Beautiful Dangerous

by Michelle Betham

  “Here. Take this.”

  I quickly turn around, shove the gun down the back of my jeans and pick up the rifle.

  “Take the tires out. That should buy us some time.”

  My first shot hits the front tire, but it also invites another round of retaliation, a hail of bullets ricocheting off the back of the truck. But I don’t hesitate, don’t take another breath, I fire off another round, taking out the second front tire, the pick-up now swerving dangerously, sparks flying up from the tarmac as it careers across the road.

  “I can see the airfield! Here!” He throws the radio into my lap. “Tell them to stand by.”

  I pick up the radio, issue the instruction, and then I sit back and finally take a breath, my eyes focused on the lights of the airfield as they draw closer.

  Behind us I can still hear weapons being fired, the incessant rattling of their machine-guns, they’re not giving up without a fight. But I never thought they would.

  “We’re almost there. Just a few more minutes and we’ll be out of here.”

  I look at him, and I smile, despite the pain now coursing down my left arm. He’s right. Just a few more minutes…

  “Jesus, these bastards are persistent.” Lucca puts his foot down, but it’s almost impossible to go any faster than we already are, so it’s no surprise when another hail of bullets rattles off against the back of the truck, but thanks to them now driving on no front tires, they’re slowing down. And I begin to let myself feel a tiny glimmer of hope, that we can actually get out of here, and I don’t know where we’re going, but I don’t care. As long as it’s away from here; from Javier, from this fucked-up life, I’m good with anywhere but here.

  We’re almost at the entrance to the airfield when we hear it – a noise that drowns out any gunfire, and I look back out of the window to see the pick-up flip up onto its roof, bumping along the middle of the road before it finally lands on its side with a deafening thud.

  “It hit that car, by the side of the road,” Lucca points out, and I can only hope that the car was empty. “And that’s bought us more time. Come on. Let’s go.”

  He’s about to drive off when I – for some reason I can’t explain – reach out and put my hand over his. “No. Wait a second.”

  “Jesus, Liv…”

  “Listen.”

  An almost foreboding silence fills the air. A dark, terrifying silence, nothing but the hissing of the severely damaged pick-up, it’s nothing more than a heap of tangled metal now. It feels like the world has suddenly stood still. Like everything’s come to a stop, nothing is moving. Nothing is happening.

  But it will.

  It’s going to…

  “We need to get out of here.” Lucca’s fingers tighten around the steering wheel, and I pull my hand away from his. “If anyone’s still alive in there…”

  “Do you think anyone could’ve survived that?”

  “People survive all kinds of shit in this world, Liv, but I’d really rather not hang around to find out if anyone survived that.”

  I want to check. I want to make sure. I want to know if Javier was in there, in that pick-up, and if he was… I just want to know.

  Why?

  Get back in the fucking truck you crazy bitch!

  “Liv! What the fuck are you doing…? Liv!”

  I don’t know what kind of adrenaline I’m running on now, but I’m racing toward the pick-up, stopping to check that the car it ploughed into had nobody inside. It’s empty, which is a relief. Innocent people shouldn’t die because of our messed-up shit.

  “Liv!” Lucca yells after me as I approach the battered pick-up, slowing down the closer I get. “Get back, Liv, come on! That could blow any second. It’s not safe.”

  I ignore him. I’m doing this. And as I round the front of the truck there are two bodies strewn across the road, obviously having been flung out from the force of the crash. Broken bodies, their exposed skin covered in deep cuts and lacerations, limbs bent back in strange positions, rivers of blood seeping onto the tarmac.

  “Liv, come on! The police’ll be here at some point, do you want Hawkins to catch us?”

  “We haven’t done anything wrong, Lucca.”

  I kick one of the bodies over and crouch down, dropping my head and sighing quietly. It’s Jorge. A man who spent so many years trying to protect me spent his last minutes on earth trying to kill me.

  “Who’s the other one?” Lucca asks as he stands over the bodies.

