28. Ezra

Chapter twenty-eight

Ezra

The steady beep... beep... beep of the heart monitor echoes distantly, slowly pulling me into consciousness.

My eyes peel open as I blink harshly against the dim lighting overhead. My body feels too heavy. A sharp pain shoots through my chest, my muscles protesting against each movement as I struggle to get up. How long have I been sleeping?

I tear my gaze from the ceiling, scanning the room. Medical supplies are scattered around, and the IV pole is a few meters away from my bed. I'm in the stitch room… but how did I—

Suddenly, memories crash into me. Enzo. The strange men. Getting shot.

The door creaks open, and Elio strides in.

“Elio…” my voice cracks, dry, rough, and barely audible.

In an instant, he’s by my side, his face hovering over mine.

“Boss… finalmente sei sveglio (finally, you’re awake).” A look of relief crosses his tired eyes. “Let me call the doctor,” he says, and starts to pull away.

“ Quanto tempo (How long)…” My throat feels like sandpaper. I have to swallow a few times to get the words out. “How long have I been out?”

Elio pauses, glancing back. “ Sette giorni (Seven days),” the words scrape out, his voice low. “You’ve been drifting in and out the past two, so nine days in total.”

Nine days! I feel a headache coming on. I’ve been out for nine days? My chest constricts at the thought, but before I can fully process it, another cuts through my mind.

“What about Rav—” I start to ask, but Elio’s already gone.

In a minute, Elio returns with Doctor Taylor. I raise a brow in Elio’s direction at this but remain silent.

“Good to see you awake, Ezra,” Doctor Taylor says, as he stands beside me, reaching for his penlight. “Let’s check a few things…”

I endure the routine exam, my patience thinning out as Taylor examines my chest and other vitals.

“You’re recovering better than expected,” the doctor comments, adjusting the drip. “Although, you still need to rest.”

I nod slowly, but as soon as he leaves the room, my attention snaps back to Elio.

“ Dov’è Raven (Where’s Raven)?” I ask, my voice sharper than before.

Elio stiffens. The lines of his face tighten as his eyes fall to the floor. The hesitation that flickers in his eyes tells me it’s bad.

“She’s… gone.” His voice is quiet, like he’s breaking bad news to a dying man.

Gone?

My heart stutters in my chest, a searing pain gripping me as I watch him. “ Cosa intendi con ‘andata’ (What do you mean ‘gone’)?”

Elio sighs, stepping closer to the bed.

“She escaped the day you were brought in injured,” he says, carefully.

I sit up quickly, ignoring the stabbing pain that shoots through my chest.

“That’s impossible!” I snap, my head spinning from the sudden movement. “ Raven non se ne andrebbe così (Raven wouldn’t just leave like that).”

“ Se n'è andata (She did),” Elio is gentle, even though his voice remains firm. “I spoke to the guards myself. She told them she was going to get medical supplies for your surgery, but… she never came back.”

The glint in his eyes shifts and I see the slight clench in his jaw. “We found the car she rode out by the side of the road,” he says, digging into his pocket.

My heart races as I watch his hand reappear with a small white card. “We found this in the car. She had help.”

No.

He hands me the card and breathing suddenly feels difficult as I collect it and scan it. There's a number in the center. Fuck.

“No.” I grip the sheets tightly until my knuckles turn white.

No. Raven wouldn’t leave me…. She wouldn't do this to me. Not now, not after I told her about my past trauma, and definitely not when we were excited about our baby.

“There’s no way she’d do this!”

Elio moves closer, his hands clamping down on my shoulder as I try to get out of bed. “Ezra, stop. You’re still recovering. You should focus on that.”

“Get your hands off me,” I snap again, jerking free from his grip. My legs suddenly feel like jelly, and the pain in my chest flares.

“ De- devo trovarla ( I need to find her),” I stutter, suddenly feeling weak.

She can't just leave… she might be in danger.

“We will,” Elio reassures, gently guiding me back onto the mattress. “But for now, we can’t. The number on that card isn’t reachable or traceable. Same with her number.”

Once my head touches the pillow, my mind races with possible worst scenarios. This doesn’t make sense… any of it. She wouldn't just disappear. She must’ve had a reason.

Perhaps the stranger lured her, or worse, she’s been kidnapped. The urge to yank out this drip and turn the whole world upside down till I find her is overwhelming. I'm halfway through yanking out the cannula when it hits me.

If she had a contact card, it means she’d spoken to someone on one of the days she visited the outside world. Fuck. I shoot up immediately, ignoring the ache in my body.

“Elio,” I say, my voice more controlled now. “Bring me the CCTV footage from when she went into town. I need to know where she’s been and who the fuck she spoke to.”

