Step Bride: A Bad Boy Mob Romance (Includes bonus novel Honored!)

by Hamel, B. B.

  We were silent again for a moment, and I watched her closely. She seemed to shrink into herself, eyes looking down at the floor. Probably remembering the gun in her face, I thought. The girl had never experienced something like Max, had never even considered that someone would want to end her life. She was right: I didn’t know a thing about what she was feeling. I couldn’t blame her for being angry. Hell, she was taking it better than I had expected.

  “I’m sorry,” she said softly.

  “For what?”

  “You saved my life. I shouldn’t be such a bitch.”

  I stared at her for a second, and then I burst out laughing. I had no clue why, but it seemed so fucking funny. It was completely absurd and insane, the whole situation just so beyond fucked that I couldn’t hold it all back. She gave me a confused smile as I rocked back in my chair, laughing loudly.

  “What?”

  “I don’t know,” I managed to say through gasps of air.

  She shook her head, still smiling. “You’re insane.”

  I pushed away from the table, slowly gathering myself. I grabbed her plate and carried it over to the sink, but she stood and followed me.

  “Let me do it. Go run your errands.”

  I paused. “Are you sure?”

  She shrugged. “Might as well get it over with.”

  I nodded and looked into her eyes, at the worry lines forming around the edges, the stress etched clearly in her skin, and I wanted to reach out, grab her hips again, feel the warmth under her clothes. Instead, I walked out of the room without another word, stopping only to grab my burner phone. I pushed through the front door and walked out into the morning sunshine, cursing as my headache came back with a vengeance. I walked for a while, moving well away from the safe house. I watched the people staring back at me and had the nagging sense that someone was going to pull up in some black SUV and gun me down in the street. I knew that was nuts since I wasn’t even in Mob territory, but still.

  When I was far enough away, I pulled my phone from my pants. I looked down at it for a second, some cheap plastic thing I got at a pay-as-you-go store, and flipped it open. I sat down in front of an abandoned house and dialed a number.

  “Hello?” Luis answered on the third ring.

  “Luis, it’s me.”

  “Shit, boss. You okay?”

  “I’m fine. Where are you right now?”

  There was a pause, and I could hear commotion in the background.

  “At the kitchen,” he said.

  “What did I fucking tell you?”

  “I know but—” he paused again.

  What did he fucking do? I thought.

  “What’s up, Luis?”

  “Colin talked to me. Said I should stay, keep the place running. He said not to worry about you, that he would protect us, that you were fine.”

  Of course it was Colin, that rat fuck. I had to relax my grip, afraid I would crush the phone.

  Even though I was pissed, I realized that this was perfect for me. I needed Luis to get something from the restaurant for me, anyway. If he was already there, it would be easy.

  “Listen, do me a favor.”

  “Anything.”

  “In my office, there’s a green box with a bunch of files and shit in it. Grab it and put it out in the dumpster.”

  “Can’t promise it’ll be there, boss.”

  “What do you mean?”

  I could practically feel the tension rolling through the radio waves.

  “Some guys came in an hour ago and tore through all your shit.”

  I cursed and shook my head.

  “Look for it anyway. It doesn’t look important, so they probably left it.”

  Probably.

  “Okay boss, hold on.”

  He put the phone down, and I could hear the noise of the kitchen preparing to open for lunch. Pots and pans banged, and I was pretty sure I heard someone cursing in Spanish. My heart was hammering in my chest, worry wracking my spine. If that box was gone, if they had found what I had stashed in there, then I was done. I was dead. There was nothing I had left to bargain with.

  We’d have no choice but to run. I had some money. I didn’t know if Ellie would go for it or not, but she’d have no choice. I’d drag her along with me if I had to. Maybe she could return in a few years under a different name. I couldn’t imagine Colm would last that long, anyway.

  As I began to plan for the worst, Luis came back.

  “I got it,” he said.

  Relief flooded through me. “And it’s full?”

  “It’s a mess, but it’s full.”

