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“Still at the hospital. She doesn’t know.” Nico consults his tablet. “We have maybe an hour before she tries to contact Jenna and figures it out.”

“Then I need to get to her first.”

Enzo rises. “Which brings us back to that choice, Marco. If you keep her close, she’s a target. If you send her away, she’s unprotected. There’s no good option, but you need to choose one and follow it through until the end. Decide now.”

I nod, run straight out to the garage, and screech onto the road like my car’s on fire. Once I start, I don’t pause until I make it all the way to Ashford County Hospital.

When I arrive, I find her sitting in her car in the parking garage in the fading afternoon light, her face pale and drawn in a way that pains my chest. The concrete around us is stained with oil, and the fluorescent lights of the garage buzz overhead. As soon as I pull in, she glances up, and the relief in her eyes nearly destroys me.

“Marco? What are you doing here?”

“We need to talk.” I kill my engine, shove the door open, and cross over to her car. Before I can think better of it, I draw her out of her Honda and into my arms. She melts against me, her hands fisting my jacket lapel as she buries her face in my chest.

“I was just going to call you.” Her voice is muffled, but I catch the strain. “I need to tell you about a text I received.”

“Later.” I ease back enough to see her, tracing the shadows beneath her eyes with my gaze. “Jenna’s gone. Bruno took her.”

She jerks her head up, her face white as a sheet.

“What?” She pauses, and then a chuckle of disbelief rips from her throat. “No, I… Marco, I just saw her. She waved at me and walked out like half an hour ago at the end of her shift. She was right there. She was fine. She was…” She pauses, and her eyes widen. “How long ago?”

“I think he abducted her from her apartment. Enzo has people on it, but…” I stop, because there’s no gentle way to say this. No version of these words will leave her unscathed. “Bruno’s using her to get to you and me. This is proof that he can nab anyone.”

Lucia’s knees buckle under her, and I grab her waist to keep her upright. Violent shudders run through her body like a live current.

“This is my fault.” Her voice is barely a raspy whisper. “If I hadn’t gotten involved with you… If I’d stayed away and kept my distance⁠—”

“Hey.” I take her face in my hands. “This is Bruno’s doing. Not yours. The moment you start carrying his sins, he wins.”

Doubt, fear, and the first flickers of retreat surface in her eyes. She’s thinking of backing away. Her mind is trying to protect herself from what loving me costs, and I can’t let that happen. I can’t lose her to the very evil I’m trying to protect her from.

“I have an idea.”

My words leave me before the thought has fully formed, but I push through anyway.

“The engagement bought us time. But news is getting around that it might be a facade, and if the wrong people believe that, you lose the shield it was meant to give you. If we’re going to take down Bruno, I need the men serving the Benedettis to believe they’re doing this for the family. And nothing carries the weight a marriage does.”

I pull away to meet her eyes.

“In this world, in Benedetti law, a wife is protected with every mechanism the family has. We offer every alliance and would cash in every obligation owed. It’ll also cost Bruno far more to touch a wife than a girlfriend or a fiancée. And it will cost anyone who helps him even more.”

“That’s why you want to marry me?” Her voice is soft. “For mafia protection?”

“No.” I shake my head slowly. “I want to marry you because I love you and because the alternative is losing you. Both of those are reasons enough, without the strategy attached. But the strategy helps. And I’ll use every tool I have.”

My next words are unplanned, and they bubble up from a place in my heart unscarred by the violence I’ve drenched myself in for all these years.

“Be my wife. Not as an arrangement and not as a performance. For real, Lucia.”

Her breath hitches. “Marco, what⁠—”

“Nonna’s ring already sits on your finger.” I take her hand to trace my thumb across the ruby. “She gave it to you because she saw what I was too stubborn to admit. This stopped being fake a long time ago. So let me make it real. Marry me.”

I’m talking too fast now, desperate to bridge the developing rift.

“I know this isn’t how it’s supposed to happen. We’re in a parking garage, your friend’s missing, and the world has gone to shit. But I can’t lose you. Every second we’re apart feels like a knife in my chest. You’re the only good part of my life, and I’ll burn the world to ash to keep you safe.”

Her throat works around a knot. “I need time to process. Jenna’s gone, and you’re asking me to…” She shakes her head. “I can’t think straight. Everything’s spinning.”