He eyes me carefully before nodding. Taking out his phone, his fingers fly over the keypad. “I’ve got our guys on it,” he says, after a beat.

I clench my fist, my vision blurring as dizziness starts to overwhelm me but I manage to ignore it.

“And the shootout that day? Did you get to find out what happened with Enzo?” My gaze locks on him.

“Ezra… I have it under control. For now, you only have to worry about recoveri—”

I interrupt him with a hiss. “My family is under attack. There’s no way I’d just stay put.”

“Boss…”

“Elio… updates,” I snarl at him.

He glances between the heart monitor and me, and then sighs in defeat.

“Okay, the shootout,” Elio begins, stepping closer again. “When we went back to clean up after bringing you here, we found one of Enzo’s men. He’d been knocked out cold during the fight.”

“And?”

“We interrogated him,” he continues, weighing his words. “He talked. Said Enzo was coerced to set you up with the meeting… by a man named Smerti.”

“Smerti!” The name coils in my gut.

Elio nods. “Enzo was smart enough to tell his guy to snap a photo of this Russian fellow.” He draws closer, holding the phone to my face. “It’s blurry, but we’re still on it…”

“Still on it? You’ve had nine days,” I deadpan, as I collect the device.

The image is fuzzy, but I can make out the man with a thick blonde beard. He’s in a business suit, smoking a pipe while in a deep discussion with someone on the other side of the photo. I assume that someone was Enzo.

There’s a glint in his eyes. They seem familiar.

“So you’re Tsvetok Smerti,” I murmur, and zoom in to study the photo closely.

Elio leans over, peering at the picture, too. “His smile tugs at the back of my mind, but I can’t figure out why.”

Slitting my eyes, I reach out and cover the beard with my hand. My brows furrow as the man becomes even more familiar. “Matteo…” His name pops into my head. “Elio, grab the picture of Matteo for me.” My heart races as I squint at the picture.

Elio covers the distance in and out of the room in seconds and hands the worn-out paper to me. I look intently at both men, their features aligning remarkably.

“This man looks so much like Matteo… Could it really be him?” I voice, as I look from one picture to the other.

Elio frowns, disbelief clear in his voice. “Matteo? No way he’s alive.”

Anyone taken by the American cartel is never seen alive again. I searched for him for years with no success. There’s no way he survived.

I grind my teeth. “I could be wrong. The picture’s too blurry to say for sure,” I conclude, pushing aside the memories of that incident from fifteen years ago that the name Matteo drags up.

My mind spins as I stare at the picture again. I can’t shake the uneasy feeling in my gut. Just then, Elio’s phone pings, pulling me out of my thoughts.

“The footage,” he says, clearing his throat as he pulls up a chair beside the bed.

He holds the phone up sideways so we can both see. Then he clicks on the play button. The time stamp shows it’s the first day I let Raven out of the mansion.

My heart pounds harder when Elio fast-forwards, stopping when Raven enters the frame. She moves through the aisles, grabbing medical supplies. But then, she pauses at one shelf, glancing around before discreetly slipping a pregnancy kit into her basket, burying it beneath other items. I let out a quiet chuckle, unable to help myself.

From the corner of my eye, I see Elio raise a brow at me. I clear my throat and continue watching when I see Raven pause in her shopping.

She glances toward the corner of the store, hidden from the camera. Her lips move, murmuring something under her breath, and her eyes flick nervously between the door and whatever she’s staring at off-screen. Something is definitely off.

“Can we get another angle? Something that shows what she’s looking at?” I ask, my frown deepening.

Elio swipes through the video files, fingers moving quickly. “Let me see...” A few seconds later, he pulls up more footage. “Ah, here it is.”

The footage, this time, captures a man standing a few feet from Raven, his face coming into sharp focus. I lean in closer, my heart pounding in my chest.

“Elio…” I barely breathe the words.

“ Mio Dio, è lui (My God, it is him),” he whispers, his voice grim.

The beard and build matches the man in the blurry photo. His face is more rugged, but I recognize him. It’s Matteo. He’s alive. Alive and with Raven.

“Elio,” I say, my voice tight with rage. “Find him.”

I glance at the footage once again. “Track them both. I believe if we find one, we’ll find the other.”

“ Sì, Capo (Yes, Boss).” Elio nods, already turning to leave.

But just as he reaches the door, a wave of dizziness hits me hard. My vision begins to blur, and I frown, confusion flooding my mind as Elio seems to spin in front of me.

“Elio…” My words drag out as I lift my hand, extending it towards him.

“Boss…?” He turns around, his voice echoing like I’m underwater.

Elio blurs further and I shake my head in an attempt to clear the fog clouding my vision.

“I don't… feel right…” My words slur as my body stumbles to the side.

The last thing I see is Elio running towards me, everything slowing down.