by Winters, KB
“I’m fine, Ma. A little banged up but alive and kickin’, not to mention ready for revenge.”
Ma stepped back and patted my face, taking her time to look me over and assure herself I was fine. “Good. Your Uncle Paddy won’t let those Italian assholes get away with this.”
Her gaze slid to Margo as she stepped from the passenger seat, still quiet and as aloof as humanly possible.
“And you are?”
Margo gave my mother a blank look and held up the burner phone I’d left in the cup holder. “Leaving.”
“Dammit, Margo,” I said, turning to her with what I could only imagine was fire in my eyes. “We talked about this.”
She stepped back from me like she was suddenly afraid of me. “No, you talked about it and made a decision, which I told you I didn’t agree with, but of course you know what’s best for me when you don’t even fucking know me!”
Fury oozed out of every pore as she took another step back. I didn’t want to have this conversation in front of my mother, or at all, really, so I scoffed and walked away.
“You’re staying,” I said over my shoulder. “So get your ass in the house.” I didn’t have time to deal with her tantrums. She’d get used to the way things had to be. Or she wouldn’t.
I really didn’t give a fuck.
Fuck. Yes, I did. I gave a huge fuck.
When she hadn’t moved, I took her hand and pulled her along with me into the house, wondering for only a split-second before I shut it out of my mind, how close we had been to the family compound before I’d let my concern for Margo’s feelings fly out the window.
***
“Rourke man, it’s good to see you.” Eamon was the first to greet me when I stepped into Uncle Patrick’s office.
“Hey, it’s good to be seen,” I joked, which erased some tension in the room as I accepted hugs from my family. “Catch me up.”
“The Milano numbers are shrinking, and without Lorenzo’s leadership, they seem to be floundering. So far, though, those assholes have shown no signs of stopping.”
Eamon looked mad enough to spit nails, and I could relate.
“The dipshit son was alive the last time we saw him. Any word from him in the past twenty-four hours?”
“Not yet,” Shae offered with a grave expression on his face. “I don’t know if that’s good news or bad.”
“Bad,” Patrick added. “It means the boy is doing something dangerous, like thinking for himself.”
I knew exactly what my uncle meant. Daniel hadn’t been properly groomed for the responsibility that now rested on his shoulders, so he would probably overreact in response.
“Look at you,” he said. “You need a day to get your head on straight?”
“Do I look that bad?” I scoffed.
“You look like you got your ass beat a few times,” Conor joked from his spot near the bar, a stiff drink in one hand and one for me in the other.
“Only a couple times, but I’m still the handsome one.”
Conor laughed along with Patrick, but Eamon and Shae were all frowns and scowls.
“Keep tellin’ yourself that,” I said, shooting him the evil eye.
“There’s more,” Eamon continued. “Something is wrong with Lorenzo and we can’t afford for him to die just yet.”
“Margo is a paramedic,” I offered up, hoping her experience could help us stave off all-out war.
Patrick nodded and stroked his chin in his classic thinking pose. “So she’ll help us. But that’s another thing we need to figure out, why they took Byrne’s daughter.”
Conor raised his hand and finished off his drink. “I’m on it, Uncle. Don’t hold dinner for me.” Without another word he strode across the room and shut the door quietly behind him.
“Do we even need to worry about her?”
I knew what Eamon was asking, but I didn’t know how to answer. “Until a few minutes ago I would have said no, but it turns out she’s not a fan of being held hostage. Twice.”
“She’ll get over it,” Patrick insisted.
I didn’t believe it for a second, but he was in charge and his mind was made up.
He looked over at Eamon. “Get her upstairs to take care of Lorenzo.”
“I’ll do it.” I said.
“No you won’t. Son get your ass up there. I don’t need that old bastard dying on my watch.”
Chapter Eighteen
Margo
The only good thing about my current situation was that this prison was prettier than the last one, more luxurious, as well. But a gilded cage was still a goddamn cage. I was as trapped here as I’d been trapped in that broken down warehouse. At least here I was by myself, curled up on a big fluffy bed.
