My head feels as if someone inflated a balloon inside. The humming and beeping of the machines around my hospital bed aren’t making it any better. It’s not pain. I’d be astounded if I could feel pain while hooked to IVs with painkillers. No, this is more infuriating. A constant, exhausting pressure as if my head is slowly heating up, tiptoeing closer to boiling point.
My body weighs a tone. Feeble, fragile, and heavy all at once. Stitches pull on my thigh and shoulder, only itchy for now. The itch will morph into pain once I’m out of here, no longer under the numbing influence of whatever glorious pain relief drips into my veins.
I try to remember; to replay the car crash in my head. Everything from when Archer pulled the trigger to shoot the tire is a blur. Straining past the milky fog in my brain is a daunting task. I give up fast, too tired to piece together a coherent, sharp picture.
Greeted by a young doctor shortly after I was brought to the hospital, the initial haze started dispersing. Pumped full of painkillers and with the effects of whatever they used to knock me out at the scene wearing off, the panic eased away. All I remember clearly is that all-consuming, blood-curdling panic, the thick fear wrapped around every muscle, bone, and cell in my body.
And that was before I saw a pool of my own blood around my injured body. By the time the ambulance arrived, I was on the verge of passing out, my breaths sawing in and out, vision blurred by tears, chest so tight it felt like I was breathing around twenty-four broken ribs.
I recall bits. Muffled voices, Rick’s distorted face in front of me, the firm touch of his big hands holding my shoulders. His desperate, futile attempts to calm me down.
He couldn’t.
The ambulance crew tranquilized me on the spot before they hauled me out of the pick-up truck. I was hysterical. Bat-shit crazy. At least that’s the description provided by the attending doctor once I calmed down with however much Diazepam they pumped into my system.
Not my proudest moment, I admit.
When I started to regain consciousness and rational thinking, fear came back, too. The doc hooked me to Diazepam again to suture my wounds in peace. Almost an hour later, the same IV still drips slowly, keeping me calm, weak, and tired. So, so tired. My eyelids want to close so badly, but I fight sleep. I’m waiting for Jean, Tayler, and Rick to visit. Doc promised to send them in once they’re checked over.
I want to go home, curl into a ball and pretend that my life isn’t a series of unfortunate events. The problem is, I don’t have a home. Now that Dante found me in Texas, I’ll never be safe again. Running isn’t really an option. He found me once, so he’ll do it time and time again.
My days are numbered…
I’m thankful for the drugs whooshing through my system. They numb the paralyzing train of thoughts that’d normally drive me insane. Dante wants me dead. And dead I’ll end up, I’m sure.
The door to the room opens abruptly. Again, if not for the diazepam, I’d be jumping out of my skin. Now, a mild flinch is all my body can muster. My heart, on the other hand, picks up the pace a little when a tall man enters. A hoodie is pulled over his head, and he’s not wearing a lab coat, dressed all in black. My pulse hurries again at the sight of a gun shoved into the holster by his belt. He parades around with the metal handle in full view, not trying to disguise it.
The machine that monitors my heart rate beeps faster as he pulls down the hoodie, revealing a wicked, chilling smile. I’m jolted into motion, frantically trying to pull myself up. At least that’s what I think is happening. In reality, I’m moving as if through quicksand. My stiff muscles and bones don’t want to cooperate while I try to at least sit up.
“Ah, you poor little thing. Let me.” The man crosses the room to adjust the pillows behind my back. “You hid well, Layla. I’ve been looking for you for two weeks.”
I silently, stupidly gawk into his dark eyes, taking in the stiff posture, broad shoulders, and exotic looks. His colorful accent and tanned complexion hint at Latin descent.
He sizes me up, snorting softly. “So young… so pretty. How did you fuck up your short life so badly, Imp?”
My eyebrows furrow as a peculiar familiarity washes over me at the nickname. Someone used to call me an Imp… it would probably be easier to access distant memories without three separate drugs in my bloodstream.
“You don’t remember me, do you?” he asks, unnaturally pleased, his grin disturbing and taking more real estate across his face by the second. “Oh, come on! Don’t hurt my feelings. Think harder, Imp.”
Again, a strange sense of familiarity envelopes me like a soft blanket. I know him, but I can’t recall his name. Even his face doesn’t ring any bells. Just the nickname. Knowing that he came here to kill me doesn’t help me concentrate. Inside, I’m as jittery as a sinner on judgment day, which, come to think of it, is probably a spot-on definition of me and this day. Outside, I wear a convincing mask of practiced indifference.
Too bad the machines betray what I feel as the rhythm of my heart beeps faster than it should.
