“Never say never,” I say, but I secretly agree. I wouldn’t want to meet anyone there either. We also made a pact that we would always stick together, and one day, we’ll have our kids growing up together. And that’ll definitely not be somewhere in Italy, where it is way too hot.
While I haven’t been to Rome, I know my parents took me to Sicily a couple of times when I was little to visit a friend of my father’s, and although I have no real recollection because I was too young, I do remember it was very hot. Too hot. And that he got me Lolita that one holiday.
Suddenly, the pilot’s voice rips me from my thoughts. We’re preparing for landing.
When we step out of the plane, and I finally have solid ground underneath, I am as sweaty as it can get, and I add flying to the list of all my fears indefinitely.
“Oh, I can’t wait for it,” says Luisa, beaming as I was when we reached Paris.
I smile, because I am glad we did this trip. Overcoming fears it is.
2
ROSALIA
PLAYLIST: MOUNT EVEREST – LABRINTH
“Rosalia,” says Kat when I answer her call.
“What is it, Kiddo?” I ask her. Kat will forever have a special place in my heart. The heart that many believe I do not have. But I do. It is cold and reserved, but existent.
Kat has been the closest I have to my own child after my son was killed; she has been the one I call family. While I never wished to have children, I have been forced to have one at the hands of my father’s will and his business partner’s execution. Bred for political reasons, for expanding the family influence. And the reason why I became the person I am today. Men are disgusting pieces of shit, and they deserve whatever they get.
Kat is like me, which is why she became family—one I’d protect with my life and also hold in the highest regard for all she has done since I took her under my wings fifteen years ago.
“Rome, Fiumicino Airport. A young woman just checked through customs. Her name is Sophie Brooks. Twenty-four years old. Our flags went up because she had a plush sloth with her.”
I feel my body tense immediately.
“You think it’s her?” I ask.
“Could be. I ran it through our system with an ageing estimate of the photo from back then; it’s a 55% match.”
I know Kat and her wife have built an international informationnetwork, but I never thought it would be so good that it would pick up a sloth from a photo from more than a decade ago.
“Sounds reasonable enough,” I say. “Send it to the server.”
“Done,” she says. “Do you want me to verify her for you?”
“Don’t trouble yourself, Kiddo. I can set someone on it.”
“You never trouble me,” she says, efficient as usual. “I’m on my way, ETA in seven, I’ll let you know.”
“Kat,” I say. “If it comes to it, take first and ask questions later.”
“I know, Rose,” she says with an audible smirk, because who am I telling that to? She has learned everything from me.
She hangs up, and I am left with the information that we might have finally found her. The girl who took my son. The girl who has the money. While I do not care about the money, I do care about principles. Rules. Honor.
The first principle I live by is loyalty. Blood makes you related, but loyalty is what makes you family. It is the highest value I carry.
The second, family. Family always comes first, whatever it is. Kat is my family, and she lives by that principle every day, as does everyone who is or has become family over the fifty years I have had the privilege of being on this planet.
And the third is honesty. A word is a word, and every betrayal will be punished.
Antonio has violated all three of them. He stole from me, lied to me, and caused harm to my family. His debt has not been discharged by his death. And so doesn’t his daughter’s. She has taken my everything from me, and I will take her everything.
But before I do, I want to know how Antonio managed to betray me and where the money went, because there might be more people I need to go after. There are only two people who know what he has done: His wife and his daughter.