by Sadie Black
Whitney had a feeling that even if she objected, he wouldn't listen. A man who would chase her down, smear blood across her face, and then knock her out wasn't the kind who took no for an answer. All she could do was choke back a terrified sob and huddle against the back of the trunk. Mikhail was not fazed.
"Come to me now," he ordered. Not willing to wait for her to comply, he reached back and grabbed her by the arm. With no other support, he wrenched her forward. Pain seared through Whitney's arm and along her back as he pulled her, and she cried out in agony. Mikhail shook his head.
"Save for camera," he told her. "More screams make more money."
Once she was in range, Mikhail reached in and lifted her from beneath her arms. Like a slab of meat, he dragged Whitney out of the trunk, then with a grunt and a bend in his legs, he hefted her over his shoulder like she was a bag of flour. Unable to bring herself to a stop, Whitney's torso slapped against his back and the wind was knocked from her lungs.
"Good girls stay quiet until it is time to scream," Mikhail said, jovial, as though they were on their way to share a few drinks and some good conversation rather that whatever twisted scenario he planned. "Arturo was right, pretty girl is excellent price."
Arturo.
As Whitney gasped for breath and twisted and squirmed against Mikhail's firm grasp, relief flooded her. No matter what was about to happen to her, she could cling to the small comfort of knowing that it wasn't Rocco who'd done this. There was one person in this world who'd been decent to her. Rocco was no prince, no saint, and the circumstances of their meeting were a black mark against him, but he'd redeemed himself in the end. Rocco was someone special. If only he'd taken her with him...
Slung over Mikhail's shoulder as she was, Whitney wasn't able to get a good view at where they'd come to a stop. The smell of the air reminded her of the warehouse that Rocco had brought her to the night before. If Arturo was involved, Mikhail might have brought her to a similar hideout. When they rose the short cement staircase and entered through a heavy metal door, Whitney thought it more likely. Was there a derelict warehouse along the shoreline that the Lombardos didn't own? The city really was under their thumb.
"What size does the little mouse wear?" Mikhail asked. "Small? Medium? I have little blue lingerie set for you, will be pretty. Will be perfect."
"I just want to go home," Whitney rasped. The words caught in her throat and irritated it, adding to its dryness. "Call Rocco, please. He'll tell you to let me go."
"Is too late now," Mikhail exclaimed. They walked through an open area. The few dangling bulbs that still worked in the place created more shadow than light. The setting was exactly like a horror movie. Whitney hung her head and tried to focus. If she could hold back on panicking, she could think her way through this and get out, just like she'd done with Rocco. "Now pretty girl belongs to me."
"Does she?" A stern voice cut through the darkness, and Mikhail came to a swift stop. "Cuz I'm thinking that you're full of shit. I'm thinking that the lady belongs to me."
There was seething anger in Rocco's voice. Whitney twisted around just in time to see Rocco step out from the shadows. Although he was dressed in the casual attire he'd worn out of the safe house that morning, he was no less intimidating than he was in a crisp suit while armed. The way he crossed his arms over his chest, how his posture was board straight, and the confidence in his shoulders and stance were all Rocco needed to look dangerous. At that moment he looked downright lethal. Expression beyond pissed, eyes narrowed slits of hate, he stared Mikhail down.
"R-Rocco," Mikhail stammered. "Did not expect to see you here."
"And I didn't expect to see you with my girl," Rocco shot back, "but sometimes life leads us to unpleasant surprises. Lemme try to make sure there are no surprises coming up in your future. Here's the deal. I know my brother told you that you could have her, but my brother is a pompous asswad psychopath who doesn't understand the consequences of his actions. Unfortunately, the consequences of his actions directly affect you. So here's how it's gonna work. You let the girl go, give her over to me right here, right now, and all's gonna be forgiven. You can go home, I can go home, she can go home, and we're all happy. Or if not happy, at least alive. You see, my brother isn't the one who runs this little business — I do. So if you wanna get on his ass about a sour deal, then you take it up with him, but I can't let this transaction happen."
Rocco. Against all odds, Rocco was here. Tears of relief streamed from Whitney's eyes and down her cheeks, but she could not bring herself to sob.
