The engine's last cough faded into the slap of water against the hull. Tisha sat with her knees drawn up, arms wrapped around her shins, the whitewashed dock still slick with dawn moisture. She'd been here since the sky was charcoal, since before the first birds, since the moment she'd slipped out of the apartment while Santiago still breathed soft and even in his bed.

The ultimatum played on a loop behind her eyes. His flat tone. The way he'd said it like he was reading a contract clause, not threatening to take her son. Two days, Tisha. You come willingly, or I take him by force. You know I can.

She did know. That was the worst part. She knew exactly what Pete Bianchi could do, had seen the proof in a basement in Queens, had watched him slit a man's throat and wipe the blade on his own handkerchief like he was cleaning a spoon.

The boat shifted under her, a gentle roll that made the rope line creak against the cleat. She'd taken the little skiff out before sunrise, not to go anywhere—the engine was off, the anchor thrown—but just to be off the land. To be somewhere he wasn't. The apartment felt small now, poisoned by his presence, his cologne still hanging in the stairwell like a claim.

Santiago had asked about the man again this morning. Mama, why did the man look like my daddy? She'd told him the man was nobody, just a stranger who'd made a mistake. But Santiago had Pete's gray eyes, and they'd gone stubborn the way Pete's did, and he'd said, He didn't look like a mistake.

Two years old and already he could see through her.

The sun was breaking over the water now, a hard white line spreading across the surface like a crack in glass. She watched it without seeing it. Her mind kept testing options the way a tongue tests a broken tooth—running, hiding, calling someone, begging, threatening—and every one of them collapsed against the weight of what she knew.

Calling someone. The police? He owned the police. The FBI? She'd sent Dana everything, and Pete was still free, still standing on her doorstep with tears in his eyes and a threat on his tongue. The journalist's story had run, and nothing had happened. Nothing. He'd bought a restaurant next to her office like it was a parking ticket.

Hiding. She could take Santiago somewhere with no airports, no ferries, no name. But she'd tried that. He had resources she couldn't even imagine, reach that extended across oceans, patience that had waited two years without breaking.

A seagull cried overhead, sharp and mocking. Tisha pressed her forehead to her knees.

There was no way out. That was the truth she'd been circling since his words landed. No way out that didn't end with Santiago in his hands, and if Santiago was in his hands, then she was in his hands, and if she was in his hands—

She whispered her son's name under her breath. Just the sound of it. A prayer she didn't believe in.

Two days. She had two days to decide something she'd already decided, because there was only one answer that kept Santiago safe. The choice was already made. She was just standing at the edge of it, afraid to step off.

The hull creaked as she shifted her weight, her bare feet cold against the fiberglass. She'd left the apartment without shoes, without a jacket, wearing only a thin sundress that was already damp with sea air. She hadn't thought about what she was wearing. She'd just needed to move, to be somewhere the walls weren't closing in.

She thought about her mother, Rosa, in Quezon City. Rosa who'd asked, Is he there? with a tremor in her voice, who knew enough to be afraid but not enough to understand. Pete's men watched her. They'd always watched her. That was the leash he'd held over Tisha from the beginning—not just her career, not just her freedom, but the people she loved.

She thought about Kaira in Anchorage, with her big fluffy dog and her warm smile, who didn't know anything about Pete or Santiago's father, who thought Tisha was just a woman who'd had a complicated past. She'd never get to see that dog now. She'd never get to sit on Kaira's porch and watch the northern lights and pretend she was just a person with a normal life.

The rope line swayed with the boat's motion, a slow pendulum against the whitewashed planks. She watched it move, timing her breath to it. In. Out. The creak of the hull. The slap of water. The smell of diesel and brine, mixing with the morning heat that was already starting to burn the chill off her skin.

She remembered the first time she'd seen him. The runway, the lights, the way his cold gray eyes had locked onto her from the shadows and she'd felt it like a hand on her throat. She'd been eighteen. She'd thought it was excitement. She'd thought it was the thrill of being seen.

She knew better now. She knew what being seen by Pete Bianchi meant. It meant being owned. It meant being claimed, and kept, and used, and then—when you tried to leave—it meant being hunted.

And now it meant her son.

The sun was fully up now, a hard white coin over the water. The dock was coming alive—a fisherman somewhere in the distance, the hum of a motor starting up, the smell of coffee drifting from a café she couldn't see. Normal sounds. Normal morning. She sat in the middle of it, barefoot and hollow, watching her life split into two paths that both ended in the same place.

