Page 113 of The Silence Lies

Luca is behind me, already on the phone to Raf, ordering the doctor in. But I’m not so sure a doctor can help him. He needs to go to a hospital, which I know is out of the question. They’re out of our jurisdiction when it comes to payroll, so they’ll ask too many questions. We can’t risk it right now.

“Help me move him,” I say to Sera.

She nods obediently, sniffing as she pushes Giovanni upright.

He groans out. It’s going to be damn difficult getting him into the car— the man is built like a brickshit house and there’s no way Sera can lift him.

“Get the keys,” I tell her. She frantically searches his pockets, locating them after a few guesses. Once she’s got them, she stands up, darting towards where the car is parked.

Luca appears beside me, wiping his brow. “Raf’s getting the doc, but we need to go now.”

He’s right. I can hear the faint sirens in the distance, meaning we don’t have a lot of time. We need to disappear before anyone sees us. The last thing we want is more questions on top of the current accusations of dead bodies at the docks.

Together, Luca and I lift Giovanni. He slumps against us, still trying to stand. I admire his determination, but now isn’t the time for stubbornness. “Come on big fella,” I say, earning a scoff from Luca.

I hear the screeching of tires as Sera pulls up beside us in the SUV.

“You can drive?” Luca quizzes.

“Just because you insist on driving me around doesn’t mean I can’t do it myself. Now get the fuck in!”

“You’re trusting her to drive?” Luca questions me, but I’m already opening the door and slipping inside.

Luca slides Giovanni over the seat to me, and with a pained groan, I drag him inside. Once we’re inside, Giovanni drops into my lap. Luca runs around the side of the car, and before the passenger door is even closed, Sera is peeling out of the parking lot and into the dark streets of Iris Bay.

I lock eyes with Sera in the mirror, her eyes watery yet focused. I know she’s doing everything she can to keep it together right now. It can’t be easy reliving the same thing over and over. First Enzo, now Giovanni.

She snaps her attention back to the road, accelerating and swerving between slower cars as blue and red lights speed past us in the opposite direction. She’s silent and focused, skilled at driving in the same way as only one other person I know. Sera takes a sharp corner and I grab the overhead handle, keeping Giovanni and I as steady as possible.

Luca curses, but Sera just smiles.

“Where the hell did you learn to drive like this?” Luca asks.

“Enzo,” we both answer with a smile.

Her concentration shines through in that moment, and I’m immediately taken back to when we were kids and the three of us would sneak out, hitting the streets to get up to mischief.

Sera was always painted as the perfect Bianchi Princess, but Enzo and I knew her better. She was stubborn and rebellious, searching for liberation as much as possible. Her father forbade her from driving, telling her she would never need it in this life because people like Giovanni would always be under her foot, willing to take her anywhere she needed to go. But independence was something Sera always chased, and Enzo helped by always, always, providing opportunities for her.

That’s how I’ve come to realize that there is more to Sera than I ever thought. She’s a queen, that’s for sure, but she doesn’t need anyone. She’s more than capable of getting the job done when she sets her mind to it, but with her upbringing, she’s still become someone who should be revered.

Effortlessly, Sera maneuvers us out of the city and onto the back roads. She never lets her gaze wander from the road, keeping two hands on the steering wheel. I sense it’s for Luca’s benefit more than anyone else because he hasn’t let go of the door handle since we left the city.

“Someone came after us,” she states, decelerating once she realizes nobody is chasing us.

“Who?” Luca quizzes. “The Vultures? I fucking knew we shouldn’t have trusted them!”

“At this point, do you really need to ask?” She raises her brow at Luca before turning her attention back to the road. She whips the SUV around another corner, the vehicle moving so smoothly that if I closed my eyes, it would feel like we were floating.

“The Verdis.”

I look down at Giovanni, but his eyes are closed.

“What were you doing out there anyway?” I ask.

Sera huffs, picking up speed as we hit a hill. “My father pissed me off,” she admits.

“Why the fuck did you leave, though?” Luca interrogates. “We were right there with you, all you had to do was say you wanted to leave.”

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