But despite the intimidating command, Mikhail did not release her.
"Have never had bad deal with Arturo before," Mikhail admitted. He took a few tentative steps towards Rocco in an attempt to close some of the distance between them. "It is big surprise. But to have come all the way here with girl only to have deal go south is wasteful. Tell you what, Rocco, we strike up deal."
"No deals," Rocco responded right away. "What I say goes."
"Shush lips and listen," Mikhail begged. "Business is slow, and although Arturo is not big boss, he is smaller part of business beneath your jurisdiction, and his actions are yours to deal with. Allow girl to stay for one night, maybe two nights if she likes it. I will not allow any harm or death to come to her. That way, you get girl alive, I get some of what I was promised, and all are happy."
"Rocco," Whitney begged him, voice crackling, "save me."
"No," Rocco said. The impersonal mask he wore while on the job was on tight. Not even Whitney's cry affected him. "Hand her over now and you get to walk out of here. It's your life or the girl, Mikhail. Choose wisely."
There was a moment's hesitation. Beneath her, Whitney felt the Russian's body tense. Before she knew what was happening, he threw her off of his shoulder so one moment she was in the air, and the next she was skidding along the rough cement floor. The outer layer of the skin along her arm and side scraped. The searing pain brought a howl from her lips, but as much as Whitney wanted to curl up, she couldn't. If she wanted to stay alive, she had to stay alert. Right now, that meant watching the scene unfold between the two criminals before her.
Mikhail drew a concealed knife from a sheath at his side. The blade caught the dim light. Rocco's arms uncrossed, but there was little time between when Mikhail drew the knife and when he rushed Rocco with it. The Don's son was given enough time to turn his body away from the hit, and the blade sank into his shoulder instead of his chest. Both men toppled to the floor, Mikhail screaming, Rocco grunting with pain.
At the far end of the room was an impromptu movie set. A white background and a dirty bed were set up before a camera beneath bright stage lights. Whitney looked towards it, heart racing, to try to find something to use to help Rocco. It looked like he was unarmed.
Beside the set was a silver medical trolley fitted with a tray of medical instruments. Scalpels, pliers, saws, and other nasty looking tools that looked medieval but that Whitney couldn't identify lined the prepared space. That could have been her future.
It was time to make it her present.
Whitney scrambled to her feet and ran across the room as the two men scrapped. Mikhail withdrew the knife from Rocco's shoulder and sent it slamming down into him again, catching him in a similar spot. Rocco, slender and lithe, had no way to knock the massive Russian off from on top of him, and unarmed, he would be killed if Whitney didn't intervene.
Grabbing a scalpel from the tray, Whitney ran back for the scene. Bright red blood splattered the floor around where Rocco lay and colored the knife that left his shoulder. Before Mikhail could stab him again, Whitney sprang into action.
"ROCCO!" she cried. Blue eyes, hardened and unafraid of death, looked her way. Time slowed. As she ran, Whitney launched the scalpel across the floor towards Rocco's hand. Mikhail lifted the knife over his head and was set to slam it back down — this time into Rocco's chest. Instead, Rocco reached out, grabbed the scalpel by its thin handle as soon as it skittered into reach, and s
lammed the blade into the middle of Mikhail's thigh. The knife slipped from Mikhail's hands and clattered to the ground between Rocco's legs.
"Get the fuck off me!" Rocco growled. The scalpel withdrew and he slammed it through Mikhail's side. The blade sank in to its hilt, disappearing entirely. Mikhail howled in pain and scrambled back.
Now that Rocco was armed, he had a chance. Whitney ran back to the medical tray. If things went sour, she wanted to have a weapon to defend herself with. If it came down to it, she would help Rocco defend himself. Mikhail made it clear he wanted both of them dead.
As Mikhail fumbled for the knife, Rocco jumped into a crouching position and sprung at him. Fueled by adrenaline Rocco was a threat. He tackled Mikhail to the floor and grabbed his hair, wrenching his throat back. Before the Russian could get out another sound, Rocco ran his blade across the man's throat and slit it wide open. Blood spurted from his severed carotid arteries, drenching Rocco's chest and face in splattered crimson with each beat of Mikhail's heart.