She could fight him. She could take Santiago and run again, disappear into a country with no extradition, no name, no trace. She could spend the rest of her life looking over her shoulder, teaching her son to lie about who he was, watching him grow up afraid of a man he'd never really known.

Or she could go with him. Willingly. She could walk off this boat, back to the apartment, pack her things, and let him take them somewhere—New York, Italy, wherever he kept his cages now. She could give him what he wanted and hope that what he wanted included keeping Santiago safe, keeping Santiago whole, keeping Santiago hers.

She knew which choice was safer. She knew which choice was smarter. She just didn't know if she could survive the cost of either one.

The hull creaked again. She lifted her head, wiping her face with the back of her hand—she hadn't realized she was crying. The tears had come without permission, the way they always did when she let herself think about Santiago's gray eyes, about the way he pointed at a stranger in an airport and said, He looks like my daddy.

She'd lied to him. She'd told him the man couldn't come with them. She'd taken his hand and walked toward the gate, feeling Pete's gaze on her back like a brand. And she'd thought, This is it. This is the last time. He'll let us go.

But Pete Bianchi had never let anything go. Not a grudge, not a debt, not a woman who'd run from him. He'd waited two years, and then he'd bought a restaurant, and then he'd stood on her doorstep with tears in his eyes and told her he'd seen his son.

And then, a week later, he'd given her an ultimatum.

A week. She'd spent a week trying to win him over, trying to soften him, trying to find the crack in his armor that would let her keep Santiago and keep her freedom. She'd cooked him dinner. She'd listened to him talk about the restaurant. She'd let him sit in her living room and watch Santiago play, his gray eyes tracking the boy's every move with a hunger that made her skin crawl.

Nothing had worked. He'd been patient, courteous, almost gentle—and every day, the gentleness had felt like a trap closing. Every day, she'd seen the deadline approaching like a wall.

And now it was here. Two days. She could feel the countdown ticking in her chest, in the hollow where her heart used to be.

The sound of footsteps on the dock made her go still.

She didn't look up. She knew the rhythm of those steps—deliberate, measured, the gait of a man who'd never had to hurry for anyone. The rope line stopped swaying as the boat shifted under his weight, the hull creaking a low protest as he stepped onto the deck.

His shadow fell across her, long and dark, cutting through the morning light. She could smell his cologne—the same scent that had haunted her apartment for two weeks, the same scent she'd woken to for a week of nights in his bed, two years ago, when she'd thought she could survive him.

She kept her eyes on the water.

He stood there a long moment, not speaking. The seagull cried again, circling overhead. The water slapped against the hull. She could feel him looking at her, could feel the weight of his gaze like a physical thing, pressing down on her bare shoulders.

"Time's up, Tisha."

His voice was flat. No pleading, no softness. This was the Pete Bianchi the world knew—the man who broke bones and signed death warrants, who'd never learned to earn something honestly because he'd never had to ask twice.

She lifted her head.

The sun was behind him, rimming his silhouette in white light. She couldn't see his face clearly, but she didn't need to. She knew the gray of his eyes, the granite of his jaw, the hunger in his hands that he'd never quite learned to hide.

She held his gaze for a long moment, letting the silence stretch between them like a rope pulled taut. The boat rocked gently beneath her, and somewhere behind him a fishing boat's horn sounded, distant and indifferent to the weight of what hung in the air.

"You said two days." Her voice came out steadier than she felt. "It's been two days."

"I know what I said." He didn't move. His shadow stayed fixed across the deck, cutting her off from the sun. "I also know you've been sitting on this boat since before sunrise, trying to find a way out I haven't already closed."

She should have denied it. Should have told him he was wrong, that she'd just needed air, that she wasn't the kind of woman who ran from hard conversations. But she'd spent two years learning that lying to Pete Bianchi was like lying to a mirror—he always saw the truth reflected.

"Santiago's asleep," she said instead. "He doesn't know I'm gone."

"I know. I checked on him before I came."

The words landed like a slap. She gripped the edge of the fiberglass seat, her knuckles going white. "You went into my apartment."

"I went to see my son." He said it simply, without apology, as if he had every right. "He sleeps with his mouth open. Makes a small sound, like a kitten. He's got your lashes—long, dark. He'll break hearts with those."