I scrutinize his warm complexion, black eyes, and scruffy beard. Broad shoulders, large hands. Tall. Six feet at least. I tilt my head, taking him in as a whole again. Athletic build, probably in his forties… and then I spot it. A clue that untangles the web of memories, pushing the relevant ones to the front. If not for the signet ring on his finger, same as Frankie’s and Dante’s, I probably wouldn’t have remembered who he is.
Relief comes first. A single, powerful wave. It dies an ugly death after a fraction of a second, morphing back to fear. Our connection doesn’t matter. Family or not, there’s no room for mercy in the mafia world.
“Morte.” I drop my gaze so he can’t see fear clouding my vision. Blood drains from my face, and the treacherous hurtled beeping of the heart monitor fills the room.
It’s been a long time since I last saw him. Thirteen, maybe fourteen years ago, back when Dino was in control of Chicago and Frankie barely rose in the ranks to his second in command. Morte was a regular guest in our home when I was a child. No wonder. He’s my godfather.
“Hello, Imp. Long time no see.” Morte beams wider again, but there’s nothing friendly in his smile. He’s excited in a peculiar, eerie way. “I’ll repeat the question. What did you do to deserve a death sentence at nineteen?”
My fear sets his face alight with sick satisfaction, so I clench my teeth harder, giving up without a fight. My body is too exhausted to hold me up, let alone fight or run for dear life. This is it. Game over.
“Tell him I’m sorry,” I look back at my hands, my voice steady, a picture of calmness. I’m still breathing, but I feel dead inside. “And tell him I understand.”
And tell him I love him.
Morte chuckles softly. God, it’s so fitting. Almost poetic. Out of all the people he could hire, Dante chose him as my executioner. He’s Portuguese, and so is his name: Death. I don’t know the story behind the name, but I’m sure there is one. What parent in the right mind calls their child Death?
“I assume you mean Dante?” he asks, alive with excitement. “Don’t prove Frank right so easily. He always said you were naïve. You’re not, though. You just don’t trust your gut. Do you think Dante wants you dead? The kill order didn’t come from Carrow, Imp. It came from your father.”
Pure confusion blurs my vision. Although shock is a more appropriate word. Pure, incessant shock. I feel as if someone suddenly pulled the rug out from under my feet as if the sky turned green before my eyes. “Frankie told you to kill me?”
“No, no, no,” he hurries closer to take a seat on the bed and leans forward, closer to me, eyes wide, hands raised, ghosting over my cheeks. “I’d never hurt you, Imp.” He cradles my face, sweeping his thumbs under my eyes. A disturbing urgency resonates in his moves, gestures, and words. “I’d never hurt you. You’re my family, remember? This job isn’t for me. It’s for everyone. Anyone can walk in here and kill you.”
“I don’t understand…” I’m dizzy with confusion. Frankie wanted me dead. My own father wanted me to die.
Hypocrite. You killed him, remember?
“It’s an open job, Layla. Instead of one hitman, you get hundreds.” Morte inches closer, lowering his voice the way children do when they want to let you in on a secret. “Frankie wanted Dante to end up with nothing even if things went wrong that night.” He throws his head back, cackling like a maniac. The sound sends a fit of shivers down my spine. The hairs on my neck stand on end. I think he’s mad. Certifiably insane. His attitude changes every few seconds, dark eyes overflowing with crazy. “Didn’t you surprise us all, Imp? You turned that night on its head.”
This is too much to comprehend so quickly. My life is too fucked up to fight for it or understand the abstract reasons, lies, and secrets. Dante hates me. My father wanted me to die to satisfy his need for vengeance. What’s left? Not much. Nothing worth fighting for or looking forward to.
“Dante no longer cares about me, Morte. My death won’t change a thing.”
“Frankie told me about his plan and your lead role a few weeks before he died. He hired me because he thought Dante might kill him before the finale…. but it was you!” he huffs with an ear-to-ear grin, stroking my hair in a monotonous rhythm that could quickly put me to sleep under different circumstances. “You killed your father! You betrayed him despite agreeing to help him take Dante out.” Admiration and approval ooze out of every word. Keeping up with his mood swings is impossible. “I didn’t expect such a turn of events. This would make a great movie, you know? What a twist! On the other hand, Dante was always good with women. They fell head over heels for him.” He clicks his tongue, shaking his head in amusement. “See? You’re not as strong as your daddy thought you were.”
“You’re stalling. Please, just get it over and done with.”
He tuts under his nose, lips in a pout. “I told you the hit isn’t mine to take. Pay attention, Imp.”