"You don't fuckin' take what doesn't belong to you," Rocco growled as Mikhail fell back, limp, to the floor. Like a fish out of water he gasped for air, but the blood that now filled his lungs made drawing breath impossible. It took a few short moments for death to claim him, and once it had, Rocco jabbed the scalpel into his chest and rose. There was no wobble in his step; death was what he did for a living, and it no longer had any effect on him.
Whitney fell to her knees by the trolley and wrapped her arms around herself. In the time that Rocco made his kill, she'd taken a heavy wrench from the table, and now she cradled it in her arms. Had Mikhail come at her, she would have used it as a club. Now that the threat of him doing so was neutralized, all Whitney could think about was how he would have used the wrench on her. The scalpels, the pliers, the saws... Would he literally have torn her apart while she was still alive for the sick pleasures of vile men? As much as her throat burned, she managed a sob. Whitney's world had always been troubled, but she never realized how filthy it was until she'd met Rocco last night.
There were no words exchanged between them. Rocco walked across the warehouse floor until he stood in front of her, then dropped to his knees and drew her into his arms. One hand cradling the back of her head, the other slipped around her waist, there was affection beyond simple lust in his touch.
He came for her when she needed him the most.
The wrench fell from her arms. Whitney locked her arms around Rocco's neck and buried her face in the crook of his neck. Warm tears met warm blood. Rocco was bleeding from his wounds, but despite the pain, he tended to her emotional needs first. Apart from the ragged pattern of their breathing and the hitched sobs that died in Whitney's throat, the warehouse was silent.
It was over.
When he caught his breath, Rocco locked his arms around her and lifted her as he stood. The deep gashes from the knife gaped like grotesque mouths from the exertion, but Rocco paid them no heed. Instead, he held Whitney close and walked across the somber warehouse floor away from the Russian and away from the front door. Mikhail's body lay where he'd left it, lifeless.
Never had Whitney appreciated sunlight as much as she did in that moment. When the metal door leading out back of the building opened and natural sunlight poured down upon them, she lifted her head and looked up at the sky. Blue sky. White clouds. The harsh chill of winter on her exposed skin was a treat. Whitney sniffled and looked back at Rocco. The stony mask he wore while on the job was still plastered to his face, emotions impossible to read. It didn't matter. Deep down, Whitney knew what he was feeling. The fact that he came back for her and risked his life to save hers spoke more than a smile or a gleam in his eyes ever could.
A black car waited by the back door. Rocco hefted her to support the entirety of her weight with his uninjured arm and opened the front passenger door. With care, he set her onto the seat and looked down upon her. Dangerous narrowed eyes. Thin pressed lips. Stern features and hard angles. How could one man be so gorgeous?
"I told you I'd track you down," he said at last. In the distance, a seagull cawed as though celebrating their fortune. There was no other noise. Whitney was speechless. The tears that formed in her eyes were no longer from terror or pain, Rocco's words touched her heart.
"There are many reasons why I'm an awful excuse for a human being," Rocco spoke evenly, "but if there's one thing about me that's good, if there's one smidge of humanity left in me, I swear to God, Whitney Greene, that it's because of you."
Lips trembling as they held back sobs, vision blurred with tears, Whitney couldn't bring herself to respond. Rocco didn't need words. His hand caught in her curls and held her in place, and then his lips were on hers, hard and possessive, but also protective and loving. Whitney kissed him back with everything she had, and when the kiss broke, she knew there was no going back. This was no Stockholm Syndrome, no misplaced affection, Rocco was in her heart and soul.
Soon enough he'd moved to the driver's seat and brought the engine to life. Tires crunching on the snow covered roads, Rocco drove from the warehouse.
Neither of them looked back.
* * *
Chapter Twenty-Three
Rocco
There was nothing to say, and yet everything to say. Rocco kept both hands on the steering wheel and kept his eyes glued to the road. The industrial path eventually gave way to the main street. With a smooth turn of the wheel, Rocco turned headed for the bridge. It would be easy to dump Whitney off at The Avenue, or a street corner and tell her to call a cab, but he knew that that wasn't what he wanted. It wasn't what he wanted at all.
