Chapter 7 - The Second Shot
Dominic was released on bail forty-eight hours later.
His attorneys argued that Vanessa's confession was unreliable, the clinic gunmen had not yet identified their employer, and the recorded confrontation had been made in a private residence.
Vincent's lawyer warned him.
"Do not underestimate him."
Vincent looked at Tessa.
"I never will again."
The penthouse security doubled.
Tessa moved temporarily into a guest suite under an independent protection agreement arranged by counsel.
She was no longer an employee.
The difference changed everything.
She wore jeans to breakfast.
She argued with Vincent without calling him sir.
And when he tried to order her to stay away from the investigation, she laughed.
"You fired me. Remember?"
"I released you from employment."
"That's a very expensive way to say fired."
Vincent had not smiled so much in years.
Then the power went out.
It happened at 2:13 a.m.
Every light in the penthouse died at once.
Backup generators should have activated within three seconds.
They did not.
Vincent woke in darkness.
His phone had no signal.
The building's internal security system was dead.
He reached for the emergency radio clipped to the side of his bed.
Gone.
His blood ran cold.
The bedroom door opened.
"Tessa?"
No answer.
A shadow moved.
Vincent grabbed the metal lamp from his bedside table and swung.
The intruder blocked it.
A hand clamped over Vincent's mouth.
"Easy."
Dominic.
Vincent stopped struggling.
His cousin stepped into moonlight.
He looked exhausted.
Unshaven.
Dangerous.
"How did you get in?"
Dominic smiled.
"You think I spent fifteen years around this family without learning the building?"
Vincent's eyes went toward the door.
Dominic noticed.
"Your guards are busy downstairs."
"Tessa?"
"Safe."
Vincent stared at him.
Dominic added, "For now."
Rage moved through Vincent's chest.
"What do you want?"
"A signature."
Of course.
Dominic placed a document on the bed.
It authorized transfer of several private holdings to an offshore entity.
"You're finished," Vincent said.
"Maybe."
Dominic leaned close.
"But I'm not leaving empty-handed."
Vincent looked at the pen.
"And if I refuse?"
Dominic's hand moved to the back of Vincent's wheelchair.
"You know, stairs are dangerous."
Vincent's face went still.
Dominic smiled.
"Especially for men who can't stand."
A sound came from the hallway.
Dominic turned.
Tessa stepped into the doorway holding a fire extinguisher.
"Get away from him."
Dominic laughed.
"I told them to lock you in."
"They did."
"Then how—"
"I used the service bathroom vent."
Vincent blinked.
Even now, part of him wanted to laugh.
Dominic reached inside his jacket.
Tessa pulled the extinguisher trigger.
A violent cloud of white powder exploded across the room.
Dominic cursed.
Vincent grabbed the bedside lamp again and struck his wrist.
A gun hit the floor.
Tessa kicked it under the bed.
Dominic lunged toward her.
Vincent rammed his powered wheelchair forward.
The footplate slammed into Dominic's shin.
He stumbled.
Tessa swung the extinguisher.
It struck his shoulder.
He crashed into the wall.
For one chaotic second, nobody moved.
Then Dominic drew a second gun.
Vincent saw it first.
"Tessa!"
She turned.
The shot exploded.
Glass shattered.
Tessa fell.
Vincent's world stopped.
Dominic ran.
Vincent ignored him.
He drove the chair toward Tessa so quickly he struck the edge of the rug and nearly tipped.
"Tessa."
She was on the floor.
Blood darkened her sleeve.
His hands shook violently.
"Tessa, look at me."
Her eyes opened.
"It's my arm."
Vincent could not breathe.
"You're hit."
"Shoulder."
He reached for her, then stopped, terrified of hurting her.
She gave a weak smile.
"Now you know how I felt feeding you soup."
His laugh came out broken.
He pressed a towel against the wound.
The backup system suddenly activated.
Lights flickered.
Security alarms screamed through the building.
Guards rushed in.
Dominic was caught in the service stairwell seven floors below.
This time, police took him away in handcuffs.
No bail.
No private confrontation.
No family protection.
Tessa was taken to the hospital.
The bullet had passed through the upper arm without striking bone or major vessels.
Vincent sat beside her bed until sunrise.
Not as an employer.
Not as a mafia boss.
Not as a patient.
Just a man holding the hand of the woman who had saved his life twice.
At six in the morning, Tessa woke.
Vincent's head rested against the mattress.
She moved her fingers.
He looked up immediately.
"You're awake."
"You look terrible."
"So do you."
She smiled.
He did not.
His eyes filled.
Tessa's expression softened.
"Vincent."
"I thought you were dead."
"I'm not."
"I saw you fall."
"I'm here."
His grip tightened.
"I can't do that again."
She studied him.
"What?"
"Watch someone I care about become collateral damage because of my name."
Tessa understood what he was about to do.
"No."
He looked at her.
"You don't know what I'm going to say."
"Yes, I do."
"Tessa—"
"You're going to tell me to leave."
He said nothing.
She continued.
"You're going to decide that losing me would hurt, so you'll push me away before that can happen."
"I can protect you better if you're not near me."
"No. You can feel less afraid."
His jaw tightened.
"That's not the same thing."
Vincent looked toward the window.
