2026…
The biting cold seeped deep into my bones as I lost all ability to move. I could barely feel anything anymore, truth be told.
My clothes, soaked and stained with mud, clung to my skin, nearly frozen against it. The faint mist escaping my lips grew weaker with every breath, a quiet sign that I wasn't far from death.
The stars burned brightly across the dark sky, dazzling in their silence. It was beautiful.
Maybe it would be the last thing I ever saw, and it wasn't such a terrible ending.
I could feel the presence of those I had lost closer than ever. As if they were waiting for me… just there.
"Sanaa!" a voice suddenly tore through the heavy silence of the night, and I felt my weakened heart stutter.
"Sanaa! Answer me, Sanaa!"
A faint sound slipped from my throat.
"Massimo…" I breathed, my eyes fluttering shut. He was here. He had come… for me.
"Sanaa! Vita mia, ti prego !"
His trembling voice echoed around me, and a sob escaped my lips. But his voice began to fade, and terror tightened around my chest.
My frozen fingers curled tighter around my son's toy, his little referee whistle, the one that made that horrible, shrill sound like a dying bird. The toy I had taken from him the night before so he would finally go to sleep.
With what little strength I had left, I lifted my heavy arm and pressed the whistle to my cracked, blue lips.
I blew.
The sharp, piercing sound rang out into the darkness.
Then everything went black.
Two years earlier, Tulsa, Oklahoma, 2023…
Highway to Hell by AC/DC blasted through the garage as I tightened the last bolts on the Honda Civic with quick, practiced movements.
"Sanaa! Get your ass on the second car, we're late, damn it!" Miguel barked.
Miguel, the owner of the garage and my boss, was a grumpy old man pushing his late sixties, yet still stubbornly energetic enough to crawl under cars. His Latino blood often set his temper on fire… which, unfortunately for him, always had a way of fueling mine.
"Why don't you go bother your nephew instead, old man," I muttered, tossing my torque wrench into my tool cart as I turned toward him.
He was coming down the stairs from the office upstairs.
"I decide who does what around here!" he snapped, as usual.
He limped slightly as he walked, a wound he'd carried for years. According to him, a car had run over his leg while he was saving a kid. According to his wife Maria, the jack holding up the car had collapsed while his leg was still underneath.
Personally, I was almost certain he'd taken a bullet to the knee at some point. With all the shady contacts he had, one of them had probably snapped sooner or later.
And it would probably happen again… if we didn't finish these three cars before sunrise.
"And that idiot doesn't have your finesse," Miguel added, grabbing one of the packages I had pulled from the rear bumper. "He pierced three of them with a screwdriver last week. I won't make any money with him." He sighed.
I rolled my eyes.
Fabi, Fabiano, wasn't an idiot. Just young. More interested in video games and nights out than actual work. And honestly, I couldn't blame him. I was exactly the same, despite the age gap.
At twenty-two, I spent most of my nights out, drinking, partying, losing myself in noise and alcohol. I didn't expect much else from life. I'd work, drink, grow old, and die in this forgotten place, alone, on the run.
But without regret.
I had done what I needed to do. The rest didn't matter.
I liked the quiet. A quiet that was often interrupted… like tonight, when I'd been called in.
At first, when I started working for Miguel, I was just a mechanic. He was the only one willing to give me a chance in a man's world. But once he saw how skilled and serious I was, he slowly let me in on what really went on behind these walls.
Miguel had ties with cartels in Latin America, organizations from Mexico and Colombia that used his garage as an extraction point for their shipments.
If he had known who I used to be, he never would have let me near this side of his business. Hell, he probably wouldn't have hired me at all.
As for me, I hadn't hesitated long before accepting the… "promotion."
The money was good. Good enough to afford a nice apartment here in Tulsa and maintain a decent lifestyle.
And I had nothing left tying me to who I used to be.
"Considering the pressure you put on him, it's no wonder he wants to run off every chance he gets, boss," Stefano commented, a cigarette hanging from his lips as he slid out from under a 4x4.
His Italian accent colored his voice as he wiped the grease off his cheek with the back of his hand.
He handed over a package of drugs he had just extracted to Chris, who grabbed it with a grin.
"Let's hope we don't have to pick him up from the cops again this time."
He dropped the package into the bucket with the others before removing his cap to fix his red hair, then pulled it back on.
I grimaced at the memory of last month, when Fabi had been arrested after a bar fight and spent twenty-four hours in custody. What had really worried Miguel wasn't the arrest itself, but the attention it might bring to his garage. That would screw all of us.
"I'm done with this one. I'll take the pickup," I sighed. Someone had to do it. Miguel nodded, satisfied, grabbing a rag as he started wiping down the Civic's hood.
"We'll help you as soon as we're done here," Chris added, popping open the 4x4's hood.
I rolled my eyes. I'd be finished twice before they even came over.
My phone suddenly vibrated in the back pocket of my denim overalls. I wiped my oil-stained hands on the rag stuffed into my pocket before pulling it out.
A smile tugged at my lips when I saw the name on the screen.
"What are you doing awake at this hour, Blondie ?" I answered, stepping outside and grabbing a beer on the way. A small break.
The cool night air brushed against my face, and I almost sighed in relief. It was summer, and the garage was a damn furnace.
"I couldn't sleep," she replied softly.
The same voice she'd had since the day we met. Almost seventeen years… and she hadn't changed one bit.
The memory of that winter night in the Florida orphanage came rushing back to me.