Or I was.
A key turned in the door that I had locked for my own safety, which was ridiculous since I knew they could get in whenever they wanted. At this point, I locked it just to piss these fuckers off. I didn’t bother to turn to see who the visitor was because it didn’t matter.
“We need you to look at the old man.”
I didn’t recognize the voice, but that only meant it wasn’t that snake, Rourke. Probably one of the thugs who’d dragged me up here like I was a sack of potatoes, then threw me in the room and slammed the door on me.
“Not a doctor,” I snarled, not bothering to look at him.
“Rourke said you’re a paramedic,” he shot back in a voice as cold as ice.
“It’s my day off.”
He sighed heavily before his footsteps grew closer and his hand wrapped around my arm, pulling me off the bed. “I don’t give a shit that you don’t want to be here. You’re here, deal with it.”
I let my body go limp, determined to be as little help as possible until I could get the fuck away from these psychopaths.
“Goddammit, woman!” Dark eyes stared down at me angrily as he jerked away from me. I didn’t flinch.
These men were all the same. If someone didn’t jump to do their bidding, they’d scare or beat them into submission. It was a simple and easy to remember playbook. Perfect for idiot criminals.
“Go ahead, hit me. Kill me. It’s all the fucking same, anyway!” I shouted all this at the top of my lungs, not because I thought help was coming, but because I was so over this whole goddamn situation.
“You’re all the same,” I said and looked away.
He scoffed and shook his head. “No, actually we’re not. We really are trying to help.”
That was bullshit. We both knew it so I didn’t bother to respond. Instead I turned to my side and stared at the baseboard below the window until my vision blurred.
“If Lorenzo dies, we’re all in trouble. You, your father, all of us.”
As much as it would kill me if something happened to my dad, this was the life he’d chosen, the same as everyone else in this obnoxious piece of real estate. Whatever happened to them, all of them, they brought it on themselves.
“Don’t you care?” he asked with a trace of reason.
I turned and met his gaze. “Nope,” I said, popping the P for emphasis.
“Look him over, and I’ll have some food brought up to you.”
“Not hungry.”
“You can’t stay hungry forever. Rourke told us you two haven’t been eating real meals.”
Of course, my traitor of a stomach chose that moment to make its hungry state known.
The jerk smiled. Oh, he thought he was so fucking clever, didn’t he?
“Not forever, no,” I said. “Just long enough.”
Understanding dawned, and his eyes widened. “Stubborn bitch.”
“Stubborn bitch. Dead bitch. Makes no difference to me anymore.” Sadly, after days in those warehouses and then trapped here, it was no longer hyperbole.
With a frustrated sigh, he left me alone, but I knew it was just a temporary reprieve.
***
It took all of ten minutes for the guy to return with back up. Some big guy lifted me over his shoulder and c
arried me out the door. To say I was kicking and screaming would be an understatement, but after a few minutes I realized whatever was happening was inevitable. So, I decided I’d just hang back as it were, and see what came next.
Next, was a bedroom upstairs where they unceremoniously dumped me on the floor.
And I wasn’t alone. “Who the hell are you?” I grumbled to the sickly old man slumped in a chair.
It was a stupid question once my eyes focused on his appearance. Dark brown hair sprinkled with gray and deep, almost black eyes combined with the sallow olive skin placed him as the man with the failing health I’d been hearing about.
“Lorenzo Milano at your service.” He tried for a smile from his spot beside the window, but it wasn’t nearly as confident as his words. “And you are?”
“The biggest dummy in the goddamn world.” I pushed up against the wall, not willing to turn my back on anyone. Ever. “My name is Margo.”
“Of course, you’re the mirror image of your mother.”
He smiled fondly like he’d known her, which would have interested me under normal circumstances. Now it just pissed me off.
