctor. Now deliver what I asked for, or the next time you hear her voice, she’ll be screaming.”

The line goes dead.

I stay on my feet by sheer will, pressing my hands flat against the desk to keep myself upright. Marco’s beside me in an instant, his warm, steady palm resting on my lower back. I want to collapse into him. I want to scream and sob and beat my fists against his chest until the fear drains out of me. But Jenna’s counting on me. I can’t afford the luxury of falling apart.

Nico glances up from the laptop screen. “The call was too short. I got a general area, though. They’re near the old Industrial District by the river. Pinpointed the location to within a radius of about three miles. No exact address. The train tracks and the water narrow it down, but we’re still looking at dozens of potential buildings.”