2025-10-18 22:19:24
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Chapter Twenty-Nine: Crossfire at the Quay
“Down,” Enzo shouted.Matteo pulled Sofia beneath the dashboard as the second round shattered the mirror. Steam rose from the hood.“Crane,” Sofia said. “Top catwalk.”“I see it,” Matteo said.In back, the boy coughed, the woman prayed, the man wheezed.“Left, container row,” Enzo said.They slid between blue steel. Flags snapped. The crane loomed over the quay.“She is climbing for angle,” Matteo said.“Clip the angle,” Enzo replied.Matteo blew two catwalk bulbs. Glass fell. The visor glinted, steady. A round starred the window beside Sofia’s cheek.“Close,” she whispered.Matteo’s phone vibrated. Unknown number.He answered. “Speak.”A woman’s voice arrived, calm. “Good evening, Rossi.”“Name.”“Agata.”“Terms.”“Leave the patients,” she said. “Leave the woman. Drive away.”Sofia whispered, “Speaker.”Matteo tapped. Enzo said, “You work for Luca.”“I work for outcomes,” Agata said. “Luca is an outcome with legs.”“He bleeds,” Matteo said.“So do you,” she answered, and stitched a h
Chapter Twenty-Eight — The Sea Between Us
“Buy a ticket or step off my ramp.”The deckhand barely glanced up. Rain ticked his cap. The ferry rumbled like an animal in a cage.Luca held a boarding pass. “Paid in full.”Matteo looked through the truck window. “He is not riding with us.”Sofia kept her tone flat. “Then we end it here.”Enzo checked mirrors. “Three vans behind, two bikes. Clerics on the left. If we stall, they box us.”Luca came to the passenger door. “Let the sick ride. Let the brothers talk.”Sofia cracked the window. “Talk then.”“You cannot outrun a tide,” Luca said. “It waits at the next shore.”Matteo opened the door and stepped to the wet deck. “You followed the wrong tide.”“I followed blood,” Luca answered.The deckhand waved. “Truck, lane two. Passenger inspects.”Enzo rolled. Matteo walked beside. Luca paced like a familiar shadow.“Tell your priest to stop being brave,” Luca said. “Good men drown.”“Rinaldi bought minutes,” Matteo replied. “Sometimes minutes are the world.”“Sometimes minutes are debt
Chapter Twenty-Seven — The Fall of Eden
“Move aside, Eminence.”Luca’s voice came from the dark at the stairs. DeLaurentis froze.“Pick a side, Cardinal,” Matteo said.“I serve order,” DeLaurentis answered.Sofia squeezed Matteo’s wrist. “He is buying time.”Enzo shifted the wounded man. “Two with him.”Luca stepped into weak light. “Lower the gun, brother. Eden has had enough blood.”“You sell mercy like bait,” Matteo said.“Mercy is a discipline,” Luca replied.Rinaldi called from below. “Doors will not stay blind. Decide.”“Open the path,” Matteo told the Cardinal.“Leave the patients,” DeLaurentis said, “and walk out alive.”“They are not inventory,” Sofia said.“They are debts,” Luca said. “Debts feed the world.”“Between us,” Matteo said. “Not him.”DeLaurentis spread his hands. “This is between God and function.”The lights flickered. The rescued three huddled behind Enzo, barefoot and blinking.“You will not shoot first while someone watches,” Luca said.“Then stop watching,” Matteo answered.Luca fired. Plaster jum
Chapter Twenty-Six — Thorns of Eden
“On my left,” Enzo said. “Two, maybe three.”“Count four,” Matteo answered. “Short bursts, then move.”“You are surrounded,” Luca’s voice floated from the ceiling speakers. “Lay down your weapons and you will be treated with mercy.”Sofia tightened her grip on Matteo’s wrist. “Your mercy looks like a locked door.”“Mercy looks like a second chance,” Luca replied. “You brought none to Naples.”“Lights,” Matteo said.Enzo snapped a glow stick and threw it down the corridor. Boots rushed the decoy. Muzzles flared. Matteo and Enzo answered with clipped fire. Two silhouettes dropped. A third folded into a cart.“Right side,” Sofia warned. “Door moving.”Matteo fired through the glass. An alarm wailed, hungry.“Eden does not judge,” Luca said softly. “Eden only harvests.”“Wrong season,” Enzo muttered.They slid to the corner at a crouch. A red thread cut the hallway at ankle height.“Stop,” Sofia breathed. “Trip laser.”She angled a pocket mirror, found the projector, slid a scalpel under
Chapter Twenty-Five — Ashes of Eden
“Do not let me die in front of them.”Luca’s whisper reached Matteo through the sirens and the screaming. The square had fractured into panic. Candles lay crushed under rushing feet, wax smeared like pale blood across the stones. The cathedral bells kept ringing, cold and relentless.Matteo lowered the rifle and moved. Enzo’s voice barked in his ear, but the words were only noise. He slipped through the riot like a shadow, down a service stairwell, through a side door. The world tasted like copper and smoke.Inside the sacristy, the air smelled of incense and bleach. Two priests huddled behind a cabinet. One tried to stand. Matteo held up a hand and they froze. He crossed the nave as paramedics shouldered through the front doors. The cameras were still rolling. A city watched its new saint bleed.Sofia’s voice cut into his head again. “Matteo, answer me. Where are you?”“Inside,” he said. “Keep the car running.”“You shot him.”“Keep the car running.”He reached the altar as the param
Chapter Twenty-Four — The Devil’s Bargain
“Your hands are still shaking.”Sofia’s voice cut through the sound of rain hitting the safe house windows. Matteo sat hunched over the table, blood drying along his knuckles, the medallion from his father gleaming beside an untouched glass of whiskey.He didn’t look up. “It’s just the storm.”“It’s not the storm,” she said. “It’s the fire still burning in you.”Matteo gave a small, humorless smile. “Then maybe it’s keeping me alive.”Sofia crossed her arms, studying him. “No. It’s what’s killing you.”Matteo finally looked at her. His eyes were distant, colder than the rain outside. “You still think there’s something left to save.”“There is,” she whispered. “But you keep setting it on fire.”Before he could answer, Enzo stepped into the room, wet from the downpour. “You both need to see this.”He dropped a newspaper on the table. The headline screamed across the page:“LUCA ROSSI — THE SAVIOR OF NAPLES.”Matteo stared at it in silence. The photo showed Luca standing in front of a cr
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