They Protected My Murderer, So I Walked Away from Them All Chapter 02

They Protected My Murderer, So I Walked Away from Them All Chapter 02

Damian slid an arm around her waist and pressed a dry kiss to her forehead.

“Aurora will be back soon. I’ll see you tomorrow. I hate keeping you hidden, Bianca.”

Bianca leaned into him, resting her hands on his chest.

“It’s fine. I was jealous back then.”

“Falling for you made me reckless enough to cause the crash that changed her life.” Her voice was soft, practiced.

“You never hated me for it. Her parents let me off the hook because I was young. I owe her this much. I won’t ask for more.”

Every word hit like a cold spike between my ribs.

It was never an accident.

Three years in a hospital bed. And the girl who put me there walked away clean.

She faced no real consequences for what happened.

Damian—the Russo family’s sole heir—must have pulled every string in the city.

His thumb caught the tear at the corner of her eye.

“I’ll drive you—”

Footsteps tore up the drive. Valerie came running, out of breath.

“Damian! Aurora’s gone. She’s not in the theater, not anywhere!”

The tenderness vanished from Damian’s face.

In its place was sheer, unhinged panic.

He shoved Bianca back, grabbed Valerie by the arm, and nearly pulled her off her feet.

“You had one job. How do you lose her?”

His eyes were venomous.

I looked down, stepped back into the shadows.

I turned the corner before anyone glanced toward the street.

Hail a cab. Give an address. Total autopilot.

I pulled up a contact I hadn’t called in years.

“Three years ago, you asked me to join your team,” I said into the speaker.

“Is the offer still good?”

A beat of silence. Then, a quiet yes.

I closed my eyes. “I’m in. But I need you to help me vanish. Completely.”

The moment I hung up, incoming calls slammed the screen.

Damian, my mother, my father, Nico.

I hit decline on every one.

Then the messages rolled in.

Valerie: [Aurora, where are you?! Damian is tearing the city apart looking for you!]

A video from Nico came right behind it.

On screen, Damian looked unhinged.

Men like Damian don’t usually end up in situations like that without a reason.

Nico: [Damian got hit by a car running after you. Mom and Dad nearly collapsed.]

I looked at the screen and felt nothing.

A sympathy play.

High-ranking syndicate men don’t cross the street without armed security, let alone get hit by cars.

And my parents—the Don and Donna of the Gambino family—nearly collapsing? Please.

Nico: [Where the heck are you? Don’t do this to us!]

I exhaled, typed a single address, and hit send.

The cab stopped.

I was at the base of the hill.

I stepped out and looked up at the long stone staircase leading to the sanctuary.

Two months ago, right after I woke from the coma, Valerie showed me a video.

Damian had climbed these exact steps on his knees.

He never believed in God. He believed in power and territory.

Yet while I lay hooked to machines, he had dragged himself up this stone path in penance, begging for a miracle.

When I woke up, the same man who refused to leave my bedside vanished for an entire day and night.

He came back gray with exhaustion, but his eyes were burning.

I went to the chapel and lit 1,000 candles, he told me.

To thank God for giving you back.

Back then, I broke down and wrapped myself around his neck. “Damian, let’s get married.”

I had been so high on relief that I completely missed how his body locked up the moment I said the word “married.”

Hundreds of steps.

It took me nearly an hour to make my way up the long stone staircase.

I leaned on my knees, catching my breath in the cold air, then shoved open the chapel doors.

The quiet inside was absolute.

I walked down the aisle toward the votive stand Damian had supposedly lit for me, my eyes scanning the flickering glass cups.

My stomach dropped. My fingernails bit into my palms.

On the candle stand meant for our lost child, underneath the single flickering white glass, was a handwritten prayer slip.

The intention wasn’t for our child.

Written on the paper was a single name: Bianca.