“Soon, I’ll resemble her in every way.” Dead, because she trusted the wrong fucking man.
He frowned. “That sounds ominous.”
“Sounds like the truth to me.” His skin was pale and despite the chill in the air, sweat beaded his forehead. “They put me in here to force me to look you over.”
“You’re a doctor?” he asked.
“No. Men like you made sure that never happened. I’m a paramedic, and I don’t care if you live or die.”
His brown eyes widened in shock but his lips curled into a creepy grin. “Even if it means certain death for everyone you love?”
“Everyone I love is already dead so I guess it doesn’t fucking matter now, does it?”
“I can help,” he offered, his smile as sleazy as all the rest of them. My father’s included.
“Yeah, you can bring them back to life?”
At his dumbfounded look, I huffed out a disgusted laugh. “Didn’t think so.”
“You gonna let an old man die like this?” he said in a pathetic whine.
“You seem to be the one person in all of this bullshit who could stop all this fighting. But you won’t.” As far as I was concerned, his death would be the best thing for everyone. One way or another.
“You can’t blame a man for having ambition. Why should the Connellys and Byrnes have it all?”
“And why can’t any of you find a better way to earn a fucking living? Because that would be too easy? Too much like the right thing to do? I wish all of you motherfuckers were dead, every fucking one of you.”
Lorenzo laced his fingers together. “Tough talk for a girl trapped here right along with me.” He laughed a little before his hands started shaking and he gripped the arms of the chair for support.
I willed my body to stay where it was. Helping this man would only prolong my stay in this house, and I would rather die than help any of them. But when he tried to stand, his knees gave out and the medical professional in me was on her feet and helping him into bed.
“You’d rather die than stop this stupid war?”
“Guess we’re both stubborn as hell. You inherited that from your old man,” he said with a shake of his head. “If he would have just agreed to help, you wouldn’t be in this mess.”
“Bullshit,” I spat at him. “This is on you, old man. You caused all of this so it looks like we’ll both die here. Together.”
Finally, his smile faltered. “You’re a stubborn little thing, aren’t you?”
I shrugged.
“You won’t get away with it for long, you know.” He mumbled and coughed.
“That’s what I’m counting on, Lorenzo.”
Sharp brown eyes studied me as I took my seat on the floor with the wall at my back, wishing I’d never come back to Rocket at all. This is what being from a criminal family like mine got a girl. Kidnapped. Twice.
“Death is permanent and not something to be viewed lightly,” he said, coughing again at the end of his little speech. He was probably sicker than he knew.
“Oh please, like you give a shit about anyone’s life other than your own. You’d kill for an extra fifty cents, so spare me your sanctity of life crap.”
I knew all about the permanence of death, with half of my family lying six feet under at Grace Memorial Cemetery.
The door opened and an older man who I assumed to be Patrick, Rourke’s uncle, walked in. He stood with the man who’d dragged me in here, staring down at me.
“So, what’s wrong with him?” he said in a commanding voice.
“He’s old.”
All eyes narrowed in my direction.
“Is he gonna die?” That question came from the younger man. Had to be Shea. Looking at him made me think the other guy from before was Eamon. Fucking Connellys.
“Eventually.”
“Goddammit, can’t you answer a single fucking question?” The tough guy who’d manhandled me vibrated with anger, and it made me smile. It was about damn time someone felt a fraction of what I did.
“You already got two answers and that’s my limit.”
Patrick stepped forward and looked down at me. “Didn’t you take an oath to help people?”
“Nope, and even if I did, I’m pretty sure the exception is if you’re being held hostage. You want him checked out, get a fucking doctor.”
“You can do it,” he insisted angrily.
“But I’m not going to. I won’t.” Growing up around overbearing men who thought carrying guns made them masculine had given me a stubborn streak a mile wide, even to my own detriment. I found it to be one of my best qualities.
“You are ridiculous. How does that help anyone?”
