"So you're saying Dimitri might already know Isabella is being poisoned?" Dante asked.
"I'm saying he probably suspects," Luca said. "And at minimum, he has resources to find answers. Resources you can access if you ask."
"I'm not asking Dimitri for anything," Dante said.
"Then Isabella suffers," Luca said, and his tone was absolute. "Because without Dimitri's resources, we're stuck. The medication source is hidden too well. Prometheus Laboratories is too secretive. We can't find them fast enough with what we have."
Dante listened to his second-in-command lay out the logic, and he knew Luca was right.
"If I call him," Dante said slowly, "he's going to know that I don't have the resources to handle this alone. He's going to know that I'm vulnerable. He's going to see it as weakness."
"Or," Luca said, "he's going to see it as a man protecting the woman he loves. And Dimitri understands that. He's doing the same thing with his American woman."
Dante considered this.
