Chapter 3 - The Wounded Men
Three months after that night, the cold reality of Dante’s world crashed violently into the quiet sanctuary of the penthouse.
It was past two in the morning when the heavy reinforced service doors slammed open. Two of Dante’s most trusted men were carried inside, bleeding heavily from gunshot wounds sustained near the South Side docks.
A private trauma doctor was rushed in to stitch them up in the lower medical suite, but once the surgical work was finished, the doctor packed his bags and left in a hurry, refusing to stay through the night. None of the guards were trained medics, and nobody else remained to monitor their spiking fevers or change their blood-soaked dressings.
So, driven by a quiet instinct I couldn't switch off, I stayed.
I rolled up my sleeves, boiled water, sterilized instruments, changed their bandages one by one, forced cool water past their cracked lips, and monitored their erratic heart rates until the digital monitors stabilized.
At exactly 3:15 in the morning, I was wiping down a basin when heavy, measured footsteps echoed down the sterile hallway.
Dante Moretti appeared in the doorway.
His custom suit jacket was gone, his silk tie was loosened, and a dark streak of dried blood smeared the white cuff of his rolled-up sleeve. He looked like an apex predator returning from a hunt, exhausted and lethal.
His dark eyes swept over the medical cot, then locked onto me.
“You should be home, Serena,” he said, his voice a low, gravelly rumble in the quiet night.
“They need someone watching their vitals, Mr. Moretti. Their fevers haven’t broken yet.”
“That isn’t your job description.”
“I know,” I replied steadily, refusing to look away from him.
His jaw tightened, and his dark eyes narrowed. “Then why in God’s name are you still here?”
“Because they’re hurt, and everyone else left.”
For several long, suffocating seconds, Dante simply stared at me. The harsh fluorescent light caught the sharp angles of his face, the dark stubble along his jaw, and the deep intensity of a man who was entirely unused to anyone defying his expectations.
Then, something shifted subtly in his expression.
For the first time since I had stepped foot inside his fortress, Dante Moretti wasn’t looking at me like I was hired staff.
May you like
He was looking at me like I was a real person.
And that was the exact moment everything began to change.
