Tethered To The Knife's Edge

Tethered To The Knife's Edge
The waiting room was quiet—too quiet for how chaotic the previous night had been.

Serena’s boots clicked against the tiled floor as she crossed the space and slumped down beside Gabriele. The unexpected shift in the cushion made him jolt slightly.

“Hey. You okay?” she asked, her voice softer than usual.

Gabriele blinked rapidly, his grey eyes clearly lost in a spiral of thought. He cleared his throat and said, “I’m fine.”

Serena tilted her head, examining him. “You’re not. You're literally wearing the anxiety on your face like a mask.”

He said nothing, just dropped his head back against the wall.

Serena reached over and patted his shoulder gently. “Don’t worry. Adriano will be fine. The bastard’s too fucking stubborn to die. Especially not like this.”

That got a soft laugh out of him—tired and reluctant, but real.

“There,” Serena smiled faintly. “That’s better.”

Gabriele exhaled. “It’s not that I think he’s going to die.” He rubbed his face. “I’m thinking about what comes next. This… this is the start of something bad. Something big. An all-out war between us and La Rosa Nera. I can feel it.”

Serena’s smile faded. “I know,” she said quietly. “But we’ll be ready. When the time comes… we’ll be ready.”

He nodded, but the weight of what he’d just said hung in the air like smoke.

He leaned back in his seat again, stretching his long legs out. “Diamond seems to be the most distraught out of all of us.”

“Yeah,” Serena agreed. “She’s really taking it the hardest.”

“She must really love him,” she added a beat later.

Gabriele’s chest tightened.

Those words echoed in his head with an uncomfortable weight.

She must really love him.

He pushed the thought aside and muttered, “I’m just glad she’s here to donate her blood. And luckily for us, it was a match. God knows what would’ve happened if she hadn’t come with us. Adriano kept insisting she stay back in New York before we flew out for this mission…”

Serena snorted. “Yeah? If she hadn’t come, he wouldn’t have been shot.”

“You don’t know that,” Gabriele replied with a sideways glance.

Serena rolled her eyes. “Maybe not. But I wouldn’t rule it out.”

He didn’t respond, and silence stretched for a moment before Serena leaned closer. “Speaking of Diamond... I’ve got an update on that task you gave me.”

Gabriele frowned. “What task?”

Serena arched a brow, unimpressed. “Seriously? You asked me to look into her background. You practically yanked me by the arm when you asked.”

“Shit,” Gabriele said, rubbing his temples. “I forgot. There's been so much chaos lately… I’m barely keeping track of my own thoughts. Anyway, what did you find?”

Serena paused, eyes flicking left and right like she was still processing. “Well… she’s definitely interesting.”

“Interesting how?”

“I dug deep. Birth records, schools, all that stuff. There were gaps. Missing years. Strange inconsistencies. Some school records stopped abruptly, some government documents had redactions.”

“She’s a ghost?” he asked.

“No, not quite. I also found death certificates for her parents, checked for any priors or criminal offenses. But apart from the gaps, she’s clean. No arrests, no red flags.”

Before Gabriele could process it all, the doors to the operating room swung open. The doctor emerged, removing his gloves as everyone in the waiting room stood, like a synchronized wave of desperation and tension.

Gabriele and Alessandro reached him first.

“Doctor,” Alessandro started. “How is he?”

The doctor gave them a small, tired smile. “He made it through surgery. It was close, but he survived. He’s still unconscious, and we’ll be monitoring him closely with more tests… but he’s stable for now.”

A breath of relief rushed through the room like wind after a thunderstorm. The air lightened, just a little.

Gabriele turned to look around. “Wait… where’s Diamond?”

Alessandro gestured to the hallway. “She stepped out to take a call.”

—

Angela stood just beyond the corridor, one hand pressed to the cold hospital wall, the other holding her phone like it had fused with her fingers.

“Charles…” she whispered, her voice barely audible.

His laugh slithered through the speaker like a snake through tall grass.

“Angela, I wonder…” he began slowly, “does Adriano know the truth? Does he know that the woman he’s been fucking into madness is actually a fed? An informant. A liar. That while he bleeds for you, you’re busy bleeding him dry for intel. Does he know you’ve been reporting back to the Bureau? At least before you got sloppy.”

