The authorities took over from there.
Dante kept his word.
No private revenge.
No disappearing suspect.
No whispered order delivered in some dark room.
Marco faced the consequences through the evidence he had left behind and the people who had watched him leave it.
Two days later, I returned to La Stella to collect my bag and the paycheck I had abandoned during the chaos.
The room felt different in daylight.
The same tables were there.
The same chandeliers.
The same polished glasses.
But people looked at me now.
The manager approached first.
“Ellie.”
His face reddened.
“I owe you an apology.”
“For the water?”
“For assuming the water was the problem.”
Monica came from the kitchen and hugged me so abruptly that I nearly dropped my bag.
“I told you to stay invisible,” she whispered.
“I remember.”
“That may have been bad advice.”
“Maybe.”
Dante waited outside.
That had been my condition.
No dramatic entrance.
No bodyguards surrounding me inside the restaurant.
No spectacle that turned my old workplace into another extension of his power.
When I walked back outside, he was leaning against the black car.
I handed him the photograph.
He frowned.
“I thought I gave this to you.”
“You did.”
“Then keep it.”
“It’s yours.”
Dante looked at the image for a long moment.
“My father gave you that?”
“Yes.”
“Then he wanted you to have it.”
I closed his fingers around the photograph.
“I don’t need the picture to believe you anymore.”
He slipped it carefully into his wallet.
Then he reached for another envelope.
I immediately shook my head.
“If that’s money, don’t.”
A faint smile appeared.
“You really are his daughter.”
“I’m serious.”
“So was he.”
“I don’t want saving my life—or yours—to become a debt.”
Dante put the envelope away without arguing.
“What do you want, then?”
I thought about it.
“A safe ride until this is over.
Information if there’s something I actually need to know.
And no decisions about my life without asking me first.”
