The compound gates rolled open on groaning metal, and Vito stepped through them like a ghost returning to its rightful haunt. Months in a cell had not diminished him—only sharpened the angles of his face, hollowed his silence into something lethal. His suit hung looser on him, not for lack of strength, but from sleepless nights spent carving escape in his mind.

Gravel shifted under his shoes. The guards froze the moment they saw him. Shoulders straightened. Eyes lowered. No one breathed wrong. His presence alone corrected them.

The courtyard smelled of damp stone and gun oil. He paused there, letting the cold air hit his skin. His jaw clenched as memory cut across his vision—your body on the marble floor, blood pooling beneath you, your breath shallow. The taste of rust in his mouth as they tore him away from you.

His fingers curled slowly. Even now, months later, he could still feel the ghost of your weight slipping from him.

“Where is my child?” he said. The words were soft, but the nearest guard flinched.

A cousin—Marco—approached with cautious reverence, head bowed, hands clasped behind his back. The younger man’s pulse fluttered in his throat. Even family feared The Silent.

“In your room,” Marco murmured. “Safe. Recovering still.”

Vito’s eyes narrowed. The word recovering dug under his skin like a blade. He brushed past the young man without another glance. The hall swallowed him—high ceilings, framed heritage photos, the muffled hum of generators. Family voices died as he passed. Every door opened before he touched it.

His pace was steady, but tension rolled through his shoulders like a storm about to break. Months of imagining you alone—hurt because someone had dared use you as bait—had left a simmering rage beneath his ribs. But above even the rage was fear. The one thing he’d never confess, not even to God.

He reached your door. Stopped. His hand hovered over the handle. For the first time since his arrest, breath left him uneven.

He pushed it open.

Dim light spilled over you—curled under blankets, the faint rise and fall of your chest proving life, proving he hadn’t failed entirely. The sight hit him harder than any prison fist. His knees nearly buckled from the relief.

He stepped inside, quiet as his namesake. The floor didn’t dare creak under him. He approached your bedside and stood over you, drinking in every inch—every bruise healed, every trace of the wound he hadn’t been there to protect you from.

His hand lifted slowly, hovering inches from your cheek before he allowed himself the touch—knuckles brushing lightly against your skin. Warm. Alive.

“Figlio mio…” The words slipped out like a confession. “I told you. I would come back.”

His thumb traced the faint scar where the bullet had grazed you. His eyes darkened with something old, violent, and sacred.

“You should never have bled without me to stop it,” he murmured. “Never.”

He sank into the chair beside your bed, elbows on his knees, hands clasped tight as if holding himself together. The compound was silent behind him; the world was locked out. Here, there was only the quiet rhythm of your breathing.

“When they took me,” he said, voice dropping lower, “I counted the seconds. Not until freedom. Until you. Every bar, every wall, every guard—none of it mattered. Only the moment I could see you again.”

He leaned back, letting exhaustion seep into his bones for the first time in months. His gaze never left you.

“When you wake,” he whispered, “you will not worry again. The rat who hurt you—he breathes now only because you needed healing more than he needed punishment.”

His jaw tightened.

“But I am home now.”

He reached out again, settling his hand over yours with a possessive, protective certainty.

“And I will never leave you behind again.”