all
11:12 Thu, Jul 23, TJ
Chapter 252
Chapter 252
Isabella’s POV
The warehouse had fallen eerily quiet.
48
Only a few minutes earlier it had echoed with shouting, accusations, gunshots and the sound of my own heart threatening to burst out of my chest.
Now, there was only silence, the kind that came after a storm had finally passed.
After Alessia was gone, I hadn’t moved from Mateo’s side, uncaring of her lifeless body lying only a few feet away. Maybe it was shock, or maybe it was the utter relief that she would never be able to harm me or my son again, but I honestly felt to remorse or sadness for her whatsoever after everything she had done.
Ignoring her, 1 focused on Mateo. One of my hands remained gently tangled in his soft hair while the other rested over his tiny chest, as though I needed to feel every rise and fall of his breathing to convince myself he was truly here.
Dominic hadn’t left us either.
He stood a short distance away, speaking quietly into his phone, his gaze never straying far from us.
Within minutes, the door of the warehouse opened again and a doctor hurried inside with a small bag while Dominic’s men cleared a path for him.
“Please,” I said before the doctor had even reached us. “My son was drugged. Take a look at him.”
The doctor offered me a reassuring smile before kneeling beside Mateo, paying no heed to the dead bodies that lay around us. Clearly, this wasn’t the first time Dominic had called him to a place like this. “Of course.”
Those next few minutes felt longer than the past several hours combined.
He checked Mateo’s pulse, his blood pressure, his pupils, listened to his heartbeat.
I watched every movement with my breath caught somewhere painfully inside my chest.
Finally, the doctor looked up. “Mrs. Russo.”
I barely noticed the surname.
“Your son is stable.”
Relief flooded through me so suddenly my eyes filled with tears. “He is?”
The doctor nodded. “His vital signs are all normal. He appears to have been sedated, but not with anything that suggests an attempt to seriously harm him.”
My shoulders sagged.
“He should wake up naturally within the next few hours.”
I let out a shaky sob that sounded suspiciously like laughter. “Thank God.”
Beside me. I heard Dominic quietly exhale too.
It was the first full breath either of us had taken since arriving.
“I’d still like for you to observe him closely and get him medical attention should anything change, the doctor continued
23
O
GRA
11:12. Thu, Jul 23 TJ
Chapter 252
gently. “But at the moment, I don’t see any indication of permanent harm”
“Thank you so much.”
The doctor gave us both a sympathetic nod before gathering his equipment. “If anything changes before he wakes, ger ham medical attention immediately.”
“We will,” Dominic replied.
As the doctor disappeared through the warehouse doors, I leaned forward and kissed Mateo’s forehead.
“You gave Mama the biggest scare of her life,” I whispered. “You’d better wake up soon so I can tell you off properly”
A small laugh escaped Dominic, fragile but real.
It made something inside me unclench.
One by one, the warehouse slowly emptied.
Dominic instructed several of his men to secure the scene. They took away the bodies of two of Alessia’s men who had been killed.
Luca was carefully lifted onto a stretcher next.
I looked at him for a long moment, my heart feeling strangely heavy.
He had betrayed me, manipulated me, helped kidnap my son and yet, looking at him lying there unconscious, I couldn’t bring myself to hate him completely.
He had been wrong, terribly wrong.
But somewhere along the way, he had become just another person Alessia had twisted into something he was never meant to be.
Dominic looked towards two of his guards. “Take him to the hospital.”
They nodded immediately.
“Make sure he gets treated.”
“Yes, Boss.”
Within another minute, they were gone.
Soon, the warehouse emptied as Dominic’s men filed out, leaving the three of us and Eduardo behind. I noticed how Alessia’s body still remained within the warehouse. I frowned. Was Dominic planning on leaving her body here?
I looked up to ask Dominic about it only to see him looking at Eduardo.
“Everything ready?”
Eduardo gave a single nod. “It is.”
My frown deepend.
Ready?
Before I could ask what either of them meant, Dominic looked at me.
1215
23
OR
11:12 Thu, Jul 23 TJ
Chapter 252
His expression had changed.
There was something strangely calm about him now. Almost resolved.
“Isa, do you trust me?” Dominic asked.
I blinked. “What?”
He took another step closer. “Do you trust me?”
I frowned harder. “Dominic, what kind of a question is that?”
“Answer me.”
There was no hesitation in my reply. “Of course I trust you.”
His eyes softened. “I needed to hear you say it.”
I reached for his hand instinctively. “I’ve trusted you for a long time. Even when I was angry with you. Even when I wanted to leave. That was never the problem.”
A flicker of emotion crossed his face. “I know.” He squeezed my fingers gently. “Then I need you to trust me one more time.
Something in his voice made my pulse quicken again. “What do you mean?”
“I need you to do exactly what I say.”
Confusion settled over me. “Okay?”
He glanced briefly towards Eduardo before looking back at me. “This warehouse has a secondary exit.
I frowned. “What?”
“We use it in emergencies. It opens into the alley behind the building,” he spoke calmly, matter-of-factly. “From there, there’s a route through several connecting alleys. Nobody outside the organization knows about it. It leads directly to the road heading towards the airport.”
Airport?
I stared at him, not understanding.
Then, very slowly, the pieces began falling into place.
The airport.
The back exit.
The urgency in his voice.
My heart skipped a beat. “Dominic…”
He held my gaze. “You and Mateo are leaving on the early morning flight just like you had planned.”
For a second, I simply looked at him, unable to speak, a hundred questions running through my mind at once.
Alessia was dead. We knew the why behind every question we had had. Did we still have to live apart? Could we not stay together now?
But then again, the mafia life was something I’d never wanted even though I’d been essentially born into it because of my
385
23
OR
11:12 Thu, Jul 23
Chapter 252
family. I had always wanted to stay as far away from it as possible. It was this life that had taken my parents away from me. This life that had caused me and Mateo so much stress, put Mateo’s life in danger again and again.
Sure. Alessia and all threats related to her were gone, but who was to say there wouldn’t be another enemy tomorrow? Who was to say that someone who wanted something from Dominic wouldn’t go after what Dominic loved the most aka his family?
If it was just me, I wouldn’t have given it a second thought before deciding to stay. But it wasn’t just my life on the line now? It was my son’s too. And I didn’t want him to grow up looking over his shoulder all the time like I had, like Dominic had 1 wanted a normal life for my son.
And nothing about life in the mafia was normal.
This was my chance to leave all that behind. My only chance.
And I was going to take it.
My thoughts raced. “But my passport, the tickets, our documents, they’re all still back at the apartment. I can’t-
“They aren’t.”
I stopped speaking.
He smiled faintly. “I moved everything.”
My brows knitted together. “You did?”
VERIFYCAPTCHA_LABEL
Comments
The readers' comments on the novel: His Ruthless Redemption (Isabella and Dominic)