“Who said I’m trying to help anyone? You’re fucking ridiculous. None of you have done anything for me but bring more shit my way. What do I care what happens to any of you? My father included.”
Patrick nodded and took a step back, pulling a gun from a holster hidden under his blazer and aimed it at me. My heart raced frantically, but I had a sense of peace as I resigned myself to my fate. “How about I just end it for you right now?”
“Go ahead. Sooner. Later. It’s all the same. Dead is dead. Just like every last one of you, eventually.”
Jaws clenched; I kept my whole body tense to avoid any trembling. I wouldn’t give them satisfaction of showing fear. I just stared up at the old man with the gun, daring him to pull the trigger.
“Just look him over and tell us if he’s dying or not.” The bastard said.
I glanced over at Lorenzo; whose brown eyes were riveted to the scene before him. “He’s dying but not today.”
Lorenzo grinned and mouthed the words, “Thank you,” to me, and I fought the urge to vomit.
“Tomorrow maybe, based on visible symptoms.”
Lorenzo’s grin fell at the same time Patrick’s turned to disbelief. “What’s wrong with him?”
“Don’t know. I left my ambulance at the office where it belongs.”
Rourke stepped into the room with a scowl aimed at me like I gave a shit. “Let me handle this.”
“Yes, let the biggest liar of all handle things. I’ll tell you what I told them, he’s old. The end.”
“Why are we being nice to this chick?” The younger guy stepped all the way in the room wearing a pretty intimidating glare that I couldn’t muster up enough fear or worry to care about. “Give me five minutes, and she’ll do what we need her to do.”
Rourke put a hand out to the younger guy’s chest to stop him. “So, we can have Byrne after us too, Shae? Be smart.”
Shae? I knew it.
***
Lorenzo sighed in his chair while his gaze followed my finger tracking his eyes. “A little tired and chilly. Hungry, too, but I’m all right,” he said in answer to my question.
I was skeptical, but I didn’t say a word to contr
adict him, just a subtle nod as I reached for the blood pressure cuff.
Patrick probably believed his gun turned the tables, but I knew that wasn’t true. As much as I didn’t give a fuck whether Lorenzo lived or died, in the end I took my training to heart. No one would die on my watch if I could help it. And maybe, just maybe, I’d figure out a way to use my Florence Nightingale skills to my own advantage so I decided to cooperate. For now.
“When did you last eat?” I asked.
“Sometime yesterday. Just once.” To his credit the old man didn’t say it to get any sympathy, just stated the fact.
Again I just nodded, aware of everyone watching me. I kept my eyes on the digital dial until the beep sounded. While hardly a fully equipped infirmary, the house had an impressive array of medical equipment. I made a note of his numbers in a log someone was keeping on the night table and looked down at Lorenzo.
“What medications are you taking?”
Lorenzo looked up at Patrick and rattled off a few names that I’m sure only I recognized.
“That’s it,” he said.
That told me a lot. He was a sick motherfucker. “Okay. How’s your equilibrium?”
“About seventy, seventy-five percent.”
“Any nausea or dizziness?”
“None.”
“Do you have your medicine on you?”
Lorenzo slid a gaze to the others. “Wasn’t counting on being gone so long, was I?”
I snorted. “Given the life you lead maybe you should have. I, on the other hand, had every right to expect to be left the hell alone.”
I shoved a thermometer in his mouth with more force than necessary, jotting down more notes before I hurried around the room checking out the supplies, retrieving a few things I needed, not sparing one fucking glance at Rourke.
“I had to get your old man’s attention,” Lorenzo wheezed.
I gave the old guy a snort and dropped down to the fridge beside the small table in the corner to pull out a bottle of orange juice.
“You need to eat regularly and take your pills,” I said, more coldly than I needed to.
Finally I turned to Rourke. I’d have looked through him if I could. That was as much emotion as I was willing to give him. Basically nothing. “He’ll live if you feed him better and get his medications.”
