Two.

"Stefano!" shouted his mother, worried about the situation in which they had gotten themselves.

That confrontation was not a coincidence, the woman with jewels around her neck was on the verge of tears when she saw the disaster.

Luckily, nothing had happened to him, other than staining his clothes with the blood of the girl who had been injured in his place.

This situation made everyone feel uncomfortable.

"I'm fine, mother" the man replied, sensing that something was off.

In the end, those who tried to attack him had to flee when they realized that his bodyguards were quite capable and well-armed.

That lasted twenty minutes during which everything was tense and they even called the police to attend.

The people were all evacuating the place in a squat, afraid of being in the middle of the dangerous zone.

Natalia was on top of the table where the Mancini family wanted to have a quiet dinner.

"What will we do with her?" Lucca, one of Stefano's younger brothers, finally asked.

"We'll see, Lucca. It's not the time" argued Giulio, who was fed up with the situation with the eldest of all, since they couldn't be calm for a single moment.

Ever since his father had done business with an Arab group, and they had tried to scam him, everything had gone from bad to worse.

Now they had in mind to eliminate the son who would inherit the position in the real estate agency.

Stefano at that moment had to take the weapon that he always carried with him and threaten the opposing group, since he was not going to tolerate that they do such acts in front of his family. Especially in front of his mother.

He fired a few warning shots, including hitting one of the men in black.

The opposing group fell back, realizing they were outnumbered. They vanished like smoke bombs, disappearing before the police reached the scene.

They were just a group of thugs, but they could perfectly belong to any mafia network since they had some rather striking red tattoos.

Stefano's younger brothers were surprised to see that he opened fire without hesitation for a second.

"Did you have a gun all this time?!" Lucca asked excitedly, who was holding his head below the level of the table since he was crouching down after what he saw.

"You shouldn't be surprised" Stefano answered, resheathing the weapon in a holster that they never managed to detect that he had with him.

"Of course it's surprising. Where did you learn to shoot?" was what Giulio wanted to know with a frown.

The mother of these men was truly shocked by all the violence they were experiencing at that time, she could not believe it.

"The important thing is that you're all okay" she replied, trying to stop shaking.

"Not all of us..." Lucca answered, looking down at the girl's body on the table, which was unconscious.

"Damn" Stefano commented, running one of her hands through her hair, he was stressed.

He approached the girl to observe her wound and verify that she was still alive.

"Is she even breathing?" Giulio asked.

"She's still alive. It was just a shot in the shoulder, it has an exit wound. It's curable" Stefano expressed clearly.

"What's the plan? We can't let the police see this scene. You have a gun on you, for God's sake" Lucca continued with his psycho-terror speech.

"We can take her with us, I guess" the black-haired man replied.

"You guess?!" Giulio began to play along with the minor.

"Enough already!" spoke her mother, who was tormented by what they had gone through in that short period "Do you want us to take her to the hospital? That would be being in the eye of the hurricane, while this is still something that we can control".

"You can't be serious, mother" Giulio insisted.

"I think it's the most reasonable thing, we can talk to the police. They know we're not the ones they're looking for. They can investigate me as much as they want. I only defended myself, and also you, ungrateful dumb" Stefano spoke with a frown pucker.

He approached his body again to stop the girl's bleeding with several knotted cloth napkins from the restaurant.

No one said another word.

When the police arrived, everyone gave their version of the story, including the employees of the place and the people who remained in the establishment.

The officers knew not to mess with that family as it would be a big problem for them.

The officers understood the whole situation, and after identifying the girl's body, they let her go with the Mancini family to receive medical attention more discretely.

Of course, it was an agreement on both sides. Stefano knew that he was partly to blame for the fact that the girl had received that bullet impact.

He must have suspected it ever since he saw those suspicious people in the restaurant.

It had been his fault for not saying anything to his bodyguards, but there was nothing he could do but attend to the girl as far as was medically possible.

Once in the car, they ordered a private ambulance to pick up the girl and drop her off at the house.

"And after she heals what? Do you think she won't say anything about us?" Giulio wanted to know.

"We can always bribe her," Stefano said, without a hint of remorse in her words.

"Wow, I had forgotten how disposable women are to you."

"It's not my fault you haven't got a girlfriend yet, Giulio. Just stop" Stefano replied bitterly.

"You didn't have to say that" he commented and stopped talking to him the rest of the way to the mansion.

When the driver parked, they all got out, and they realized that the ambulance was already there as well.

Stefano was forced to go see what state the girl was in, so after being attended to by the housekeeper, he decided to go upstairs.

There was something about her that he found strange and attractive at the same time.

He got upstairs to the second floor and then he knew that she was in the room at the end of the hall, which had the door open.

He decided to knock on the door for education for health personnel.

One of the nurses came out to attend to him.

"Good evening, sir" she commented a little nervously "Do you want to know how the patient is?"

"Good evening. Yes, of course."

"Everything is under control, however, she will need a lot of rest, a good diet, and specific medications."

"Okay, what a relief. Charge everything to my account, please."

"I understand. Do you know any of the girl's relatives? Maybe they are worried" commented the nurse.

"When she wakes up, I'll have her contact her family. Don't worry."

The woman agreed.

"You can come to see her in the morning" the professional spoke.

"Perfect, I'll stop by then."

Stefano couldn't help but glance into the room as soon as the woman turned around.

There he saw the long-haired girl on a stretcher, which was in the hands of the doctors, who worked on her body.

On that skin that looked so smooth that his hands suddenly itched to touch.

He pushed those thoughts from his mind and headed towards his room.

He would see her in the morning.