Her throat closed. She didn't want him to know these things. Didn't want him to have seen Santiago curled in his bed, soft and trusting, didn't want him to have stood over her son in the dark like some kind of guardian or predator—she couldn't tell which anymore.

"You shouldn't have done that."

"I shouldn't have done a lot of things." He took a step closer, the boat shifting under his weight. "But I'm here now, and I'm not going anywhere. The question is whether you're going to make this hard or make this easy."

She laughed—a short, hollow sound that surprised her. "Easy. You want easy. You've spent two years hunting me across three continents, you've threatened my mother, you've bought a restaurant just to stand next to my office and watch me—and now you want easy?"

"I didn't say I wanted it. I said the question is whether you're going to make it."

The distinction was pure Pete—cold, precise, leaving no room for argument. She'd forgotten that about him, or maybe she'd never let herself remember. The way he could take something warm and human and reduce it to a transaction, a calculation, a line item on a ledger.

"And if I say no?" she asked. "If I tell you to get off this boat and leave us alone?"

He was quiet for a moment. The seagull cried again, circling lower now, as if it too wanted to hear his answer.

"Then I take him," he said. "Not today. Not tomorrow. But someday, when you least expect it, you'll turn around, and he'll be gone. And you'll spend the rest of your life wondering if he's safe, if he's happy, if he remembers you. I'll make sure he doesn't."

The threat was so matter-of-fact, so delivered in the same tone he might use to order a coffee, that it took her a moment to understand what he'd actually said. When she did, the cold that flooded her wasn't the morning chill—it was something deeper, something that reached into her bones and squeezed.

"You'd take my son." Her voice cracked on the word. "You'd take Santiago from me."

"If you force me to." He said it without triumph, without cruelty. Just a statement of fact, the way he'd once told her the sky was gray or the water was cold. "I don't want to. I want you to come willingly. I want to walk into that apartment and watch him wake up and see his mother and his father in the same room for the first time. But I've learned that I don't always get what I want. So I'll take what I can get."

"That's not taking. That's stealing."

"It's the same thing when you have the power to do it."

She wanted to hit him. Wanted to launch herself across the deck and claw at his face, to make him feel a fraction of the fear he'd just poured into her chest. But she'd seen what happened to people who fought Pete Bianchi. She'd watched him slit a man's throat and wipe the blade on his own handkerchief, and she'd learned that violence only made him more determined.

"Why?" she asked, and her voice came out smaller than she wanted. "Why do you even want us? You could have anyone. You've had anyone. Women throw themselves at you, and you've never once had to ask. Why me? Why Santiago?"

He was quiet for so long she thought he wasn't going to answer. The boat rocked, the water slapped, the sun climbed higher, burning the chill off her bare shoulders. She watched his silhouette, waiting, and when he finally spoke, his voice was different—lower, rougher, like the words were being dragged out of him.

"Because you're the only thing I've ever wanted that I couldn't just take." He took a step closer, and now she could see his face—the granite jaw, the gray eyes that held something she'd never seen in them before. "And Santiago—he's proof that something good came out of me. Proof that I'm not just the man in that basement, the man who breaks bones and signs death warrants. He's the only thing I've ever made that isn't broken."

The confession hung between them, raw and unexpected. She'd spent two years telling herself he was a monster, that everything about him was cold and calculated and cruel. And now he was standing on her boat, in the morning light, telling her that her son was the only good thing he'd ever created.

She didn't know what to do with that. Didn't know how to hold it without it cutting her.

"You can't just show up and decide you're his father," she said, but her voice had lost its edge. "You can't buy a restaurant and watch us for two weeks and think that makes you a parent."

"I know." He crouched down, bringing himself to her level, and the move was so unexpected that she went still. "I know I missed the first two years. I know I have no right to walk in and claim him. But I'm not asking for a right, Tisha. I'm asking for a chance."

"A chance." She repeated the word like it tasted strange. "You gave me an ultimatum. You threatened to take my son. And now you're asking for a chance?"

"I'm asking you to come with me. Willingly. To let me prove that I can be what he needs. That I can be what you need." He reached out, and his scarred knuckles brushed her knee—the lightest touch, barely there. "I know I've given you every reason to say no. But I'm asking anyway."

