THE ROSSI EMPIRE

CHAPTER 2- THE DOCTOR

The car ate up the dark roads in silence, and the hum of tires speeding away from the warehouse.

"Stay with me, Dante," Valentina said, pressing his jacket hard against the wound in his shoulder, blood already soaking warm through the fabric onto her hands. "Look at me. You're not allowed to pass out on me tonight."

"Wouldn't dream of it," Dante muttered through clenched teeth, his face pale under the passing streetlights.

"It's alright, Dante. You're gonna be alright," Valentina said, her voice steady even as her pulse hammered beneath her calm exterior.

In the front seat, Marco drove fast and controlled, a phone pressed to his ear. "Domino, I need you….Now." A pause, his jaw tightening. "Where are you? ...No, it can't wait that long." Another pause, longer this time, and something in his expression shifted from urgency to cautious consideration. "Who?... How reliable is he?" A beat. "Fine. Send me the contact. We're running out of time."

He hung up and glanced in the rearview mirror at Valentina. "Domino's out of the country. Emergency leave, family thing he won't be back for weeks. He's giving us a name. Someone he trusts."

"We don't use strangers, Marco," Valentina said sharply.

"We don't have a choice tonight," Marco said, already dialing the new number. "Domino vouched for him personally. Says he's the best he knows."

Valentina said nothing, but the look she gave the back of Marco's head said enough.

---

They reached the safehouse just past two in the morning.

Elena was already waiting by the door, helping carry Dante inside and laying him across the reinforced table that had seen this exact scene more times than anyone cared to count.

"Pressure, keep pressure on it," Elena instructed, grabbing clean towels from the cabinet built for this purpose.

Headlights swept across the driveway eleven minutes later.

The man who stepped out of the car was a stranger in every sense that mattered unfamiliar face, unfamiliar car, no history with the Rossi name beyond a phone call Marco had made less than twenty minutes ago. He carried a medical bag, sleeves already rolled, moving with a calm that didn't belong to someone walking into a house full of armed men for the first time.

Valentina stepped directly into his path before he reached the hallway.

"Who are you," she said. It wasn't a question.

"Dr. Adrian Hayes," he answered evenly, meeting her eyes without the faintest flicker of hesitation. "Domino sent me."

"I don't know you." She replied with a curious look.

"No," Adrian agreed. "You don't. But your man is bleeding out six feets away, and every second we spend having this conversation is a second he doesn't have."

The hall had gone utterly still. Marco stood near the door, rigid, bracing for Valentina's reaction. Elena watched from the staircase, arms crossed. Even the two soldiers posted near the entrance had turned their attention fully onto the stranger standing his ground in front of their boss.

"You walk into my house," Valentina said quietly, "a stranger, with no history, no vetting, asking me to trust you with my family's life…"

"I'm not asking you to trust me," Adrian cut in, not unkindly, but firm. "I'm asking you to let me do my job before trust becomes irrelevant."

Marco stepped forward quickly, lowering his voice but speaking clearly enough for the room to hear. "Valentina. Domino trained him. Vouched for him personally, said there's no one else he could trust with this on such short notice. We called every other name we had this was the only option that didn't involve an actual hospital." Marco pleaded

Valentina's gaze didn't move from Adrian's face. She studied him the way she studied every threat that walked uninvited into her world searching for the flinch, the tell, the crack in composure that most men showed eventually. It never came. He simply stood there, steady, bag in hand, waiting.

From the table, Dante groaned, his voice strained. "What are you doing, Val... let him."

That broke it.

"Fine," Valentina said finally, stepping aside, though her eyes stayed fixed on Adrian a moment longer, a warning dressed as permission. "But if anything happens to him…"

"Nothing will happen to him," Adrian said simply, already moving past her toward the table, "because I intend to do this properly."

He worked quickly once he reached Dante, assessing the wound with steady hands, cutting away fabric, calling for supplies with a calm authority that made even Marco step back without question.

Valentina lingered only a moment longer before grabbing Marco by the arm and pulling him into a darker corner of the hall, voice low and sharp.

"Are you sure about this?" she hissed. "Domino is our trusted doctor. We've used him for years. This man … we know nothing about him."

"I know," Marco said, matching her tone. "But Domino trusted him enough to send him into our house, at two in the morning, without asking a single question about who we are. That has to count for something."

"This is dangerous, Marco." She said

"Everything we do is dangerous, Valentina." He held her gaze steadily. "Right now, the most dangerous thing would be letting Dante bleed out because we were too proud to trust a name Domino gave us."

She didn't answer, jaw tight, eyes drifting back toward the table where Adrian was already closing the wound with quick, practiced stitches.

Several minutes passed in tense silence before Adrian finally straightened, peeling off a pair of bloodied gloves.

"I'm done," he said. "He's okay. The bullet went clean through, missing anything vital. He'll need rest and the dressing changed in two days, but he's going to make a full recovery."

Dante exhaled shakily from the table, managing a weak, exhausted grin. "Told you... I've had worse."

From the staircase, Elena finally pushed off the railing and sauntered closer, eyeing Adrian with open amusement. "Ummm, handsome Doc," she drawled, holding up her forearm where a blade had sliced a thin line earlier in the fight, "you still have one more patient."

Adrian raised an eyebrow, glancing at the cut with mild professional interest. "That's barely a graze."

"A graze still needs attention," Elena said sweetly, batting her lashes with exaggerated innocence that fooled absolutely no one in the room.

Valentina rolled her eyes, understanding exactly what Elena was doing and refusing to dignify it with comment.

"Sit down," Adrian told Elena, already reaching for antiseptic, unbothered by the flirtation sliding off him like water. "This will sting."

"Good," Elena said, grinning. "I like a little sting."

Valentina shook her head slightly, turning away before anyone caught the faint, reluctant twitch at the corner of her mouth…

She understood Elena flirt ….

Everyone knows Elena always had a thing for handsome new strangers…