Chapter 97
Nico
Nico leaned against the edge of the cold steel table, arms crossed over his chest, trying not to focus on the puddle of vomit congealing near the legs of the interrogation chair.
Nothing like a little light psychological warfare before dinner.
Lola sat just inches away, swinging her legs like a sugar–rushed preschooler waiting on juice and crackers–except this preschooler had mentally dismantled. a grown man with a sucker and some well–placed silence. She was still working the candy in one cheek like a cherry–flavored threat, lashes lowered, expression pure mischief.
“You good?” Nico asked, keeping it low. Casual. Like they weren’t standing in a glorified murder basement with some guy’s soul leaking out of him across
the floor.
She didn’t answer right away. Just tilted her head up, red sucker gleaming like a siren. “He. puked before the show even started,” she whispered. “Can you believe that? Amateur hour.”
Nico huffed. “You’re terrifying.”
“You’re welcome.”
He looked at her–really looked. Glitter smeared under her eyes. Goggle straps still on top of her head. The oversized shirt draped over her like a trophy she hadn’t decided if she was keeping yet.
She was absolute chaos. And yet somehow, still the calmest thing in the room. Like gravity bent to her instead of the other way around.
He didn’t get it. Not fully. But Enzo did. He’d seen that look in his best friend’s eyes–a look Nico thought only came once in a lifetime, if you were lucky.
And Enzo?
He was cursed lucky.
“You want me to stay?” he asked, a little quieter now. A little more real.
Lola blinked, like the question had caught her off guard. Then she smiled. “Nah. Go do the tough guy thing. I’ll hold down the snack table.”
He rolled his eyes. “You’re lucky I like you.”
As he pushed off the table, he muttered, “You did good, Lo.”
She didn’t answer. Didn’t have to. She was already back to watching Sprinkles like a predator debating dessert.
And as Nico walked away, he sent up a silent prayer that she always stayed on their side.
ཧ་ར་ཚ་
Because if not?
God help them if she ever wasn’t.
Enzo
Sprinkles was still trembling, barely able to hold himself upright as the last few strands of intel spilled from his mouth–names, hideouts, comms channels, burner routes. None of it useful. Not anymore. Jake had already fed them every name in the chain except the one that mattered. The one who gave the order.
Which meant Matty here?
1/4
Just a loose end.
Enzo watched the man crumple back against the chair, breathing ragged, face slick with sweat. He didn’t feel angry anymore. Or vengeful.
He just felt done.
Because none of this was enough.
Not when Lola had been taken.
Drugged.
Moved like cargo.
He should’ve been there.
He would be there next time.
“Anything else?” Dom asked, voice flat.
Sprinkles whimpered, shook his head. “I swear, I don’t know who ordered it. They just said grab the girl. Make it look clean. They didn’t tell me why–just that she’d be alone.”
And she had been. For all of twenty seconds.
Enzo’s jaw flexed. Not from rage–just the sharp memory of how fast the world had shifted. How the air had turned acid when he realized she was gone.
How he never wanted to feel that again.
Behind him, Jake stepped into the room, quiet and efficient. “No new names. No new files. Everything else is already in the system.”
Enzo nodded once, then glanced at Lola-
Still perched on the table like she was waiting for a game show to start. Legs swinging, sucker in her mouth, goggle straps pushed to the top of her head. An image he wanted burned into his retinas.
He was so fucking gone for her.
She caught his stare and grinned.
“Can we cut their throats or whatever it is you do, so we can go already?” she asked sweetly. “I’m over it. I wanna swim. Maybe grill some steaks. I deserve
steak. And a beer.”
The room went still.
Then-
Gino muttered, “Steak and murder. Classy.”
Even Dom cracked a grin.
But Enzo?
He didn’t smile.
2/4
Because somehow–by some miracle of fate or fury–she was still here.
Still his.
He moved toward her without realizing it, his body drawn like gravity had rules now and her name was carved into all of them.
When he reached her, he touched her face–just barely. A thumb to the corner of her mouth where cherry red lingered from the sucker.
“You’re here,” he murmured.
She blinked up at him, playful and wild and so fucking alive.
“Of course I’m here,” she said, like it was the dumbest thing he could’ve possibly said. “Where else would I be?”
Because there was no reality—no version of the universe–where he was letting her go.
His heart kicked hard.
He should’ve kissed her. Should’ve owned the feeling swelling in his throat like it was his birthright.
Instead-
“I fucking love-”
He bit it back.
Swallowed the word so hard it scorched his throat on the way down.
Too soon. Too much. Not here.
But it was already out-
It beat behind his ribs, thunderous and raw, louder than gunfire and heavier than blood.
Because this wasn’t the kind of love that simmered quiet in the background.
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