Santa Rosa, northern coast of Palermo.
The evening took the city with a slower breath.
The gallery windows turned dark, the reflection of the sea hanging like a shadow.
Naiara switched off the last row of lights, checked the lock twice, then paused with her hand still on the key. She didn't want to carry the weight of the day home, but some hours cling to the skin like salt.
Outside, the air smelled of algae and gasoline. The seafront glimmered under weak yellow lights, a warm breeze scattering flyers across notice boards.
She looked down the street: almost-empty bars, stacked chairs, a waiter drying glasses while staring at a muted TV.
She liked that inhabited silence, the feeling of being able to choose which sounds to keep and which to let go.
She walked.
She had promised herself not to give up on small things: walking home when the town was calm, feeling the sound of her steps on stone, counting the orange trees in the square. Still, her mind kept mapping distances and escape routes; and when a shop curtain flapped suddenly, her fingers tightened on her bag handle before she could stop them.
"Come on, Nay," she whispered. "Just road. Just sea."
She crossed the little port square.
Three boys sat on the low wall, laughing at something that belonged to no one.
A summer song played faintly from a phone.
One of them lifted his head when she passed, followed her with his eyes; a second gave a lazy whistle. The third stood up, moving slowly, wearing a smile that wanted to seem kind but wasn't.
"Miss," he said, "late to be walking alone, huh?"
Naiara didn't slow down.
She'd learned that a steady pace is a language many men understand. But he closed the distance, not enough to touch her, just enough to be heard.
His breath smelled of beer.
"Wait, I'll buy you…"
The sentence broke mid-air, sliced by a voice that came from nowhere, not near, not far, but from the exact point where everyone could hear it.
"Leave her alone."
Calm. Low. Unhurried.
The three of them turned at once, as if someone had pressed a switch. They stared into the darkness between two streetlights but saw no one.
The first one laughed, unsure; the second shrugged; the third raised his hands in mock surrender. "All right, man."
They sat back down, suddenly absorbed by their phones.
Naiara froze for a second too long, surprised by how her body had prepared to defend itself against something that never happened. Then she started walking again, not turning around.
She didn't know whether to thank whoever it was or fear him. And she didn't know which would make her feel weaker.
Across the street, a man watched.
The car was parked in shadow beside a half-closed shutter.
The window, lowered by two fingers' width, let in the sound of the sea and a faint TV hum from somewhere nearby.
He sat upright, elbow resting, eyes fixed on the clean geometry of the night.
He shouldn't have been there. Not that night, not in the open.
The operation's notes said otherwise: times, places, names to cross-check.
Yet there he was, for the third night in a row.
Measuring things no report would ever ask for: how many lights stayed on after eleven, when the bar on the corner closed, how many seconds the girl, the daughter, took to lock the gallery door.
He held a pen between his fingers, turning it without thinking. He hadn't written anything for minutes. He saw her leave, steady pace, her head slightly turned toward the sea, like someone holding on to the horizon not to get lost.
He followed her with his eyes to the square, saw the three boys, their paths crossing too close. He didn't move immediately; he calculated angles, distance, timing.
When the third one stepped down from the wall, he spoke.
The voice was enough.
He leaned back in his seat, drawing one slow breath.
It wasn't adrenaline, he'd forgotten that years ago but the quiet recoil of a decision made at the only right moment.
He turned on the penlight, wrote two words in the small notebook: zero contact.
Then added, in smaller handwriting: don't look at her profile.
He couldn't explain the thought.
Some details serve no purpose, yet stay because they choose to.
He followed her from afar, noiseless.
It wasn't hard, not in a town like this.
You only needed to know the folds of darkness, the reflections on glass, the simple math of routine.
He saw her slow in front of the closed bakery, switch her bag to the wrong shoulder, as if remembering something left behind.
He saw her speed up under a broken light, then pause at the curb, listening for a sound no one else could hear.
He turned down the car radio, though it said nothing. For a heartbeat, the town was nothing but sea.
The villa appeared at the end of the road, quiet and exact, as if the night had drawn it by hand.
A dark gate. A garden shaped by order more than warmth.
Naiara entered the code, waited for the lock's metallic click, pushed the gate open.
A light turned on with her first step, another after three, the next near the door, a mechanical choreography she found reassuring.
She leaned against the door before reaching for the keys. Let the wood hold her weight.
Closed her eyes for two seconds. Her breathing slowed, evened out. She turned the key and went inside.
The house sounded like a well-built house: soft settling of walls, the hum of the fridge, the faint thread of sea slipping through the cracks.
She dropped her bag, kicked off her shoes, turned on the smallest kitchen light.
A note on the counter read: Lasagna in the fridge. Heat it up. Call me – Mom.
She smiled faintly, poured a glass of water, drank slowly, counting between sips.
Only then did the question surface: Who spoke?
Her body had reacted before her mind, tensed, then released and that was what frightened her most: the memory living on through skin alone.
She moved to the living room, switched on the lamp, stepped onto the terrace.
Outside, the beach was a dark stripe; two fishing boats in the distance, one steadier than the other. The wind carried short gull cries. And for a heartbeat, she felt certain she was not alone.
"Stop," she whispered. "Don't name the dark."
She closed the window. Drew the curtains, leaving a hand's width open, the house must see the sea, even at night, her mother always said.
She warmed the lasagna, ate standing up, the microwave timer ticking like a metronome. Then she went upstairs.
The house smelled of tomato and clean sheets.
She undressed slowly, folded her clothes, brushed her teeth.
Checked the lock, the shutters, the balcony. All in place. Her body loosened by half a breath.
She lay down. Didn't fall asleep right away.
Counted the waves: three, pause, two, pause, one.
An imperfect rhythm, which made it real.
From the street, the man watched the house.
The car engine had cooled long ago.
He sat low behind the wheel, eyes following the timed lights along the path: first, second, third, then the warm rectangle glowing upstairs.
He didn't need binoculars. One lit window was enough. He listened more than he looked.
When the curtain moved by an inch, he instinctively lowered his head, though no one could have seen him from that distance.
A phrase came to mind, one learned long ago, impossible to forget: To be present is to be invisible.
He repeated it under his breath. He took out the notebook. Wrote the hour. Safe return.
Then stopped. Closed it. Rested his head back. Breathed in.
The phone vibrated. A short, dry sound.
He answered without a word.
A metallic voice came through, flat, without hesitation.
"Return. Call the others."
Then silence.
He stayed still, phone in hand, eyes on the dark line of the sea.
He didn't answer. Ended the call, but the words lingered in the air like an unspoken order.
Return. Call the others.
He turned the wheel, yet didn't turn around.
Paused for one last second, then smiled faintly. It wasn't peace. It wasn't surrender.
"Not yet," he murmured.
He pressed the accelerator and vanished into the coastal dark.
Naiara shifted in her sleep, caught in a dream she couldn't hold on to. For an instant, she thought she heard a man's voice, distant, calling across the sea. But when she opened her eyes, there was only the sound of water against the rocks.
The sea was silent, but the glass still remembered a breath that wasn't hers.