Accidentally Yours (Merffy Kizzmet) novel Chapter 206

Dom lifted two fingers in a lazy salute. “Copy.”

Gino modded once. “Already moving.”

民国

Enzo squeezed Lola’s hand once, then let go. He felt the loss like a drop in pressure, a warning before a storm. “Dottie,” he said, voice even. “You’ll come with me. I’ll show you your room.”

Dottie stood without a groan, which told Enzo she’d made of iron long before the cane. “Finally. I was beginning to think the famous Marchesi hospitality was a rumor.”

“Depends who you ask,” Enzo said, starting for the door.

They moved as a unit: habit, grief, work. The guards outside parted without words. The corridor felt colder than the room, a strip of polished stone and mostly–silent footsteps. Lola’s presence lingered behind him like heat from a hand that had just left his arm.

He didn’t let himself look back. If he did, he might turn the meeting into a wake and the plan into a riot.

At the elevator, Dottie leaned on her cane and looked him up and down like a tailor measuring old scars. “You chose right,” she said. “Standing down from stupid. Men die of stupid.”

“Men die of waiting too,” he said.

Her mouth tipped. “Only if their impatience gets the better of them.”

The elevator chimed. He hit the button for the guest floor and stood in silence with her while the city hummed around their metal box. He could feel her glance, not unkind, the way a hawk might watch a man who thought he knew the wind.

The door swung open to a corner suite; two rooms, windows overlooking the strip, a sitting area already set with tea. Dottie stepped inside like she’d been there before, her gaze sweeping over the furniture, the view, the small details.

“Clean linens. A chair I won’t hate. I approve,” she said, tapping the edge of her cane against the rug before moving deeper into the room.

Enzo followed her in, gesturing toward the secure comm line on the desk. “You’ll have a line to the war room.”

“I’ll make some calls to old friends and enemies,” she said, voice casual but laced with something heavier. Then she turned toward him, eyes sharp. “And I’ll tell you what I find. Then you decide what the rest need know.”

“Fine.”

Dottie took a slow circuit of the room, fingers brushing over the back of a chair, the drape of the curtains, before finally lowering herself into the seat by the window. She set her cane neatly across her lap, settling it like a soldier setting down a weapon, and looked up at him,

“You know this is the first person she’s ever lost,” she said.

Enzo’s brow furrowed. “You mean-‘

“I mean ever,” Dottie interrupted, voice rough. “Not a mother. Not a father. Not a friend. No one. It’s only ever been her and me. And I’m

still here.”

1/2

11:28 Thu, Oct 9

Chapter 206

He stood there a moment, the hum of the city beyond the glass barely registering.

“She’s been through so much already,” he said finally.

“More,” Dotţie agreed. “But grief’s a different kind of animal. You can’t fight it, can’t outsmart it. You just live with the teeth marks.”

He didn’t answer, jaw tightening.

84

“She obviously cared deeply for that boy,” Dottie went on, softer now. “I’ve never seen that girl look so defeated. You’ve no idea what I’ve had to do to get her ready for this world; what I’ve had to take from her just to make sure she survived it.”

Enzo’s hands closed, slow and deliberate, against his knees. She’s learning to breathe through holes the world keeps cutting into her.

She set the cane beside the armchair and before he could walk out, “Enzo, don’t mistake her fire for something you can control.”

“I’m not trying to control her.”

“Good,” Dottie said, gaze steady. “Because the moment you try, you’ll smother her. Let her burn hot, Enzo. Just make sure she doesn’t turn to ash.”

He didn’t answer. He didn’t need to.

Back in the corridor, the door whispered shut behind him. He stood still for a count of three, letting the quiet settle into his bones.

We don’t start blind. But we start.

He turned toward the elevator, toward Lola, toward the work waiting under the hum of the city; nets to be cast, footprints to be erased, a world to pry open with patience.

And when the names finally surfaced, he’d make good on what he had already promised in the street and in the shower and in the marrow of his teeth:

He’d pull them out by the roots.

Chapter Comments