The scissors were still warm when I pulled them out of him.\n\nHis blood soaked into the ivory silk lining—a jacket I’d spent weeks stitching for some debutante’s father. Now it was ruined. Like my life. Like any chance I had at normalcy. I dropped the weapon, but my hands wouldn’t stop shaking.\n\nI barely heard the sirens over the rain tapping the shop’s skylight. He wasn’t supposed to come back. Not after I told him to leave. Not after I screamed. But the Morettis don’t take no from nobody—especially not from a lone seamstress in a forgotten corner of the Garment District.\n\nI wiped my hands on my apron, leaving smears like war paint. One call. I only get one call. My fingers hovered over the number I hadn’t dialed in ten years. The man who once held me through a panic attack behind this very counter. Who whispered, I’ll always keep you safe.\n\nDean Russo answered on the first ring.\n\n‘Megan?’\n\nI swallowed the sob clawing up my throat. ‘They’re going to come for me. I killed Vincent Moretti.’\n\nSilence. Then, low and dangerous: ‘Don’t open the door for anyone. I’m coming.’\n\nBut even as relief flooded me, I knew—this wasn’t salvation.\n\nIt was the beginning of war.