  “Put a lid on it and toss it in the dumpster across the street. They might be watching, so make it look real.”

  “Yeah, can do, boss.”

  “Be careful, Luis. Don’t trust Colin.”

  “When are you gonna be back?” he asked, concern in his tone.

  “Not sure. Hopefully soon.”

  “If you need anything else—”

  “Take care, Luis. And be safe.”

  I hung the phone up before he could say anything more. He had done more than enough already, and I didn’t have much time; I needed to be quick, just to be safe. I dialed another number, and this time it kept ringing. I stared at the phone, willing the asshole to pick up as it kept ringing and ringing. Finally, I heard a click.

  “Hello?” came a groggy voice.

  “Leary, you asshole. Wake up.”

  I heard some muffled shuffling. “Liam, that you?”

  “Yeah, it’s me.”

  “Fuck, I thought you were dead, man.”

  “Not dead yet, but might be soon.”

  “They’re all looking for you, man. The whole fucking Mob is out there.”

  “I know. Listen, I need a favor.”

  “What can I do?”

  I paused, not sure I could trust him. If Colm had gotten to him, maybe offered him something to turn on me, I’d be fucked. But even though Leary was a shady dude and a drug addict, he was still my friend. And I needed him.

  “Go to my restaurant, out back. There’s a dumpster across the street. Inside, you’ll find a green box full of papers and shit. It might be in a trash bag, I’m not sure. But get that box, and take it to Fairmount. There’s a statue on Kelly Drive of a cowboy riding a horse with the words “Frederick Remington.” Stick it in the bushes near that.”

  There was a long pause and more shuffling. “Can you say all that shit again, man? I’m a little, you know.”

  I sighed. Typical fucking Leary. I was hungover, too, but at least I was functional. I explained the whole thing to him again from the beginning, and slowly. He made me repeat it all one more time, which was fine. So long as the asshole didn’t mess it up.

  “Okay, I think I got it,” he said.

  “And Leary? Don’t get followed.”

  He laughed. “That’s about the only thing I’m good at. When should I do this?”

  “I’ll go check the drop spot sometime tonight, so do it anytime today.”

  “You gonna be okay, man? They’re saying some serious shit about you.”

  “If you can get me that box, I’ll be okay.”

  “I’ll do it. Consider it done already, man.”

  “Thanks, Leary. I won’t forget this.”

  “You better not, asshole.”

  “Gotta go. I’m tossing this phone, so don’t bother calling it.”

  “All right man. Good luck.”

  “Thanks. You too.”

  I hung up the phone, frowning down at it. After a second, I took the back plate off and ripped out the battery. I put the phone on the pavement and stomped on it, crushing the cheap case. I sighed, looking out at the neighborhood.

  I’d find out sooner than I wanted to whether or not I could trust Leary. If he stabbed me in the back, I was done. So much of my plan hinged on the loyalty of other people, people that maybe would be better of rolling over and betraying me. But I had to believe in them. For a second, I thought I kn
ew what Ellie felt like, being at the mercy of other people, your life more or less in their hands. At the very least, even if everything went wrong, they wouldn’t know where the safe house was. Ellie could still survive, even if they killed me.

  I stood up and stretched, the hangover starting to ebb. I began to walk fast away from the phone, just in case it had been traced. I doubted it, but it was always possible.

  I had a long day ahead of me. I decided I’d get some more food, maybe some books, more clothes, shit like that for Ellie. I could at least try to make her life a little easier. I owed her that much.

  The sun was climbing in the sky. Time would tell if I’d live through the day.

  Chapter Sixteen: Ellie

  I shut the paperback book and tossed it across the room with a sigh. The sun was beginning to set, and Liam had left again about an hour ago. I had spent the day lying around the couch, alternating between reading the books Liam had brought me and staring at whatever was on TV. At a certain point, though, I needed to get up and move around a little, maybe get some fresh air, but I knew that I couldn’t go outside. There was a backyard, but even that was unsafe, at least according to Liam. I wasn’t used to staying cooped up all day and night, and it was already starting to wear on me.

