From ashes to fire

Locks and keys

*Livia*

The house is quieter than Enzo's.

That bothers me first.

Enzo's place was built to make silence feel expensive. Thick carpets. Soft-close doors. Hidden speakers pouring piano music into empty rooms. There was always somebody moving somewhere, a maid polishing glass, a guard changing shifts, an assistant taking calls in the kitchen. You never forgot you were being managed.

The Moretti house has none of that polish.

The entry hall is old stone and dark wood, scarred at the baseboards, warm from radiators that clank behind brass covers. A narrow table sits beneath a religious painting blackened with age. There are fresh flowers in a chipped blue vase, grocery-store carnations, not the enormous arrangements Enzo had delivered every Monday because he liked being thanked for them.

Nico takes off his wet coat and holds out a hand.

I look at it.

"The jacket," he says.

"I'm still cold."

"Keep it then."

I blink at him.

His dark eyes meet mine, silver catching in the low hall light. "It is a jacket, Liv. You don't need to negotiate custody."

"I wasn't negotiating."

"You were glaring at it like you were about to."

I huff slightly, "I glare at everything."

"I noticed."

Elio walks past us with two men I do not know, talking low into his phone. He pauses at the foot of the stairs.

"Your room's up there," he says. "Second floor, end of the hall. Bathroom attached. Door locks from inside. You have the key."

Nico looks at him.

Elio looks back with the stubborn calm of a man who has already made a decision. "What? She asked for one."

"I did not ask for one."

"You were about to. I could see it in your eyebrows."

Now Nico is the one to glare, "I do not communicate with my eyebrows."

"Sure, boss."

I should not be comforted by the fact that Elio talks to Nico like that. It means nothing. Men can laugh together before they turn cruel. I have seen it.

Still, Nico does not snap at him. He only says, "Give her every key she needs."

Elio nods and heads upstairs.

Nico gestures toward the kitchen. "You should eat."

My stomach rolls at the thought. "I should sleep."

"You have not eaten."

"You have known me for less than four hours."

"I watched you refuse a lemon candy, water, and food in a car. It is an educated guess."

I fold my arms across my chest. Nico's jacket hangs heavy around me, warm enough that I do not want to give it back.

"Are you always this irritating after a medical emergency?"

"Usually worse."

"Wonderful."

He starts toward what must be the kitchen.

I stay where I am.

Nico stops and looks back at me.

The front door is behind him. Two locks. A keypad. A guard outside the gate. Cameras tucked beneath the eaves. I have been in enough beautiful prisons to recognize the architecture.

"You said I could leave," I tell him.

"I did."

"Can I walk out the front door right now?"

His gaze does not move from mine. "Yes."

"Will your men follow me?"

"Yes."

The answer punches clean through my chest.

"Then I cannot leave."

"Not alone."

"There it is."

Nico's mouth tightens. He looks exhausted for a second, older than twenty-seven. The hard control slips enough for me to see the ache still sitting behind his eyes.

"If you leave alone, Vitale gets you," he says. "I will not pretend otherwise to make you like me."

"I don't like you now."

"That is survivable."

The front hall feels too small. I hear rain ticking against the windows. Somewhere upstairs, old pipes groan inside the walls.

"You think Enzo is the only man who can make a woman disappear?" I ask.

His face goes still. "No… I know he isn’t… far from."

"Then why should I trust you?"

"You shouldn't. Not tonight."

The words take some of the fight out of me because I have no ready answer to them.

Nico glances toward the staircase. "Take the room. Lock the door. Elio will bring you clothes and food. Tomorrow, you can hear the contract from a lawyer who does not work for Vitale."

"And who does work for you."

"Yes."

"That is not much better."

"No."

He says it again, that blunt little no, as if he has no idea what to do with comfort and no interest in faking it.

Then he turns away and walks into the kitchen.

I stand in the entry hall for another ten seconds, listening to the front door locks breathe behind me.

Elio is waiting at the top of the stairs with a ring of keys looped over one finger.