Legs curled beneath her on the seat, head resting against the car window so that her curls were scrunched against her head, Whitney stared out the window and said nothing. From time to time, Rocco stole glances at her. Even with crusted blood smeared across her face and soaking into her hair, even in the oversized t-shirt tied at the hip, she was gorgeous. But it wasn't just her looks that forbid him to leave her behind for a second time. Whitney was worth so much more than her appearance. It was...
Rocco wasn't sure what it was. There was no doubt that she was different from other girls, but he found the differences hard to pinpoint. She was gorgeous, but so were plenty of other girls he'd brought to bed. She was tough, but so were the women in the industry that he hooked up with. She was gentle, but Rocco had seduced plenty of good girls that he'd had no issue showing the door the next morning. So what was it?
Maybe, he thought as he glanced back to the road, it wasn't anything that could be explained. All the little bits that made up Whitney's personality happened to fit in just the right way to make her special, and that was all that mattered. Love was blind, or so they said. Love. Was that too much, too soon? Rocco couldn't be sure, but he knew there was no sense in trying to rationalize it. Rocco felt the way he felt, and it was foolish to try to dismiss it. He just had to figure out what he needed to do about it.
It wasn't until they were off the island that Rocco dared speak again. Whitney was still awake, but she was fading fast. Before that happened, he wanted to make sure that he knew what had come to pass after he'd left the safe house.
"Are you okay?"
"I'm okay," she mumbled, turning her head to look at him even as it rested against the window. "It's just a lot to go through. I um, I guess you know that, though."
"Yeah." Had it not been for the adrenaline and the searing pain in his shoulder, Rocco would be in the same state she was in. It was in their favor that a kill refreshed the spirit and woke the body. Even if he wanted to, he wouldn't be able to sleep for a while. "What happened?"
"I was going to call a cab," Whitney said, arms crossed over her chest to hold herself, "and so I went downstairs to wait in the living room and the front door was open. I thought it was weird so I closed it. When I went to the living room, that man was there. He grabbed me. He told me that he was going to make me a star and that I belonged to him, and said some messed up things, and then.
.. Well, I bit him. I tried to run, but he caught me and knocked me out. I woke up in the trunk, he brought me into that building, and you know the rest from there."
Rocco knew the rest better than Whitney did. The Russian mob in New York was nowhere near as prevalent as the Italian mafia, but the Lombardos saw every sect of crime as an opportunity. Dealings with the Russians were often tense, but Vittore had done his part to establish diplomacy. Mikhail did a lot of cleanup work for them, but it looked like those days were over. In the days that followed, recovering relations with the Russians would be a top priority. Rocco didn't need another group on his ass. The Black Mafia and Arturo's deranged attempts on his life were enough.
"He was a bad man," Rocco said as though it mattered. Mikhail was a different shade of bad, but they were variations of the same color. Rocco couldn't claim he was any better.
"I know," Whitney whispered.
"I'm just glad you're okay. I'm going to make sure your head wound is cleaned up and good to go, don't worry."
Sweet and low, Whitney hummed an affirmative noise and closed her eyes. Now that the excitement was over and she was no longer in danger, her body begged her to sleep so it could recover. Rocco couldn't blame her.
The half an hour back to the safe house seemed much longer than it was.
When at last the winding driveway appeared in the distance, Rocco snapped from his stupor. The dirt driveway weaving between the trees felt easy to navigate compared to the day before.
As the car slowed and rattled over the uneven terrain, Whitney awoke from her slumber. With care she lifted her head and looked out over the forested area.
"The safe house," she murmured, voice cracking with sleep and dehydration.
"Yeah," Rocco said. "This time I'm gonna make sure that it really is safe."
If his dad was right about his prison sentence, it meant that the family business was in Rocco's hands now. While the responsibility was daunting, it also meant that Rocco could do whatever he wanted. If he wanted to bring Whitney with him, no one was there to tell him no. Not his father, not Arturo, and not any of the men who now worked beneath him. The Don's word was absolute. His rise to power couldn't have come at a better time. Under his law, Whitney would be safe.