Tessa squeezed his hand.
"My father spent his life letting Corvino men decide what was safe for my family."
Vincent flinched.
"Don't become another one."
He turned back.
"What do you want?"
"The choice."
"To stay?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
Her eyes filled.
"Because somewhere between hating your name and watching you learn to move your foot half an inch, I fell in love with you."
Vincent forgot how to breathe.
Tessa looked terrified now.
More frightened than when Dominic had entered with a gun.
She laughed shakily.
"That was not how I planned to say it."
Vincent stared at her.
"Tessa."
"If you don't feel the same—"
He leaned forward and kissed her.
Carefully.
Slowly.
Not like a man claiming something.
Like a man asking.
Tessa kissed him back.
When they separated, Vincent rested his forehead against hers.
"I love you too."
She closed her eyes.
He whispered, "And I hate that."
Tessa laughed.
"Very romantic."
"I mean I hate how much there is to lose."
She touched his face.
"That's what makes it real."
Vincent looked at her bandaged arm.
Then at his wheelchair.
Two people marked by bullets fired because someone wanted control.
Neither dead.
Neither finished.
He kissed her hand.
"Then we finish this together."
After their first kiss, Vincent and Tessa made a rule.
No secrets.
It lasted eleven hours.
At breakfast, Tessa asked, "How much pain are you in?"
Vincent said, "Three."
She stared.
He sighed.
"Six."
"That's a secret."
"That's optimism."
"That's lying with vocabulary."
Vincent smiled.
The truth was that pain had become part of his daily life.
Nerve pain burned through his legs even when he could not fully feel touch.
His back cramped.
His shoulders ached from transfers and chair use.
Before Tessa, he had hidden most of it because he thought pain made him look weak.
Now she refused to admire that performance.
"If you need medication, take it."
"It makes me tired."
"Then be tired."
"I have meetings."
"Reschedule them."
"I run companies."
"You also have a nervous system."
Vincent glared.
Tessa kissed his forehead.
"Very terrifying."
The intimacy was not glamorous.
It was medication schedules.
Scar massage.
Vincent asking for help getting into bed after a brutal therapy session.
Tessa admitting nightmares after being shot.
Some nights, she woke convinced Dominic was in the hallway.
Vincent never told her to calm down.
He turned on every light and checked every lock with her.
One night she apologized.
"I'm supposed to be the brave one."
Vincent frowned.
"According to who?"
She laughed.
"Good point."
Their relationship grew in the space where neither had to perform strength.
That made the later discovery of Salvatore's confession even more devastating.
Vincent feared the letter would end them.
After Tessa read it, she disappeared onto the balcony.
He waited.
Every instinct told him to explain.
Defend.
Separate himself from his father.
Instead, he let her feel what she felt.
When she finally returned, her eyes were red.
"I love you."
Vincent's throat tightened.
"But I still hate what your family did."
"I know."
"Both are true."
"I know."
"Can you live with that?"
Vincent thought about the question.
"Yes."
She sat beside him.
"Good."
He took her hand.
"Can you?"
Tessa looked at their fingers together.
"I think love that requires me to rewrite my father's story isn't love."
Vincent nodded.
"And love that requires me to pretend I'm innocent isn't either."
For a long time, they said nothing.
Then Tessa whispered, "Maybe that's why this has a chance."
After Dominic was taken away, Vincent made a decision about the penthouse.
He opened rooms that had been locked for years.
His father's old office.
A storage room full of ledgers.
A private cabinet only Salvatore and Vincent had keys to.
Tessa stood beside him as he opened the cabinet.
Inside were photographs, deeds, old passports, and envelopes marked with names.
One envelope said QUINN.
Vincent stopped breathing.
Tessa reached for it, then pulled her hand back.
"You open it."
"Why me?"
"Because if it contains something terrible, I don't want to learn it from a locked drawer alone."
Vincent opened the envelope.
Inside was a cashier's check never cashed.
Five hundred thousand dollars.
Payable to Anna Quinn.
There was also a note in Salvatore's handwriting.
For relocation. Never delivered. Anthony objected. I allowed him to stop it.
Tessa laughed bitterly.
"He was going to pay my mother?"
Vincent shook his head.
"Not pay. Move."
"And then he changed his mind."
"Yes."
Tessa looked at the check.
"Five hundred thousand dollars sat in a drawer while my mother worked nights cleaning offices."
Vincent had no defense.
He hated that there was always another layer.
Another choice his family had made for hers.
Tessa picked up the check.
"Can this still be honored?"
"No."
"Good."
She tore it in half.
Vincent did not stop her.
Then she tore it again.
And again.
The pieces fell across Salvatore's desk.
"I don't want his guilt."
Vincent nodded.
"What do you want?"
She looked around the office.
"I want this room gone."
Vincent raised an eyebrow.
"Gone?"
"Turn it into something useful."
Three months later, Salvatore Corvino's private office became the administrative center for the Michael Quinn Foundation.
The heavy desk was donated.
The locked cabinet was removed.
The wall where Salvatore's portrait once hung displayed photographs of rehabilitation patients and scholarship recipients.
When Marco saw it, he laughed for nearly a minute.
"Your father would haunt you."
May you like
Vincent looked around.
"Then he can watch."