"Before you say it," he tells me, "yes, this house has too many locks. Nico grew up here. They think a normal family activity is installing a panic room beside the wine cellar."

"There is a panic room?"

He shrugs, "Probably more than one."

"That is not helping."

"Sorry. Bad instinct."

He hands me two keys. One is small and brass, marked with a strip of blue tape. The other is a plain silver house key.

"The brass one is your bedroom. The silver key opens the side gate. If you decide to leave, use the side gate. The guards have been told not to stop you."

"Will they follow me?"

Elio exhales through his nose. "If you leave without telling us where you're going, somebody will keep eyes on you. Not close. Not touching. Just enough that Vitale doesn't scoop you off a sidewalk."

"That still sounds like being followed."

"It is."

At least he does not dress it up.

He looks down the stairs, toward the kitchen where Nico disappeared. When he speaks again, his voice lowers.

"Listen. I know what this looks like."

"You don't."

"No. You're right. I don't." He rubs a thumb over the scarred knuckles of his left hand. "But I know Nico gets scared and turns it into orders. He thinks if he plans every possible disaster, he can stop one from happening. Most days, that makes him useful. Some days, it makes him a pain in the ass."

I sigh, "He wants me to marry him."

"Yeah."

"You think I shouldn’t."

"I think you should not sign something because you're tired and frightened and a man with a black suit has made the danger sound organized."

My throat tightens.

Elio looks at me carefully.

"If you want a hotel room somewhere else, I'll get you one. A room in your name or a fake name, a room with no Moretti guards outside it, whatever you need. I can drive you there myself."

"And Enzo?"

"He'll look."

"He'll find me."

His expression changes, the humor leaving it completely.

"Maybe," he says. “Most likely.”

Those few word are more honest than a promise.

I look down at the keys in my palm. The blue tape is torn at one corner. Somebody has labeled it by hand.

"Why are you offering me an exit if Nico wants me here?"

"Because he wants you alive." Elio pauses. "Those aren't supposed to be different things."

I meet his eyes.

"Supposed to be?"

He gives me a tired half smile. "I work with criminals, Liv. I can't sell you a clean moral system before bedtime."

The honesty should be ugly. Instead, it gives me something solid to stand on.

He leads me down the hall.

The room at the end is larger than the apartment I grew up in above Nonna's bakery. A wide bed sits against one wall beneath a faded quilt. There is a fireplace, cold but clean, two armchairs near a tall window, and a bathroom tiled in old green porcelain.

No flowers. No silk robe laid out on the bed. No note telling me what Enzo expects when he comes upstairs.

On the dresser, someone has placed a folded black T-shirt, gray sweatpants, a toothbrush still in its package, and a pair of white sneakers.

I stop in the doorway.

Elio sees them too.

"I asked Rosa to grab something from the store," he says. "She runs the kitchen. She guesses everybody's size and is annoying about being right."

The sight of the clothes makes my eyes burn. I look away before he notices.

"I don't need charity."

"Then call it emergency laundry."

"I have no clothes to wash."

"Well. That is a flaw in the system."

I almost laugh.

It comes out as a breath instead.

Elio points toward the bathroom. "There are towels. The tub works. The window opens about four inches, and no, I didn't order that. It has bars inside the frame because this house is insane."

My attention snaps to him.

His face goes serious.

"I saw you check it already."

I hate that he did.

"I check windows."

"Good habit." He tells me with a nod.

"People who say that are usually trying to make you feel less crazy."

"People call women crazy when they don't like what women notice." His voice is quiet now. "I'm not doing that."

For a moment, I cannot speak.

Elio looks toward the hall. "I will bring food up. You can lock the door after me. Nobody comes in unless you say so. Nico included."

"And if he ignores that?"

"Then you call me." He taps the clean phone tucked into the pocket of Nico's jacket around my shoulders. "I answer."

"You expect me to trust your word?"

"No." He gives me a small nod. "But I plan on keeping it anyway."

He leaves before I can answer.

The lock turns easily beneath my fingers.

I lock it.

Then I lock it again.