  My situation was weird and dangerous and impossible, and I knew he had my best interest at heart, but for some reason I found myself moving between wanting to shove my tongue into his handsome mouth and shoving my fist in there. I ran my fingers over the ugly couch’s old fabric and wondered who he had stolen it from.

  I shook my head; that wasn’t fair.

  I was having a hard time dealing with the reality of Liam’s past. He was a criminal, and he wasn’t shy about it. And yet, he said that he had some “code of honor,” or whatever, like he was some knight in shining armor. He didn’t seem like a criminal; he wasn’t a scumbag or seedy or weird. He honored the past and his family. But what does that really mean? He seemed to really care about the people around him, and he took care of them. Well, he took care of himself, too. That certainly showed, I thought to myself, remembering the feeling of his body pressed up against mine.

  Still, he was a member of the Mob, which meant he must have done some pretty bad stuff. I tried not to judge people by their past, by the mistakes they made, since I was the first to admit that I’d made plenty of mistakes myself. But I’d never met anyone involved in the underworld so blatantly. Liam was a completely new kind of person, something I knew probably existed but had never seen any real evidence of. He was like someone from a dream, or from a movie. That was part of the draw, though; I wanted to excavate him, to understand what made him do the things he did. I wanted to know why he risked his life to save mine, someone who meant almost nothing to him.

  And I was angry. Above all, I was so angry.

  I got up off the couch and began to pace around the house between the kitchen and the living room like a caged lion. I wanted to scream and yell and punch the wall. I wanted to make Liam’s life as hard as possible, for no reason other than I blamed him for my position. And the worst part of it was, I knew he was the only person trying to keep me alive. He was the only person I could trust.

  Why did I have to stumble on those two guys? It could have been anyone else in the entire city. Then again, if it were someone else, would Liam have tried to save her? I was so frustrated and confused, and I felt like I didn’t deserve all the hard work and risk and pain and suffering. Liam wanted to save my life, but I really couldn’t understand any of it.

  I glanced at the clock on the stove. He should have been home twenty minutes ago. I put it out of my mind, refusing to worry.

  At least I wasn’t paralyzed with fear anymore. Anger was beginning to replace the fear, a deep burning anger at my situation and at Liam. I knew it was misplaced anger, and really I should have been mad at Colm Brennan or whoever else was trying to murder me, but I couldn’t help it. Liam was an easy target. Despite how badly I wanted to kiss him again, and how easy and free his confidence made me feel. He was the only person I could be angry at because he was the only person I was allowed to see.

  As I walked back into the living room, I wondered briefly how Petey was doing. Chelsea wasn’t exactly the most responsible person in the world, but Petey was a good dog. I hoped he was okay.

  I flopped back down on the couch with a loud sigh and flicked through the television channels again, intent on getting lost in whatever was on. I needed some escape, at least an escape from my own twisting mind. I couldn’t keep torturing myself, wondering about scenarios that didn’t exist.

  Time slipped by that way without me noticing. One second I turned on some random reality show with crazy southern idiots getting way too wasted and the next it was night outside, dark and quiet, and I didn’t even recognize what was playing on TV.

  I look around the room, feeling groggy. Did I fall asleep? I must have.

  “Liam?” I called out loudly.

  There was no response. The creepy, empty safe house just echoed my words back to me. I briefly wondered if the place was haunted, which made me laugh softly to myself. I must have been pretty messed up, wondering if the house that was keeping me alive was also haunted.

  Ghosts and gangsters. That was my life.

  I got up from the couch, worry beginning to take hold of my chest. He was supposed to be back already. I walked into the kitchen and looked at the time: two hours had passed and he was still missing. I felt something inside me clench up. What if he never came back? I had nothing and no way to survive on my own. I couldn’t go back to my apartment or the Mob would kill me. I shook my head, on the verge of panic.

  I couldn’t break down, not yet. He might just be running late.

