CHAPTER 15 – When The War Reaches Her Door
1164 Words
The first six months in hiding passed like an uneasy dream.
Routine became Elena’s shield: prenatal checkups, quiet meals, cheap soap, second-hand maternity clothes, late-night whispers to the baby who kicked harder every week.
She kept her curtains closed.
She learned which creaks in the hallway belonged to the old neighbor upstairs and which did not.
She learned how silence could be louder than voices.
But nothing—nothing—could have prepared her for the night the war finally found her.
It began with a knock.
Not loud.
Not frantic.
Deliberate.
Three taps.
A pause.
Two more.
A pattern.
Her blood ran cold.
Only one person knew the signal to her door.
Rosa.
Elena rushed to open it—heart pounding, belly heavy, hair tied back in a messy bun—and pulled the door wide.
It wasn’t Rosa.
It wasn’t anyone she recognized.
A man in a gray hoodie stood in the dim hallway, face shadowed, hands in his pockets.
“Mrs. De Luca?” he asked.
The voice was wrong.
The tone too familiar.
The look in his eyes all predator.
Her hand shot to the door, slamming it shut—
But his foot jammed it open with terrifying speed.
“You don’t want to do that,” he hissed.
Elena stumbled backward, instinctively shielding her belly.
“Who are you?” she demanded, voice shaking.
Her phone was on the table behind him—too far.
Her escape route—blocked by a body built like a wall.
He smiled.
“A gift,” he said. “From Il Corvo.”
Her entire world tilted.
Before she could scream, he lunged.
But the door behind him exploded inward.
The sound was so loud Elena thought the world had cracked in half.
The man in the hoodie flew forward, slammed to the floor by a force that blurred past him.
A gun skittered across the linoleum.
Elena gasped, stumbling back against the wall—
Then froze.
Because the man standing in her broken doorway—
Breathing hard
Chest rising and falling
Eyes blazing like a storm breaking— was Matteo.
Her husband.
Her enemy.
Her impossible, unbearable past.
He hadn’t shaved.
He wore a black shirt soaked with sweat and dust.
His knuckles were bloody.
His hair was wild.
He looked like he had fought his way through hell— and maybe he had.
“Elena,” he rasped.
A thousand emotions slammed into her: fear, relief, anger, longing, confusion.
Her voice cracked.
“What are you doing here?”
He didn’t answer.
Because the man on the floor groaned, reaching for something in his pocket.
Matteo kicked it away and pressed his boot into the man’s spine.
“Touch her again,” he said, voice deadly quiet, “and I’ll break every bone in your body before I kill you.”
The man whimpered.
Elena stared, chest tight, baby kicking wildly in panic.
“Matteo,” she whispered. “Stop. Not here.”
He didn’t stop— but he stepped back enough to drag the man upright by the collar.
“Elena,” he said again, breath shaking, “we have to go. Now.”
“Go?”
Her voice trembled.
“Matteo, what—why—”
“Because your location was compromised,” he said.
“Il Corvo sent someone to take you. Or the baby. Or both.”
Her stomach dropped.
Baby.
Suddenly, the entire room spun and narrowed until only her child existed.
“My God,” she whispered. “How did they find me?”
“Because I didn’t do enough.”
His jaw clenched.
“Because I should never have let you go alone. Elena, please, we have to move.”
A rare crack ran through his voice—raw fear.
The Hoodie Man groaned again.
Matteo turned to one of his men in the hallway she hadn’t even noticed.
“Bring him,” he ordered.
Elena stared.
“That’s your man?”
“No.”
Matteo’s voice turned cold.
“He’s the security Il Corvo planted on the building last month.”
Her breath froze.
He had been watching her.
He had known her routines.
He had known her weakness.
Matteo stepped toward her, still breathing hard.
“Elena,” he said softly, urgently, “I swear to you, I will explain everything. But I need you to trust me now.”
“I trusted you before,” she whispered. “And you threw me out.”
He closed his eyes for one heartbeat.
Pain flickered across his face.
“I know,” he said.
“It’s the only thing I’ve done in years that I regret.”
Her lips parted— but before she could speak, someone down the hallway shouted:
“BOSS—CAR, NOW!”
Matteo’s entire body snapped to attention.
The danger was not gone.
It was coming closer.
He strode to her, took her hand—and for the first time in months, she felt his touch, solid and warm and real.
“Please,” he whispered, voice breaking.
“I will die before I let anyone hurt you or our child. But I cannot protect you if you stay here. Come with me.”
Her heart thrashed.
Her baby kicked.
Her instincts screamed to run, to hide, to scream—
But not from Matteo.
Never from Matteo.
She nodded.
He exhaled shakily, relief flooding his face.
He pulled her into his chest for just one second— one desperate, silent second— before guiding her toward the stairwell.
She limped along, still dizzy.
He steadied her with both hands.
But when they reached the bottom of the stairs, she froze again.
“Matteo,” she whispered, tugging his sleeve. “Wait.”
He looked down, panic flaring. “What? Are you hurt? Is it the baby?”
Elena shook her head, tears flooding her eyes.
She smelled smoke.
She smelled gasoline.
And outside the building—
Headlights waited like hungry eyes.
“They set your escape on fire,” she whispered.
Matteo turned—and saw it too.
Two SUVs.
Dozens of men.
Guns.
Shadows.
Il Corvo’s soldiers.
He pushed Elena behind him instantly.
“Elena,” he said, calm despite the storm outside, “listen to me and don’t argue.”
“Matteo—”
“If anything happens to me,” he continued, “you run back upstairs, lock the door, and hide in the bathroom. You protect our child.
That is all that matters.”
“No,” she choked.
“Don’t you dare say if—”
He cupped her face with both hands, eyes blazing with something beyond fear, beyond love, beyond everything.
“There is no universe,” he said fiercely, “where I let our child grow up without me.”
His next words came like steel wrapped in fire:
“Stay behind me, Elena. Whatever happens tonight—
I am getting you out.”
And then the gunfire began.
- Writer