She looked down at his hand on her knee, at the scars that mapped his violence, and thought about all the ways this could go wrong. She thought about her mother in Quezon City, watched by his men. She thought about the basement in Queens, the blood on the floor, the man named Miguel who'd begged for help she couldn't give. She thought about Santiago's gray eyes and his stubborn chin and the way he'd pointed at a stranger in an airport and said, He looks like my daddy.

And she thought about the truth she'd been circling since his words landed: that there was only one answer that kept Santiago safe. Only one answer that kept them together.

"If I say yes," she said slowly, "what does that look like? Where do we go?"

"I have a house in Sicily. Quiet. Remote. No one will bother us." He kept his hand on her knee, warm and heavy. "You'll have your own room if you want it. Santiago will have a yard to run in, a beach to play on. I'll hire a tutor, a nanny—whatever you need."

"And if I want to leave?"

His jaw tightened. "You won't."

"That's not an answer."

"It's the only answer I have." He met her eyes, and for a moment she saw something flicker there—something almost like fear. "I can't promise you a door that opens, Tisha. I can only promise you that I'll try to make you want to stay."

The boat rocked gently, the water slapping against the hull in a rhythm she'd been timing her breath to all morning. She looked at his hand on her knee, at the scars and the strength in it, and thought about how many times she'd dreamed of being free of him. How many nights she'd lain awake in Mykonos, Santiago asleep in the next room, telling herself she'd escaped, she was safe, he'd never find her.

And now he was here. On her boat. In her morning. Asking her to walk into his world with her eyes open.

"Two days," she said, and the words felt like stepping off a cliff. "You gave me two days. I want two more. To pack. To say goodbye to this life. To explain to Santiago that we're going on an adventure."

He studied her for a long moment, his gray eyes searching her face. She could see him weighing the risk, calculating whether she'd use the time to run again. She held her breath, waiting.

"Two days," he said finally. "But I'll be watching. And if you try to run—"

"I know." She cut him off, not wanting to hear the rest. "You'll take him."

"No." He shook his head slowly, and something in his voice made her look up. "If you run, I'll follow. I'll find you again, and again, and again. But I won't take him from you. I want you to come to me because you chose to, not because I forced you."

The words landed somewhere deep in her chest, unexpected and unwelcome. She'd spent two years building a wall of fear and anger around everything she felt about Pete Bianchi, and he was chipping at it with every sentence.

"Why?" she asked again, and this time the question was different. "Why does it matter if I choose it?"

He was quiet for a moment, his hand still warm on her knee. When he spoke, his voice was rough, almost reluctant.

"Because everything else in my life, I took. I never earned a single thing that mattered. And I think—" He stopped, swallowed, started again. "I think if you come to me because you have to, I'll never know if you could have loved me. And I need to know."

The confession hung in the air between them, fragile and raw. She looked at him—this man who'd broken bones and signed death warrants, who'd threatened her mother and trapped her in a cage of his own making—and saw something she'd never seen before.

A man who was afraid.

Not of her, not of the police, not of the consequences of his violence. Afraid of something much simpler, much more human.

Afraid that she'd never love him back.

The realization was like a crack in the ice she'd built around her heart, and she felt warmth seeping through it, unwanted and dangerous. She pulled her knee away from his hand, not because she wanted to, but because she needed space to think.

"Two days," she repeated, standing up on unsteady legs. "I'll be ready in two days."

He stood with her, his shadow falling across her again. For a moment, she thought he might reach for her, might try to seal the deal with a touch or a kiss. But he just nodded, his gray eyes holding hers.

"I'll be at the apartment at dawn," he said. "Pack light. Sicily has everything we need."

She didn't answer. She just stood there, barefoot on the fiberglass deck, watching him turn and step off the boat onto the whitewashed dock. His footsteps were steady, deliberate, the gait of a man who'd gotten what he came for.

The seagull cried overhead, circling once, then settling on the dock railing. The water slapped against the hull. The morning sun climbed higher, burning off the last of the chill, and Tisha stood in the middle of her shattered life, watching Pete Bianchi walk away.

She had two days.

Two days to pack. Two days to say goodbye. Two days to explain to Santiago that they were going on an adventure, that the man who looked like his daddy was coming with them, that everything was going to be fine.

She pressed her hand to her chest, where her heart was beating too fast, and wondered if she'd just made the biggest mistake of her life—or the only choice that could save them both.