  “I don’t know. But it’s not Javier.”

  The other body has blond hair, and a tattoo on his bloodied forearm that I don’t recognize, I’m not sure this man is one I know.

  “I’m going to check the truck.”

  “Olivia, we really need to get out of here, this isn’t safe.”

  I start to climb up the side of the pick-up, aware that the heat coming up from below isn’t a good sign, but I need to see if Javier is in there. And as I reach the front, I peer inside, but it’s difficult to see anything in the dark.

  “Here.”

  Lucca throws a flashlight up at me, and I catch it, shining it into the pick-up, and there’s definitely another body in there. I can just about make it out. It’s flung forward against the dashboard, and I reach inside and push it back, before recoiling, it’s him. It’s Javier.

  “Liv?”

  “It’s Javier,” I whisper, and all of a sudden I don’t know what the fuck I’m feeling anymore.

  Lucca prises the flashlight from my fingers and points it at the body, and then he leans over, pressing his fingers against the side of Javier’s neck, is he trying to find a pulse? Surely he couldn’t have survived that…?

  “I think he might still be alive.” Lucca’s eyes meet mine, and I feel my chest tighten; my heart’s racing, but my breath’s catching in my throat.

  “He’s still breathing?” I gasp, struggling to get the words out, and Lucca nods.

  And then we hear it.

  Drip.

  Drip.

  Drip.

  We smell it.

  Gas.

  “Get down, now!” Lucca yells as we both jump to the ground, throwing ourselves across the road, landing face down as the pick-up explodes, the heat of the flames almost too hot to bear. Pieces of metal and shards of glass rain down on us as Lucca reaches out and pulls me against him, using his own body to shield mine. And it seems to go on forever, more explosions, the intense heat, and I keep my head down because I’m scared to open my eyes.

  “We need to go,” Lucca murmurs as he takes my hand and drags me to my feet, and when I look at him it’s all I can do not to cry out. His face and hands are a mess of bloody cuts, and when I reach up to touch my own face my fingers meet sticky blood and grained-in dirt. But I’m feeling no pain. I’m too numb for that. “Now, Liv!”

  I nod, and we run back to the truck, I think we’re both working on adrenaline and auto-pilot now.

  “It’s gonna be okay,” Lucca says as he starts the engine and pulls away, toward the airfield which is, literally, right there in front of us. “We’re here now. We just need to get on that plane and get out of here.”

  I look back, at the ball of flames in the middle of the road, and I feel tears start to stream down my cheeks. And I don’t know whether I’m crying with relief, or whether I’m genuinely upset at what’s just happened, either way, it’s over. That part of my life, it’s done.

  “He really is dead this time, Liv.”

  He really is dead.

  This time…

  Epilogue

  Two Years Later

  Lucca

  “You know we didn’t have to come back here, don’t you?”

  Olivia leans back against the counter, crosses her arms and fixes me with a look that tells me she’s getting tired of hearing me say that now.

  “Okay,” I sigh, heaving another box of liquor up onto the countertop. “You won’t hear me say that again. I
promise.”

  She smiles and shakes her head, leaning in to drop a quick kiss on my mouth. But she doesn’t get away with quick, I catch her waist and pull her against me, kissing her deeper and slower until she falls against me.

  “I just wanted you to know that we could’ve stayed in Finland.”

  “And Finland was beautiful. It was perfect, and I loved every second of the time we spent there, but we needed to come back, Lucca. This restaurant, the hotels and bars, the casinos, they’re ours, all of them. They belong to us now, why should we walk away from them? We had the power to make them exactly what we wanted them to be, and that’s what we’ve done. It was the right decision, to come home. It was the right decision to change things. For the better.”

  I smile and tuck a strand of dark hair behind her ear. “All legit now, huh?”

  “All legit.” She smiles again, her face lighting up as it always does when she realizes what it is we’ve achieved in just a couple of years.

