From ashes to fire

Her demands

*Livia*

The room is warm, but I cannot take off Nico's jacket. It feels stupid, wrapping myself in the clothes of a man who proposed a contract marriage before I knew the address of his house.

I set both phones on the dresser and inspect the room.

Window first.

Elio was right. It opens four inches. Iron bars are tucked into the frame, painted the same dark color as the wood. I test them anyway. They do not move.

Bathroom.

One door. No second exit. The medicine cabinet has nothing in it except unopened soap and toothpaste. The towels smell like detergent, clean and plain. I open every drawer, check beneath the sink, run my hand under the rim of the bathtub.

No cameras that I can see.

That does not mean there are no cameras.

I stand in front of the mirror.

My hair has dried in tangled waves down my back. The makeup Enzo's assistant applied has smeared under my eyes. I look younger without it. Smaller. Like the girl who used to bring espresso to men in dark coats at Nonna's bakery and think adults knew what they were doing.

I peel off the oversized housekeeping tunic.

The cream silk dress beneath is stained at the hem with rainwater and gray loading-dock dirt. Rafe's fingers left red marks around my wrist. The bruises are clearer now.

I touch them once.

Then I sit on the closed toilet lid and take off one of my shoes.

I have been wearing the same pair of thin nude flats for months whenever Enzo lets me leave the house. They are soft enough to fold, plain enough not to draw attention. Inside the right shoe, tucked beneath the insole, is the Bellwether wristband.

My hands tremble as I pull it free.

The plastic is yellowed at the edges. My name is printed in black block letters.

LIVIA ROSSIE.

Admission date.

Patient number.

The barcode that let strangers scan me into locked doors.

I have carried it through airports, restaurants, charity dinners, Enzo's bed. Sometimes I forget it is there until I feel the hard edge against my heel. Then my whole body remembers.

I should have put it in the storage locker.

I almost did.

The night before I planned to run, I held it over the kitchen trash while Enzo sat in the next room on a call with one of his uncles. I wanted to throw it away. I wanted to burn it. Instead I slid it back into my shoe.

Proof, I told myself.

Of what?

That it happened?

As if the marks on my skin and the missing eleven days had not happened without a plastic band to prove it.

A knock sounds at the door.

I flinch so hard the wristband slips from my hand.

"Liv?" Elio's voice comes through the wood. "Food. I left it outside. I'm walking away now."

I wait until I hear his steps recede.

Then I hide the wristband under the insole again and open the door.

A tray sits on the floor. Pasta with a tomato sauce, a small bowl of soup, bread, and a glass bottle of water. There is no note. No demand that I eat every bite. No white ribbon tied around the fork.

I bring it inside and lock the door.

The pasta smells like garlic and basil.

My stomach twists with hunger.

I sit in the armchair by the window and take three bites before my throat closes. The food is good. That makes it worse somehow. Kindness is dangerous when you are hungry enough to mistake it for safety.

The clean phone lights up on the dresser.

I freeze.

It rings once.

Twice.

I cross the room slowly and look at the screen.

ELIO.

I answer without speaking.

"Don't panic," he says.

"That is a terrible opening."

"Yeah. I know. Sorry." His voice is tight. "Your mother is okay. Our people saw a black SUV outside the facility, but it left. Nobody went inside."

I grip the dresser until my knuckles ache.

"Did they see who was in it?"

"Tinted windows. We have the plate. We're checking it."

I shake my head, "Call the police."

"We will if they come back."

"You keep saying that like you decide when police exist."

There is a pause.

"You're right," Elio says. "Do you want me to call now?"

I close my eyes.

If the police come, Enzo's people will hear. If Enzo's people hear, Mama becomes another loose thread he can pull until I come back.

"No," I whisper.

"Okay."

The word is careful. He does not tell me I am wrong. He does not make me say it twice.

"Can you send me the address of the facility's front desk?" I ask.

"I can."

"And the name of whoever is watching it."

He doesn’t even pause, "Sure."

"I want to know."

"You should know."

A message comes through before he hangs up. The address. A first name, Dario. A number to call.

I stare at the screen until the letters blur.

One night.

By morning, Enzo will have more men looking. He will have lawyers building a story around my disappearance. He will tell anyone who listens that Nico took advantage of a sick, confused woman. He will use Bellwether because it already worked once.

I sit on the edge of the bed with the phone in my hand and think about a three-year contract.

Three years is too long.

Three years is also a number.

A wall with an end date.

Enzo never gave me an end date. His promises were always softer than that. Forever. Always. You and me, darling. A life so beautiful I would never need to leave.

Three years gives me time to get documents. Time to find out who at Bellwether signed me in. Time to protect Mama. Time to build something that is mine before I walk away from the Moretti name too.

It binds me to Nico.

It puts a ring on my hand and his enemies at my door.

But it gives Enzo a problem he cannot solve with a concerned voice and a locked clinic room.

I stand.

The room tilts a little from exhaustion. I brace a hand on the bedpost until it passes.

Then I unlock the door.

Elio is sitting in a chair across the hall, his jacket off, his gun resting in a holster beneath one arm. He looks up at once.

"You need something?"

"I need Nico."

Elio studies my face. "Are you sure?"

"No," I say. "But I need him anyway."

He gets to his feet.

Nico arrives five minutes later, alone.

He stands outside the open door, one hand in his pocket, his black shirt unbuttoned at the throat. The faint edge of ink shows above his collar. He looks like he has not rested either.

"You asked for me."

"I did."

He waits.

I do not invite him in.

"If I marry you," I say, "it lasts exactly three years."

His expression does not move.

"Thirty-six months," I continue. "Not until you decide I am safe. Not until Enzo is gone. Not until you feel generous enough to let me out. Three years from the date we sign."

Nico's eyes stay on mine.

"At the end," I say, "I leave if I want to leave. No argument. No men following me. No hidden accounts in my name. No threats about what happens to my mother. You do not touch me unless I say yes. You do not use my help with your episodes unless I agree every time."

The hall has gone silent.

Elio is still across from us, but he looks away, giving me the thin privacy he can.

Nico says, "Anything else?"

I had expected him to fight. To call me unreasonable. To smile and tell me we could discuss it after I calmed down.

The lack of resistance leaves me unsteady.

"Yes," I say. "I get my own lawyer."

His jaw shifts.

"A lawyer approved by both sides."

"I do not have a side."

"You do now." The words land harder than I want them to.

Nico reaches inside his jacket and takes out his phone. He types for a few seconds, then looks at me.

"Three years," he says. "Exact term. Your own counsel. Your consent for any touch, including medical assistance. Separate finances. A termination clause that does not require my permission."

My breath catches.

"And if Enzo comes after me?"

"He will."

"That was not the question."

Nico steps closer, stopping at the threshold.

"If he comes after you, I will protect you," he says. "If you tell me you want out, I get you out. Those are the terms."

My fingers close around the brass key in my pocket.

"Tomorrow," I say. "We do it tomorrow."

Nico holds my gaze for a long second.

Then he nods once.

"Tomorrow."

He turns away, already reaching for his phone.

Elio looks at me from across the hall. No grin. No joke. Just a small, grave nod.

I close my bedroom door and lock it.

For the first time since I ran through the hotel, the lock does not feel like the end of the world.