Chapter 8 - THE STITCH IN TIME
“A clean cut heals quickly, but a jagged tear leaves a scar that never stops burning.”“Hold on!” Cosimo roared, fighting the wheel as the armored car spun toward the guardrail.
Donatella braced her hands against the dashboard, her vision blurring as the world spun. Through the side window, she saw a massive, heavy-duty pickup truck roaring up from behind them, its front grill reinforced with a steel bull bar.
RAM!
The truck slammed into their rear quarter panel, sending the sedan spinning off the highway and crashing through the wooden barrier, plunging down a steep, muddy embankment into a dense patch of woodland.
The airbags deployed with a loud bang. Smoke filled the cabin.
Donatella coughed, shaking her head to clear the ringing in her ears. She looked to her right. Cosimo was slumped over the steering wheel, a deep gash near his hairline bleeding heavily, his face pale as his body succumbed to the trauma of the crash combined with his unhealed gunshot wound.
From the highway above, doors slammed. Heavy boots began crunching down the muddy slope.
“Check the wreck!” a voice shouted. “Silvio wants them both dead! No survivors!”
Donatella’s survival instincts, honed by years of living on the edge of a violent world, took over. She reached over, unbuckled Cosimo’s seatbelt, and dragged his massive frame out of the passenger side door just as a hail of bullets shattered the remaining bulletproof glass of the sedan.
Pfft. Pfft. Pfft.
The hitmen were using submachine guns with suppressors.
Donatella hauled Cosimo behind the thick trunk of an old oak tree. He groaned, his eyes fluttering open, but he couldn't stand. The impact had completely ruptured his internal stitches; dark red blood was already soaking through his black shirt.
“Donatella...” he rasped, coughing up blood. “Take... take the gun from my belt. Run.”
“Shut up,” she hissed, pulling the titanium blade from her coat. “I told you, I don't leave my fabric behind until the suit is finished.”
She looked through the brush. Three men were descending the hill, their weapons raised, scanning the smoke. They were professional, moving in a tight tactical wedge.
Donatella reached into her coat pocket and pulled out a small, heavy silver object—the vintage iron tailor's shears she had packed in her canvas bag. They were solid steel, heavy enough to crack a skull, and sharpened to a razor edge.
She threw the heavy shears to the left, intentional crashing them through some dry bushes twenty feet away.
“Over there!” one of the hitmen yelled, spinning his weapon toward the sound.
As two of the guards shifted their focus, Donatella lunged from behind the oak tree like a ghost. She didn't go for the gun; she went for the closest man. She dropped low into the mud, driving her titanium blade upward into the back of his knee, severing the popliteal artery.
The man collapsed with a choked scream. Before he could hit the ground, Donatella grabbed his tactical vest, pulled his head back, and sliced his throat with a single, clean stroke—the exact motion she used to cut through heavy denim.
The second guard turned, but Cosimo, using the last ounce of his strength, fired a single shot from his heavy pistol from behind the tree. The bullet caught the guard in the throat, sending him crashing into the mud.
The third man—the leader—panicked. He dropped his rifle and lunged at Donatella, tackling her into the wet earth. He was easily two hundred pounds of muscle, his heavy gloved hands wrapping around her throat, cutting off her air.
Donatella gasped, her vision turning black around the edges. She couldn't reach her knife. The man’s weight was crushing her ribs.
“Silvio sends his regards, bitch,” the man growled, tightening his grip.
Donatella didn't panic. She used her full, heavy hips to shift her center of gravity, throwing him slightly off balance. With her right hand free, she didn't strike his face—she reached into her pocket, pulled out a long, heavy steel upholstery needle she always kept threaded, and drove it directly into the man’s ear canal.
The hitman shrieked, a high-pitched, agonizing sound as the needle pierced his eardrum and entered his brain. His grip slackened. Donatella violently rolled him off her, grabbed her titanium knife from the mud, and drove it down into his chest, silencing him forever.
She stood up, covered in mud and blood, her chest heaving as the rain began to fall again, washing the grime from her face. She walked back to Cosimo, who was watching her with a look of pure, unadulterated awe.
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“You...” Cosimo choked out, a bloody smile spreading across his lips. “You are magnificent.”
“I’m covered in mud,” she said, her voice trembling slightly for the first time. She knelt beside him, ripping her own silk scarf off to press against his bleeding side. “And if you don't survive this walk through the woods, Cosimo, I’m going to kill you myself.”