“You said Frankie hired you!” I snap, my body rigid as steel, refusing to follow my mind and give up
I don’t want to hear any more. I’ve had enough. My parents let me down at every turn, but I always found a way to justify their lack of love. Now, this can’t be explained in neither a rational nor irrational way. It’s barbaric. Unnatural. Incompatible with every human’s basic instinct— to protect your offspring. Frankie was an anomaly.
And I’m an anomaly because of him. Because of the sick genes he passed down to me. I’m no better than him. Nothing in my life makes sense. Everything appears to be one giant illusion. I don’t know right from wrong. Truth from lies. How could I have not noticed my own father was a psychopath? How? How the fuck is it possible? There’s something fundamentally wrong with my head that no amount of therapy would fix.
“Earth to Imp.” Morte playfully wraps a lock of my hair over his index finger, pinching the dark strands with the fascinated look of someone in a coma for two centuries and waking in a new reality. “Did you hear what I said?”
“No, I don’t care.”
Gritting his teeth, he squeezes the bridge of his nose. “You should. Curiosity is a natural thing, Imp. Frankie hired me for surveillance. Not to carry out the dirty work. I wouldn’t agree. Not even for the three million he offered for your pretty head.” He stamps a kiss on three of his fingers and taps them at the crown of my pretty head. “I’m the promoter. I set the wheels in motion right after Frank’s death, but you hid so well it took me two weeks to trace your journey from Chicago all the way here. I only sent the word about your location earlier today.” He pauses for a moment, looks around, and crosses the room to pour himself a glass of water from a plastic jug on the side table. “The only reason I’m here tonight is that Archer called in your time of death two hours ago. Before I wired the money, I wanted to see with my own eyes that you are, in fact, dead. Imagine my surprise to find he’s the dead one.” He cackles, coming back to me. “But it’s all good fun. I’m glad we got to talk. As I said, I’ve been looking for you too.”
“Why?” I wrap my arms around myself, seeking a bit of comfort.
“Finally!” Morte takes my hand to squeeze lightly. “You’re starting to ask the right questions. Frankie wanted me to tell you why he ordered the hit. He wanted you to know you’ll die in the name of the greater good.” He scratches his beard, seemingly unconvinced. “At least that’s how he saw it. He wanted you to understand him. If he knew you’d kill him, there’d be a different reason for the hit, I guess.”
“Understand him? How am I supposed to do that? He wanted me dead, Morte. What kind of a parent does that?”
He touches his fingers to both temples, massaging in small, purposeful circles as if our conversation gives him a headache. “Frankie was somewhat crazy all his life, but it got worse after we killed Dino. In a way, you did him a favor when you killed him. It’s such a pity you need to die too.”
“Frank deserved what he got. You knew him. You know what he was like. When Dino died, nothing mattered more than revenge. He was obsessed. He controlled my life for years before telling me I was supposed to be the bait for Dante. I killed him because Dante gave me all I needed and could’ve ever wanted. Everything I never had. And he didn’t expect a goddamn thing in return. Unlike Frank.”
“Dante got a wee bit irritated when he found out you were conspiring with Frank, didn’t he?” Morte sits up, straightening his spine. The crinkles around his eyes betray excitement.
I think he wants all the inside information he can get, but I’m not about to relay the worst night of my life for his entertainment. I clench my teeth, refusing to cooperate.
A scowl blooms on his face, but a manic smile covers it up fast. “You said you’re nothing to Dante now, right? So, tell me… why did he set a whole army of pawns on their toes to find you? He’s nobody without you, Imp, and he knows it.”
The damn heart monitor speeds up once more, but this time, my pulse thuds in my ears loud and clear, partially drowning out the background noise. Dante’s looking for me. “He wants to kill me,” I whisper, not ready to let my mind wander too far. Not ready to allow hope to break the dam I’ve built for the last thirteen days.
“He wants to protect you, Layla. He’s bent over backward, pulled in very expensive favors, and started calling off hitmen yesterday when he found out about the hit.”
A tiny flame of hope flickers in my heart, burning shyly as Morte’s words sink into the deepest, most vulnerable parts of my psyche, filling the holes in my heart, gluing it back together. The flame morphs into a blazing inferno, burning my fear to the ground. Panic recedes, and real, intense relief rattles every cell in my body. This time, it’s here to stay.
He wants to protect me. He cares.
Morte inhales a deep breath, eyes full of pity. “I hope whoever kills you does it quickly, painlessly. You don’t deserve to suffer, Imp.” He leans over to kiss my forehead and winks before leaving the room in a hurry like an unwanted stranger.
