Chapter 27: Comfort in the Quiet
The traitor was tied to a chair in the basement. Matteo had handled the questioning himself. Short. Brutal. The man talked fast—entry points, numbers of men Vittorio was bringing, the exact hour they planned to hit. Midnight. Tonight.
After the confession, Matteo shot him once in the head. No ceremony or words. Just the dull pop of the silencer and the slump of a body.
Elena didn’t watch. She waited upstairs in the living room, wrapped in a blanket on the couch. When Matteo came back up, hands washed clean, he looked at her like he expected her to flinch.
She didn’t.
Instead she stood. Walked straight to him. Slid her arms around his waist and pressed her face to his chest.
“I’m not scared,” she said quietly. “Not of this. Not of you.”
Matteo exhaled