  I walked back out into the living room, my heart beating hard, and walked up the stairs. I checked the bedrooms one by one, wondering if he maybe fell asleep somewhere, but they were all empty. I was alone, completely and utterly alone, and the only person in the entire world that knew what I was going through and was trying to keep me from a bullet to the face was missing. Maybe he was dead for all I knew.

  I hated it. I hated the waiting and the fear, and above all I hated being powerless.

  When I was an addict, I was powerless. I was weak and I would do anything to get a bump when I needed one. I was out-of-control fucked up most of the time, and I had no power to change it. Until, one day, I woke up alone in a strange apartment, my bra and panties missing, as flashes of the night before slowly came back to me. Gyrating on the stage, slowly stripping out of my clothes, people throwing money at me; later, stumbling around, getting higher, and, finally, the dude that actually helped me, for once in my miserable life. He dressed me and let me crash at his place. If I couldn’t even fend for myself anymore, I was practically dead. At least that’s what he had said to me the next morning, the only guy I ever trusted with all of my problems, Noah Carterson.

  So I refused to be powerless anymore. Sure, I gave myself over to the program, worked all the steps and kept going to meetings, but it was through my own ability to take action that I figured anything out. I had trouble getting close to people, since I had been taken advantage of so many times when I was a disgusting, fucked-up mess, but at least I was finally living the life that I wanted to live.

  At least I was until some mobsters decided they wanted to murder me.

  I walked back downstairs, practically shaking with worry, and dropped back down on the couch. I didn’t know what to do; there really wasn’t anything I could do, other than wait. I had to practically physically force myself to stay seated, my jaw clenched and my hands gripping the cushion.

  Worst-case scenarios kept running through my mind. If he was dead, I was probably fucked, too. Maybe they already knew where the safe house was, and they were on their way with huge men who wanted nothing more than to shoot me down. Or maybe he had decided that I wasn’t worth his time or his loyalty or his life, and he was turning me into his boss and begging for mercy. That l
ast part didn’t seem like him, actually; I could imagine him cursing the guy out and killing me himself, but never begging.

  As the thoughts swirled around my mind, I heard something scratching against the front door. I froze, terror in my chest, as the doorknob slowly turned. The door pushed open; I clenched my jaw, waiting for the guns to follow.

  Instead, it was a green cardboard box, with Liam lugging it.

  “Liam!” I yelled, jumping up from the couch.

  “Hey—” he said, but it was cut off as I practically tackled him.

  The box fell to the ground and papers spilled out of it as I wrapped my arms around his strong chest, his perfectly ripped body, and pushed myself against him. I wasn’t crying, couldn’t cry, wouldn’t let him see how weak I was, but I needed to feel him. I was desperate for him.

  “It’s okay,” he said softly, wrapping his arms around me. “It’s fine. I’m sorry I’m late.”

  I looked up at him. “I was worried, asshole.”

  He grinned. “Miss me?”

  “Only because you’re the only person I can see right now.”

  “Yeah, I’m sure that’s it.”

  That was the cocky man I was used to. Slowly, I disengaged from him, and it felt like I was giving up a life preserver in the middle of a stormy ocean. I looked down at our feet, at the papers all over the floor.

  “What’s this?”

  “That’s our ticket out of this fucking shit.”

  I nudged the papers with my foot. “Looks like nothing.”

  He bent over and began to shovel it all back into the box, and I helped. When we were finished, he hoisted it up again, shutting the front door and locking it.

  “Doesn’t look like much, but it is.”

  He walked upstairs, and I heard him toss the box into one of the empty rooms. I followed him up, leaning against the doorframe as he pulled the lid off and began to spread the pages out on the floor gingerly, like they were some sort of precious treasure. I made a face at him.

  “Never pictured you as a paper pusher,” I said.

  “I’m not, or not usually, at least. I do some financial stuff for the bosses, or at least I used to back before Colm took charge. I guess they saw how successful my business was and wanted someone with half a brain to do this shit for them.”