Chapter 5 - The Devil’s Bargain
The rain battered the dark windows of the Winnetka estate as Clare’s black SUV rolled through the iron gates. Her hands were ice-cold inside the pockets of her coat. Every bump in the road felt like a countdown.
When Gabriel opened the door for her, his sharp eyes instantly scanned her face. He noted the pale skin, the dark circles under her eyes, the rigid set of her shoulders. He didn't say a word, but his hand hovered closer to his holster than usual.
"You look like you've seen a ghost," Gabriel said as he led her down the long, mahogany-paneled hallway toward Sebastian’s study.
"I'm fine," Clare lied, her voice tight and strained.
When they entered the room, Sebastian was waiting by the fireplace. He wasn't in his wheelchair.
Clare stopped dead in her tracks, her breath catching in her throat.
Sebastian Lombardi was standing.
It was a shaky, agonizing spectacle. He was gripping the heavy oak mantelpiece with both hands, his knuckles stark white, his legs trembling violently beneath him like two dry twigs trying to bear the weight of a collapsing bridge. But he was standing. His dark eyes burned with a fierce, triumphant fury as he looked at her.
"Look at this," Sebastian gritted out, a triumphant, breathless smile breaking across his patrician face. "Forty-two years old, and I'm learning how to walk again like a toddler."
Clare stared at him, the weight of the phone call pressing down on her chest like a physical anvil. In her coat pocket, tucked inside a small velvet pouch she hadn't opened, sat the tiny glass vial of neurotoxin that a Moretti operative had left on her doorstep forty minutes before she left her apartment. All she had to do was slide her thumb into the massage oil, press the needle deep into his L4 vertebra while he stood there, and the war would be over. Sebastian would collapse, his lungs would fail, and the Moretti family would own the city.
And Oliver would live.
Sebastian let out a ragged breath, his knees buckling slightly. Gabriel moved instantly, catching him by the elbow and easing him back down into the titanium wheelchair before he could crash to the floor. Sebastian slumped into the seat, breathing hard, sweat pouring down his temples, but his eyes were blazing with victory.
"Next week," Sebastian panted, looking up at Clare with absolute trust. "Next week, I'm taking three steps. Because of you. You gave me my life back, Clare."
May you like
Clare looked down at her hands. They were steady. But inside, her soul was tearing apart.
She opened her medical bag, pulled out her arnica oil, and stepped toward him, knowing that whatever she chose in the next thirty seconds, there was no turning back.