I struggle to make sense of my life, staring at the closed door. I’m nineteen, for crying out loud. This isn’t the time to die. This is the time to find happiness, have fun, and live the way I’ll never live again. This is the time to stay up with friends, drink, and make silly mistakes. The time to fall in love every Friday evening and forget about the guy by Sunday afternoon. Instead, I wait for death, madly, irresponsibly in love with the one man I want to love until the end of time. Not long ago, I thought the end of my life was somewhere in the distant future, but now my end looms around the corner.
I jump out of bed, adrenaline jarring my limbs, zap after zap, that pushes me to act. I tear the cannulas out of my arms. The sudden injection of raw vitality helps my legs hold me upright when a few drops of blood splatter on the bed.
Dante’s looking for me.
He doesn’t want to kill me.
I need to get back to Chicago.
The door opens slowly again, stopping me dead in place. This time, it is a doctor who walks in, a white lab coat on his back. He frowns, taking in my state and the warm blood trickling down my arms from the torn cannulas. Maybe it wouldn’t be as ghastly if I took more care. My heart beats out of my chest at the thought, but I transform fear into strength.
“Layla, you need to lie down,” he says, striding closer, his hands outstretched far to the sides. Either he attempts to block the way out or readies himself to catch me. “You shouldn’t be on your feet for a while.”
“I need to see my cousin. She was in the car with me.”
He takes two steps forward and grabs me gently by the shoulder. “You can’t leave this room. Get back to bed.”
Does he really think he can keep me here? I just found out there’s a bounty on my head, and the one person who can keep me safe wants to do so. No one can keep me here. I need to grab Jean, Tayler, and Rick and head for Chicago right now.
In an electrified haze, I scan the room, an abstract plan at the back of my mind. A metal tray sits on the table nearby, beckoning me to use it. I don’t stop to consider my predicament, the hospital gown on my back, or that I can barely stand on my own two feet.
Dante is all I can focus on.
I grab the tray, swing at the doctor, and ram him over the head. He goes down, swearing under his breath. By the time he scrambles to his feet, I’m on the run, darting barefoot down a bright, empty corridor. I pass doors left and right, aiming for those at the far end. Again, I failed to take a second and really think. I have no idea where I’m going or where Jean might be, but sheer willpower spurs me on.
The double door in front of me swings open. A tall man marches through them, a dozen or so others hot on his tail. His eyes widen when he sees me charging straight at him. I’m no more than ten feet away, too close to apply the brakes. All the man has time to do is open his arms before I ram hard into his chest, almost knocking us both off our feet. Shooting pain jabs my thigh and shoulder, knocking me out of breath.
“Whoa, where do you think you’re going, little birdy?” He pushes me away, his hands cupping my shoulders in a tender but firm hold.
“Let go of me!” I claw at his arms to wriggle out of his grip, but despite only holding me by the shoulders, my efforts are pointless.
“I don’t think so,” He looks over my shoulder with a deep, dissatisfied frown. “What the fuck, Mark? She’s not supposed to leave the room.”
I turn to see the doctor in the doorway of my room, massaging a sore spot on the side of his head. “I couldn’t stop her. She whacked me with a tray.”
A murmur of laughter cuts the air. The man in front of me smiles, teeth and all. “Good job, birdy, but I’m afraid you can’t leave. Go back to bed. And you better not run again, or I’ll have to cuff you until Dante gets here.”
My heart thumps faster. If the unexpected news won’t stop soon, I might really end up with a coronary. “He’s coming?”
“Oh, he’s coming, alright.” He spins me around to face the way I came. “He’s on his way. My job is to keep you safe until he arrives, so do me a favor and cooperate.”
I cast him a sideways glance as he falls into step beside me. “Who are you?”
“Me? Call me Johnny.” He places his hand on the small of my back, pushing me gently toward the room. “Now, get to bed and let Mark check you over. I think you pulled the stitches on your thigh. You’re bleeding.”
“Don’t look,” the doc clips immediately. “I’ll take care of it, just don’t look, okay? I hear you don’t do well with blood.”
“I don’t,” I admit, laying back on the bed, eyes on the ceiling. “How did you know? Oh, and… sorry about your head.”
“I had Dante on the phone five minutes ago. Whatever you need, I’ll do my best to make it happen as long as you stay in this room.”
“Right, I think you’ve got this, so I’ll leave you to it,” Johnny says from where he stands in the doorway. “Shout out if you need help.”
“Yeah, that won’t happen either,” Mark huffs, the sound coming out amused. “Dante said no one but me can come in this room, so you better back away.”
Johnny chuckles. “I wasn’t talking to Layla. I was talking to you. You know, in case birdy here whacks you over the head with something else.”
