“Give her to me,” Greta said, putting out her arms to take the upset toddler. “Carrying her must be hard with your injuries.”
I let Anna go, then said, “But the guys were right behind me. Marco had to help Luca out from under a slab of the ceiling. Luca’s leg is badly broken, but Marco promised to get him out. He said he’d meet us here.”
“I’m sure they’re on their way then,” Rosa said touching my arm kindly, but her face remained afraid.
A woman firefighter approached us next, as other members of the brigade began to douse the blaze. “Did everyone get out? Is anyone missing?” she asked us.
“Luca and Marco Varasso haven’t made it over to us yet,” I said.
Greta added, “Francesca Salvatore is also missing.”
“All right. Everyone stay put. I’ll send some EMTs over to get you all some oxygen.”
I waited, thinking Marco’s bulky mass would show up any second with the man I loved slung across his back. But one minute passed and then two. Maybe it was Anna’s perpetual crying or maybe it was the cold fear that had seized my insides, but I began weeping, as well. And once I started, I couldn’t stop.
Rosa and Greta had tears streaking down their faces, as well, the moisture carving paths through the black soot that covered all of us from head to toe. A couple of ambulances arrived, and the paramedics put oxygen masks on our faces, telling us to breathe deep.
As hot as it had been inside the burning house, outside it was freezing. All of us started to shiver, and when a wind kicked up, it blew through me like an icy blade. The wind fed the fire, making flames shoot out of the windows on all three floors. The firefighters were forced back, and within moments, the whole building was consumed.
My silent tears became sobs, and I found I couldn’t stay on my feet. Someone caught me halfway down, but I had this horrible feeling. Though I didn’t want to give it voice, my mind kept coming to the same conclusion.
He and Marco should be here by now. And if they weren’t, that must mean…
But I couldn’t allow myself to believe that. After all we’d been through, I couldn’t lose Luca now. It wouldn’t be fair.
Yet I knew very well that life wasn’t always fair. In fact, it seldom was.
I stared at the architecture of the massive structure turned bright vengeful orange by ravaging flames and knew it heralded the end of an era. The end of the life the Varassos had built.
The end of my life as I’d come to know it.
I came to on a patch of frozen ground as a paramedic fussed over me, the oxygen mask still over my nose and mouth. I must’ve fainted. A male voice, Gabriel’s, carried over to me, the sound of it incensed. I concentrated my gaze on him, tuning in to what he was saying.
“This was an attack, plain and simple. I saw what came through the window. It was a grenade. Some asshole launched fucking grenades into our home. That’s military grade weaponry, so whoever this is should be easy to find. Be careful of the emergency assistance people, but if you see anyone suspicious, I want them captured. And if you can’t capture them, put a bullet in their brain.”
Alessandro’s voice then followed. “I’ve got two images from my motion detection app. The only person who got through was our usual delivery truck.” I looked over and saw him squinting as he tapped on his phone. He didn’t have his glasses. “And that person was Roman.”
I knew who Roman was. He was one of their runners, someone pretty low level. As soon as Alessandro mentioned his name, though, Gabriel spit in disgust, I’d never seen him so angry. “You think Roman is capable of all this? Isn’t his IQ like seventy or something?”
“I think so, but Marco suspected someone on the inside,” Alessandro said.
“But it doesn’t make sense. We need to know if anyone else had access,” Gabriel gesticulated jerkily as he talked, his voice growing sharper and more intense. “If there was any other way this could have happened. I mean, we had the whole area locked down tight. Now we’ve got two brothers missing, and…”
“Bro, I know,” Alessandro said, and I saw Gabriel lose it. His body shook for a second until he could get himself back together.
“We were prepared,” Gabriel bit out, his sorrow tinged by rage as he wiped his face with his fists. “We knew someone had snuck in under the radar. If it was Roman, we need to know precisely what he did. How he got a hold of a grenade launcher. How we didn’t see him coming.”
“You said it yourself, Gabriel,” I entered the conversation, my voice sounding way calmer than I felt, but my brain latched onto this excuse to problem solve. Applying logic felt a lot better than the useless weeping I’d done up till then. “We didn’t suspect him because he seems less than able. But if he was the only one who had access, it must be him.”
“I’ll beat him to death with my bare hands,” he said, and I agreed with his sentiment. I’d never committed murder before, but now I seriously considered it.
Everyone went quiet for a few minutes. The atmosphere was clouded by the horror of the situation, by the staggering amount of loss we were all feeling, and by the furious need we had for revenge. I felt desperate with it, with all of it.
I couldn’t breathe, but it wasn’t the smoke this time. It was the fear that I’d lost the love of my life. It was the fear that after finally getting to the place we needed to be, I’d lost him.
I’d lost Luca.
Suddenly, the radio of the paramedic hovering over me sprang to life. “We need two ambulances to the rear of the domicile. Two victims were just found stuck beneath a cave-in near the back entrance.”