Chapter 7 - Stitching Scars
The safehouse was a nondescript brownstone in Brooklyn Heights, hidden beneath the shadow of the bridge. Inside, it was fully equipped with sterile medical supplies—a grim necessity of the Moretti empire.
Alessandro sat on a leather examination chair, stripped to the waist. His chest and shoulders were a map of past violence—knife scars, old bullet wounds, and winding black ink that told the history of a decade at war. Now, a fresh, ugly gash seeped blood across his ribs.
The local syndicate doctor had laid out surgical needles, antiseptic, and thread before Marco pulled him outside to secure the perimeter, leaving Sophie alone with the needle.
"I can't do this," Sophie said, her hands shaking as she held the silver forceps. "I'm not a surgeon, Alessandro. I decode books!"
"You have the steadiest hands I’ve ever seen," Alessandro rasped, his voice thick with pain, but his gaze burning into hers with absolute trust. He took a long swig of bourbon directly from the bottle and placed his hands firmly on the arms of the chair. "Clean it. Stitch it. I trust you."
Sophie swallowed the knot of panic in her throat. She soaked a cotton pad with iodine and pressed it to the wound.
Alessandro’s muscles coiled like steel cables, his knuckles whitening on the leather, but he didn't cry out. He merely held her gaze, refusing to look away, anchoring himself to her steady breathing.
With trembling precision, Sophie guided the needle through the torn flesh. One stitch. Two. Her honey-blonde hair had fallen loose from its pins, brushing softly against his bare shoulder as she leaned over him. The intimacy was suffocating, raw, stripped of pretense.
"Why did you jump in front of me?" she asked quietly, tying off a knot. Her voice cracked. "You don't even know me. I'm just Julian’s daughter."
Alessandro looked at the top of her head, his eyes dark and heavy with unspoken truth. "When my brother Leo died, I thought I had lost the only part of myself that was human. For five years, I’ve been a machine running a war. But last night... when you stood in front of Camilla with that fire in your eyes..."
He reached up, his rough fingers brushing a loose lock of hair behind her ear. His touch sent a shiver straight to her core.
"...I saw someone who was worth dying for," he finished softly.
Sophie froze. Her hands rested against his warm, bare chest, feeling the heavy, rhythmic thrum of his heart. She looked up, her hazel eyes meeting his. The air between them was electric, charged with the sheer adrenaline of survival and something deeper, terrifyingly magnetic.
"You're a fool, Alessandro Moretti," she whispered, her fair face flushed with a rosy warmth that had nothing to do with fear.
"Probably," he murmured, his lips curving into a tired, genuine smile. "Now finish the job, doctor."
Ten minutes later, the wound was bandaged, and the room had grown quiet. Sitting on the low wooden table between them was the black walnut music box, its polished wood gleaming under the single lamp.
Sophie picked up her father’s notebook and opened the base of the music box. Inside was a brass dial marked with Roman numerals.
She turned the dial: *IV - IX - I - VIII.*
A soft *click* echoed in the quiet room.
The false bottom of the box sprang open. Resting inside was not a USB drive or a stack of cash, but a heavy iron key with a fractured tip—and a single folded letter written in Julian Dubois’s unmistakable, delicate cursive.
Sophie unfolded the paper, her breath catching in her throat as she read the opening line:
May you like
*“To my beloved Sophie, and to Alessandro—the son I never had.”*
***
