Chapter 104

NARRATOR

The wind descending from the mountains was not wind—it was an icy knife slicing through skin. In the abandoned Russo estate—a stone ruin that smelled of dried manure and old gunpowder—Valentina waited, seated on a rusted iron chair, her legs crossed with cold elegance. The fitted black dress traced every curve, but it warmed nothing.

Across from her, Ivan Petrov drank vodka straight from a crystal bottle, his gray eyes gleaming like blades beneath the single hanging bulb that swayed whenever the wind struck the broken windows.

Damián stood to her left, leaning against the wall, smoking calmly. His pistol rested at his waist, visible, like a promise. Cigarette smoke mingled with the damp smell. It had been an oil warehouse in the fifties, later a clandestine slaughterhouse, and now the perfect stage to close deals that were never written on paper.

“The De Lucas are in the mountains,” Petrov said, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “Cornered like rats. Your information was precise. The mansion burned. Sebastián wounded. The priest praying while shooting. It was beautiful.”

Valentina smiled without warmth. The fire from the improvised fireplace licked at her ankles, but it warmed nothing.

“And you delivered,” she replied, her voice hoarse. “The warehouse, the mansion, the priest humiliated in the press… everything burns.”

Petrov lifted the bottle in a mocking toast.

“To the dead who no longer speak. To the living who soon won’t either.”

From the back of the room, two Russian guards dragged in Sofía. Her hands were bound behind her back with plastic ties, her silver hair disheveled, a dark bruise swelling her cheek and eye. Her heels scraped the floor with a sound almost like a lament.

Her eyes locked onto her daughter’s with a mixture of contempt and plea.

Valentina rose slowly.

“Mother.”

Sofía spat blood onto the floor. It landed near Valentina’s shoes, splattering the black leather.

“Figlia mia.” Is this what you wanted? To see me kneeling before a Russian? To see me dragged like a dog?”

Petrov stepped forward, pulled a Makarov from his belt, and pressed it to Sofía’s temple. The cold metal made her shudder, but she did not look away from her daughter.

“One should never trust the enemy,” Petrov said, smiling coldly at Valentina. “You know that better than anyone.”

Valentina felt the air thicken.

“Ivan…”

The shot was sharp, like a bone snapping.

Sofía collapsed without a scream. Blood spread across the stone floor, pooling wide. Her body lay on its back, eyes open toward the ceiling, mouth slightly parted.

Valentina did not move. The world shrank to the sound of her own breathing and the metallic smell of blood.

Petrov slowly turned the gun toward her.

“Now you. The deal is over. The De Lucas fall, but you’re a loose end. With your mother dead, no one will look for you. And with the information you gave me, I keep everything: routes, vineyards, contacts.”

The guards advanced. Their boots echoed like execution drums. Valentina stepped back, her heel slipping in her mother’s blood.

“Ivan, wait…”

“There is no waiting.” Petrov cocked the gun. “Only an end.”

Damián moved first.

Two shots. The first Russian dropped, his throat torn open. The second took a bullet to the knee and another to the back of the head before hitting the ground.

Damián positioned himself in front of Valentina, the smoking barrel aimed at Petrov’s chest.

“Lower the gun, Ivan. Or I’ll give you a third eye.”

Petrov smiled but stepped back, raising his hands.

“I always knew you were a dog with two masters, Damián. But I thought money had bought you.”

“Today I have only one,” Damián replied, and with a swift motion grabbed Valentina by the arm. “And it’s called survival.”

He dragged her toward the exit. Valentina stumbled over her mother’s body, her heel sinking into the pool of blood, but Damián did not let her fall. He shoved her into the back seat of the black Jeep waiting with the engine running.

The wind lashed their faces as the Jeep skidded over gravel. Valentina stared ahead, her hands trembling in her lap, Sofía’s blood still splattered on her shoes and dress. The smell of gunpowder clung to her skin.

“Why?” she finally asked, her voice broken.

Damián kept his eyes on the road.

“Because I still need you.”

Valentina closed her eyes. Her mother’s face burned into her retinas.

In the rearview mirror, the estate burned. Petrov had set fire to everything. Flames rose high, lighting the night.

“We’re prisoners of our own revenge,” Valentina whispered.

Damián accelerated, the Jeep jolting over potholes.

“No. We’re the only ones left alive.”

The vehicle vanished into the Sicilian night, leaving behind a corpse, a betrayal, and the echo of a gunshot that had just severed the last blood tie Valentina had left.

But the night was not over.

At 04:12, Damián’s satellite phone vibrated on the dashboard. He answered with one hand, the other on the wheel.

“Speak.”

The voice on the other end was hoarse, urgent.

“Petrov activated the cleanup protocol. Three teams are on the move. One toward the mountains, one toward Palermo, and the third… toward you.”

Damián hung up without replying. He looked at Valentina in the rearview mirror.

“They’re hunting us.”

Valentina straightened, the mask of ice returning to her face.

“Then we run.”

The Jeep sped east, toward hills where dawn had not yet arrived. Behind them, the fire of the estate reflected against the sky.

In the mountains, Mateo woke with a start. He had dreamed of blood.

He rose from the makeshift bed in the refuge, the crucifix in his pocket burning against his skin. Lucía slept beside him, the twins curled between them.

Something had changed. He felt it in the air. In the blood.

He moved to the window. The sky was beginning to pale in the east, a dark red that promised nothing good.

Sebastián appeared in the doorway, shoulder bandaged, face pale from blood loss.

“Can’t sleep?”

“I dreamed of blood,” Mateo replied without turning.

“It wasn’t a dream,” Sebastián said. “I just got a call. They found Sofía.”

Mateo turned sharply.

“Where?”

“Dead. In an abandoned Russo estate. Shot in the head.”

Silence filled the room like weight.

“Valentina,” Mateo whispered.

“No,” Sebastián replied. “The Russians did it. But she handed her over. Sold her just like she sold all of us.”

They looked at each other in silence. Two brothers bound by blood and broken by betrayal.

“This doesn’t end until one of us is dead,” Sebastián said. “Her or me.”

Mateo nodded slowly. He was no longer a priest. No longer a saint. He was only a man protecting his family.

“Then let’s finish it,” he said.

The sun rose red over the mountains. And with it, the promise of more blood.