Her throat clenched. Her heart pounded so hard it echoed in her ears. She wanted to scream, to throw the phone against the nearest wall and watch it shatter, but the calmness in his voice—the cold, calculated smoothness—pinned her in place. It was the kind of voice that didn't need to yell to be terrifying. 

“Oh, don’t worry,” Charles cooed, “I’m not gonna tell him. But here’s what’s really delicious, my dear... You’re not just compromised. You’re cornered. And do you want to know why that’s dangerous?”

His voice dropped to a venomous whisper.

“Because desperate women make reckless choices. And reckless women die.”

Angela’s knees almost gave out.

“Ask Asher. If you can find his tongue. Or better yet… why not ask Chelsea? Oh, wait. You can’t. You’re still on the line, right? Did you hear her scream? I gave her a beautiful moment. She deserved it.”

The gunshots echoed again in her skull, replaying like a haunting drumbeat. Chelsea’s scream roared through her memory, even though it didn’t last more than a second. But that second would haunt her for a lifetime.

“You animal!” Angela choked out. “You’re a fucking monster! I hope you burn in hell!”

Charles laughed—genuine and full of something unhinged.

“Don’t hang up yet, honey. This is the good part.”

Angela stood frozen, her breaths sharp and uneven.

“You think you’re safe in that hospital?” he sneered. “Under the Grecos’ protection? You think their love can save you? It won’t. Because the moment they find out who you really are… they’ll kill you before I even get the chance.”

Angela couldn’t stop shaking. Her whole body trembled like she’d been dropped into ice water. Sweat beaded at her temple, and her breaths came out sharp, shallow, too fast to control. The sterile scent of hospital antiseptic mixed with the sour taste of dread in her mouth.

“And when that moment comes, Angela… I’ll be watching. Just like I was the night of the auction. Just like I am now.”

Her breath caught in her throat.

The air around her suddenly felt thick, like the hospital corridor had narrowed into a tunnel and she was standing at the mouth of it, like prey under a sniper scope.

She turned slowly, her eyes scanning the hallway.

People were walking past. Nurses in scrubs, a doctor with a clipboard, a janitor pushing a mop cart. Nothing out of the ordinary.

But everything felt wrong.

Her gaze darted from face to face.

There. A man leaned against the far wall, phone in hand, seemingly texting—but his eyes lifted the second she looked his way. Just a glance. Then back down.

Too fast. Too trained.

Her stomach tightened.

Behind her, a nurse pushing an IV stand exited a room. The sudden motion made her flinch.

She turned again, more frantic now.

A woman stood at the vending machine, pressing buttons with slow precision. But she wasn’t looking at the snacks—her reflection in the glass was angled toward Angela.

A loud ding from the elevator startled her. She whipped around.

Three more people stepped out—two men, one woman. Regular clothes, maybe visitors. One of the men had sunglasses on. At night.

Her mind spiraled.

“Is it the man by the wall? The woman at the vending machine? The janitor?”

Everyone felt like a threat.

Anyone could be one of them.

Her breath grew shallow.

The fluorescent lights buzzed above her head. The low hum of machines, beeping monitors, distant murmurs of medical staff—it all melted into a static roar.

She took a step back.

Then another.

She felt exposed. Naked in the middle of a battlefield without knowing where the bullets were coming from.

She pressed a hand to her chest, trying to steady her heart, but it was racing like it wanted to leap out of her body and run.

Her skin crawled. Every inch of it.

She glanced up toward the ceiling—toward the camera mounted in the corner.

A little red dot blinked.

“Is that hospital security?” she thought to herself, “Or Charles?”

“Is he watching me right now, through that very lens?”

She swallowed hard and turned back toward the hallway—but her legs moved without balance, and she stumbled against the wall.

Charles’s smooth, calm voice crackled through the phone speaker again. “Goodbye Angela. Say your last prayers.”

Then the call ended.

A harsh, sudden silence followed afterwards.

She stood there, paralyzed.

Her hand was still holding the phone, but she couldn’t feel her fingers anymore. Her whole body trembled violently. Her heartbeat was loud, uneven. Her ears rang.

Tunnel vision took over. Her legs moved without her knowing. She stumbled toward the window just to see sleek, black, polished cars pulling into the hospital’s side entrance.

She darted from the window but stopped in her tracks.

“Wait…” she whispered.

She slowly backed up to the window again. 

The men stepping out of the cars wore deep red suits, and sunglasses. 

Angela’s heart plunged.

“La Rosa Nera.”