  The night of the explosion; the night Javier Delgado finally died, for real this time, we flew to Canada, spending just one night there before heading to Europe. The first flight we could find was to Finland, which is why we ended up there, holing ourselves up in a small but cozy house in the middle of nowhere while we tried to make sense of everything.

  The Devil’s Creed took a lot of the shit from the fallout caused by my trying to save Olivia from a man who was willing to do anything to keep us apart. And I felt guilty, for a long time, but Eddie bore no grudges. He’s a good man, he knew the score, so he was ready for any eventuality. But what none of us were ready for was for Hawkins to be brought down on corruption charges, man, that was one thing none of us saw coming. Harry – our man on the inside – was the one to finally expose him, landing himself a promotion and a stronger position on Eddie’s payroll. Not the cartel’s. Because the Delgado cartel was thrown into disarray the night Javier died. Technically, I was in charge, but I had no inclination to deal with any of that shit in the beginning. I gave that responsibility to Miguel, who ran things out of Mexico until I decided I was ready – we were ready to take back control. Which Olivia and I did, not long after we returned from Finland. Our aim? To make this business legitimate. To make it legal. To turn dirty money clean, and we already had a head start with the hotels, bars and restaurants. I’m not going to lie and say our decision went down well with everyone, but anybody who wanted to leave our new-found family was free to do so. And some did, some liked living on the edge too much to stop doing it, but many stayed with us, including the bikers.

  After Hawkins was brought down, and Harry elevated to a higher position, any shit on the bikers; any lingering crap they might’ve had on me and Olivia regarding that night and Javier’s death, it was all dropped. The slate was wiped clean, which made it easier for all of us to get on with our lives. And although the Devil’s Creed will always be outlaws, they do a lot of work for us. Everything they do, it isn’t all bad. There’s a lot of good in those men.

  “What are you thinking about?” she asks, cocking her head slightly, her eyes locked on mine.

  “How everything can change in a heartbeat.”

  Her smile widens, because she knows it took a little longer than that, for things to change. But we got there. Eventually.

  “Yeah. I guess it can.” She steps out of my arms and glances at her phone. “I’m due at the Orchid Resort in an hour.”

  The newest of our hotels. The one we’d been building just as the shit hit the fan, it’s brand new. About to open, tonight.

  “I need to make sure everything’s ready for the opening party.” She looks at me, and I can see it in her eyes, the fear that still lives there. Still haunts us. “All eyes are going to be on us, Lucca.”

  “We have nothing to hide anymore, Olivia. No secrets. We can hold our heads up and know that everything we’re doing, it’s okay. It’s good.”

  She drops her gaze, and I know that she still thinks about Javier. About the life they shared, the loss she suffered; the shock of his return. His death. I see her sometimes, go off into this state of reverie and I know she’s thinking about him, and the woman he made her. I know she feels pain at the way he eventually died, because somewhere deep down she still loved him.

  “It’s hard, baby, I get that. Which is why the option to go back to Europe…”

  She lifts her head, her expression determined, but the smile is back on her beautiful face. “No, Lucca. These businesses, we helped make them what they are now. They belong to us, and we have a duty to make sure they stay ours. To make sure they remain under our control, just because we’ve decided to go legitimate doesn’t mean to say there are people out there who won’t respect that. We still have to be on our guard.”

  “We have few enemies left, Liv. And we still have the bikers on-side.”

  “I know.” She checks her watch again. “I should go. I’m meeting Celine, and I don’t want to be late. She’s overseeing the food and drink, along with Katy and Reuben.”

  Celine didn’t take Javier’s death well. She was the one who found him, after I’d shot and injured him, the night Olivia and I fled. And to this day we still don’t know how much she really knew about that night, but we do know that she mourned Javier a second time, far harder than the first. Far harder than either I or Olivia did. But she’s remained in post, although the house she’s running now is far smaller than the Delgado estate. That’s sold now, to an oil tycoon and his Vegas showgirl wife. Olivia didn’t want to be surrounded by memories she doesn’t always want to be reminded of, she wanted a new start. A new home. And that’s what we have, a beautiful, two-storey ocean-front house with views of the beach and the mountains. It has two terraces, a small infinity pool that faces the ocean, and a myriad of trees and shrubs and colorful flowers that remind us every day how lucky we are to be alive. To still be alive.

