Chapter 4 - The Woman Who Died Twice
Victor raised one hand and said:
“Don’t shoot.”
Damian stared at the wedding ring hanging from Victor Hale’s fingers.
Two initials were engraved inside the gold band.
E.R.
Damian had buried that ring with his mother.
The dead had begun returning faster than he could understand them.
Garrett aimed at Victor.
Hazel did the same.
Victor smiled faintly.
“Still protecting him, R-17?”
“Drop the ring,” Hazel said.
Victor placed it on the floor.
Damian stepped forward.
“Where did you get it?”
“From Elena.”
“My mother is dead.”
Victor’s expression changed.
“She was.”
Damian felt his patience fracture.
“What does that mean?”
Victor looked toward the balcony.
“We don’t have time.”
“You have exactly as much time as I decide.”
“Then decide quickly.”
A vehicle accelerated outside.
Hazel grabbed Damian.
The church windows exploded.
Everyone dropped.
A black SUV tore away from the curb.
The attack had been a warning.
Victor surrendered his weapon.
Back at Apex, they locked him inside an interrogation room.
Damian sat opposite him.
Hazel remained behind Damian.
Garrett watched from the wall.
Victor studied them.
“The family reunion I expected was warmer.”
Damian struck him.
Victor wiped blood from his mouth.
“That was deserved.”
“Start with my mother.”
“Elena discovered the first conspiracy against your father seventeen years ago.”
“What conspiracy?”
“Someone inside Antonio’s organization wanted succession accelerated.”
“My father was forty-three.”
“Exactly.”
Victor explained that Elena had discovered payments to assassins.
Antonio created the Russo Protocol.
But Elena distrusted his senior men.
She secretly built another layer.
Hazel eventually became part of it.
“Why fake my mother’s death?”
“She didn’t.”
Damian stared.
“Elena was poisoned.”
The room went silent.
“She clinically died for seventy-three seconds,” Victor continued. “Doctors revived her. We realized whoever poisoned her would try again.”
“So you buried an empty coffin?”
“No.”
Victor’s eyes hardened.
“We buried another woman.”
Damian stood so quickly the chair fell backward.
Hazel touched his arm.
He pulled away.
“Who?”
“An unidentified woman killed the same night. Similar age. Similar build. The coffin remained closed.”
Damian remembered being fourteen.
His father’s hand on his shoulder.
The closed coffin.
His mother’s funeral.
Everything had been constructed.
“Where did she go?”
“Witness protection outside the organization.”
“Where is she now?”
Victor looked down.
“She died six years ago.”
Damian’s anger collapsed into something quieter.
“So I lost her twice.”
“Yes.”
“Did she ever ask about me?”
“Every day.”
Victor reached into his jacket.
Garrett moved.
Victor stopped.
“Letter.”
Damian nodded.
Garrett removed it.
The envelope carried Damian’s name in handwriting he recognized from childhood birthday cards.
Damian opened it.
My beautiful stubborn boy.
He stopped reading.
His eyes burned.
He folded the letter.
Not here.
Not in front of them.
“Why Hazel?”
“Elena chose her.”
“Why?”
Victor looked toward Hazel.
“That is hers to tell.”
Damian turned.
Hazel remained silent.
“Tell me.”
“I owed your mother my life.”
“How?”
Hazel looked toward the window.
“My father owed money to people who collected debts from families, not bank accounts. When I was sixteen, they came for me.”
Damian said nothing.
“Elena found out. She paid the debt. Then she made the men disappear.”
“You knew my mother?”
“For three months.”
“And she recruited you?”
“Not then. Victor found me later.”
Damian understood something.
Hazel’s loyalty had never begun with him.
It began with Elena.
The recording had said exactly that.
Her loyalty is to—
Elena.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because Elena made me promise.”
“Even after she died?”
“Yes.”
Damian laughed bitterly.
“You let me fire you.”
“You were angry.”
“I was an idiot.”
“That too.”
Garrett almost smiled.
Damian looked at her.
It was the first joke he had ever heard Hazel make.
For one second, she was not a ghost.
Then Victor ruined it.
“You still don’t understand the important part.”
Damian faced him.
“The attacks?”
“No.”
Victor leaned forward.
“The attacks were never designed only to kill you.”
“What were they designed to do?”
“Test Hazel.”
Silence.
Victor explained.
Someone knew R-17 existed.
They did not know who she was.
So they created threats around Damian.
Restaurant.
Convoy.
Flight.
Hotel.
Every incident forced Hazel to intervene.
Each intervention narrowed the suspect list.
“The elevator attack exposed her,” Victor said.
Damian looked toward Hazel.
“That’s why you disappeared.”
“Yes.”
“And firing you?”
“Helped.”
Damian stared.
“You could have mentioned that.”
“You were very committed to the speech.”
Garrett coughed into his fist.
Damian ignored him.
“Who is hunting her?”
Victor looked toward Garrett.
“The same person who corrupted the protocol.”
“Name.”
“I never had proof.”
“Give me your suspicion.”
Victor hesitated.
Then every monitor inside the security room went black.
Garrett turned.
“That wasn’t us.”
White text appeared.
HELLO, R-17.
Hazel’s face changed.
For the first time, Damian saw fear.
Another line appeared.
YOU SHOULD HAVE STAYED FIRED.
Then live video filled the screen.
A room.
A chair.
A woman sitting with her back to the camera.
Brown-gray hair.
Damian stared.
The woman slowly turned.
Older.
Pale.
Alive.
Damian dropped the letter.
“Mom?”
Elena Russo looked directly into the camera.
Then someone stepped behind her.
A hand rested on her shoulder.
A man spoke from outside the frame.
“Come get her, Damian.”
The camera widened.
Damian recognized the man.
May you like
He had eaten dinner with him every Sunday for twenty years.
His uncle Carlo.