  “What time will you be home? I assume you’ll want to shower and change before the party?”

  “I should be back around five.” She stands up on tip toes and kisses me quickly, squeezing my hand. “I love you, Lucca. Don’t ever forget that.”

  “Never, mi reina.”

  I watch her walk out of the restaurant and across the street to her car, and I can’t stop smiling. It took a lot of pain and hurt; death and destruction, to get to where we are today, so looking back isn’t something we do all that often. The past is gone. Maybe it can’t be forgotten, but it’s gone.

  I’ve loved Olivia Delgado for a long time. Too long. Most of the time it was a battle I didn’t even know I was fighting, but I won, in the end. I fucking won…

  Olivia

  “I thought you’d be at home getting changed for the big night.” Angel leans against the wall of the clubhouse and lights up a cigarette, taking a drag and blowing smoke into the air.

  “I’m on my way there. I wanted to see you first.” I sit down on the bench facing him. “Eddie tells me you saw your mom and dad last week.”

  Angel’s eyes meet mine, and it takes a moment, but the smile finally arrives. “Yeah. And I’m not gonna say it wasn’t kinda weird, ’cause it was, I mean, we haven’t seen each other in years. Twenty-four, to be exact. I wasn’t expecting them to look so old, but then I guess they weren’t expecting me to be this six-foot-two, bearded, tattooed guy who’s VP of an outlaw motorcycle club.”

  “Yeah,” I sigh, clasping my hands together. “How did that go down?”

  He laughs and reaches for the bottle of beer by his feet. “Again, not gonna lie and say they were proud of me or anything, to be honest, Liv, I’m not sure what they made of me. What they made of my life.”

  “Did you talk at all?”

  He shrugs and downs a mouthful of beer. “A little. We’re meeting up on Monday, before they head back to Vermont.”

  “Is that where they’ve been living?”

  “Yeah. Got themselves a good home in a small town, they’re part of a close-knit, friendly co
mmunity now, everything my momma always wanted.”

  “But everything you didn’t, huh?”

  He looks at me, and his smile is a little weaker this time. “I need to apologize to them, Liv. I haven’t done that yet, and I should’ve done.”

  “It wasn’t entirely your fault, Angel.”

  “I know. But I never gave them a chance, I jumped to so many conclusions…” He drops his gaze and tosses his cigarette to the floor, grinding it into the concrete with the heel of his boot, dragging a hand back through his hair. “I don’t even know how they found me, I thought I was pretty much off the radar. I don’t know why they wanted to find me, they haven’t said all that much yet.”

  “Sometimes people realize that being apart for a long time, it doesn’t mean you can never reconnect with that person. But, whatever made them get back in touch, this is a second chance, Angel. And we’re not always lucky enough to get those.”

  He smiles again, and this time it reaches his eyes, and I get up and I hug him. His arms wrap around me and he holds me tight, and this man, I missed him more than anyone else while Lucca and I were away.

  “If anything had happened to you, Liv…” he murmurs into my hair, and I pull back and smile at him.

  “But it didn’t. I’m okay, we’re all okay.”

  “Thanks to Harry.”

  I laugh and step out of his arms, sliding my hands into my pockets. “Yeah. Thanks to Harry.”

  He takes another swig of beer, and I watch as he briefly drops his head again, his parents turning up like this, it’s really affected him. I just hope it’s all good, and that their reasons for tracking him down are ones that might mean they have a chance to reconnect with their son, he’s a good man, deep down. A kind man. I can only hope that they see that, too.

  “I should go,” I sigh. “I don’t want to be late for the hotel’s opening night.”

  “You’ve done good, Olivia. You and Lucca, you turned it all around, you made it happen. You’re the good guys now.”