HEAT: A Dark Romance

by Sophia Gray

  Hand still on the wall, I walked over to the window. If I weren’t on the second floor, I would risk breaking a window and trying to escape that way, but I couldn’t risk it. There was no ledge outside of this window, just a straight drop down.

  The sight of bodies lying on the floor, some of the men writhing around in pain, blood staining the grass, made me even sicker to my stomach, and I had to look away. God, help them. Help me, too. Please. This is terrible.

  Anton had come for me, but at what cost to himself and his men? Yes, I had hoped and prayed he would come rescue me, but I never thought it would end up being such a bloodbath.

  The gunfire continued, on and on without end, and shouts and screams filtered to me, as well as the sound of men fighting. Terrible howls of pain as shots connected. Threats of more violence, promises that loved ones would be hunted. I couldn’t make out all of the words, and I couldn’t recognize any of the voices. My ears were beginning to hurt, even though my closed door muffled the sounds of the shots.

  How long the fighting lasted, I didn’t know. Had there been neighbors to this house? Couldn’t others hear the gunfire? Would they call the police? Maybe not, if they knew they lived near a mobster’s house. Couldn’t blame them for not wanting to get involved, and maybe the police showing up wasn’t a good idea. Anton himself was a mob boss. The police might want to arrest him or his men.

  And if that happened, if we were so close to reuniting only to be separated by jail bars this time, I wouldn’t be able to handle it. I wasn’t meant for this kind of life. I needed to not live in fear. I needed something more.

  I wanted something more. Out of my life. Out of his.

  If we survived this somehow, I wanted to do something with my life. I didn’t just want to be Anton Kovalsky’s woman or mother to his child. I wanted to make a difference. I wanted to help women who had been abused or kidnapped. I wanted to help them survive. I wanted to give them hope.

  Hell, I needed hope myself right now.

  The man who had kidnapped me…he wouldn’t be able to get away with this, right? I could see him try to claim this all as self-defense. They came to my house, guns ablazin’. We had no choice but to fire back. The thought sickened me. If I survived this, I would do whatever it took, I would testify, I would make sure he would end up convicted and in jail.

  But I had never seen the man behind the curtain. I didn’t even know his name. His men talked about him but only ever referred to him as their boss. What if he tried to claim ignorance? What if he threw his men under the bus and said they acted under their own authority? That he hadn’t ordered them to take me? It would be my word against theirs, and considering I was involved with a mob boss, would the jury believe me?

  The gunfire and the shouts of the angry and the wails of the dying grew louder. I slid backward to the corner. What if the door opened but it wasn’t Anton or one of his men on the other side? What if the mobsters holding me hostage decided they didn’t need to keep me around anymore? That I was expendable? There wasn’t a weapon here. All it would take would be a gunshot.

  The doorknob jiggled, and I held my breath. The door opened. The guy standing there was one I didn’t recognize, but it didn’t matter if he was friend or foe because suddenly he slumped down, bleeding profusely, dead from a shot to the temple.

  I stifled a scream, my hand over my mouth. I was going to be sick again. This was a nightmare. So much death and carnage. I was going to die here. This was it. The end for the baby and me. We would die. Anton might have already died. Who knew? The two mobs might shoot each other to the point of destroying both.

  Trying to calm my stomach, I held it, hunched over, walking bent over to the door, but I didn’t leave. Bullets were whizzing by in the hallway. The house shook suddenly from a big blast beneath us, and I stumbled to the ground, landing hard. What was going on?

  I brought myself up to my feet, peeked outside, and in the room across from mine, I saw Anton. He was holding a man by the throat. His lips moved, and from his facial expression, it was obvious he was shouting. Whoever the man was, Anton was beyond pissed at him. His arm came up, and I gasped, my hands flying to my mouth. Was he going to execute the guy? No. Anton pistol-whipped the man, knocking him unconscious.

  “Anton!” I tried to cry out, but his name was unintelligible on my lips.

  Or maybe not. He turned around, and his eyes widened. The expression on his face…I would never forget it. He looked at me like I was his whole world, his sole reason for breathing, and I couldn’t handle it. I couldn’t handle the terror that had been my life throughout this ordeal. I couldn’t handle the thought that I might be saved. I couldn’t handle Anton and his baggage or my baggage either.

  I didn’t mean to, but I started to cry. There was still fighting going on, but it did seem to be winding down some. The number of shots fired was going down. Maybe they were starting to run out of bullets. I risked a few steps forward so I could peek up and down the hallway. I sorely wished I hadn’t. The amount of dead bodies was terrible. Piles of them. Men stepping over them to shoot at others. The cost was way too high.

  Anton was making his way to me, but I didn’t want him to, terrified a stray bullet might hit him, but then he was standing in front of me and picking me up, cradling me to his chest. I had wanted this moment for so long it didn’t feel real. Maybe none of this was real. Maybe I was hallucinating or sleeping. Yes. This was all a dream. A nightmare. Both in one.

  It took me a few tries to be able to lift my arms to wrap them around his neck. I could feel him, his hard, long body. He felt real. He smelled real. He looked real. Maybe this wasn’t a dream after all.

  I was still crying, the tears hot against my cheeks. He had to know. He might have saved me, but the baby…I didn’t know if the baby still lived or if I had lost him or her, and that pain remained with me despite my happiness at being held by Anton again.

  Through tears and gasps for breaths, with my eyes closed so I couldn’t see his reaction, I managed to say, “I’ve been bleeding. Anton…Anton, I probably lost the baby. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I’m sorry…”

  I couldn’t stop apologizing, to both him and to myself. When I opened my eyes, I saw that his face was fierce and grim, so grim. But he didn’t say anything. He just walked down the hallway, stepping over bodies, ignoring the carnage. He held me close, and I should feel safe. I had always felt safe in his arms.

  I didn’t feel safe. I didn’t feel happy.

  My sense of happiness, my sense of self, my sense of security…they had taken a lot more than just my body by holding me prisoner.

  Anton carefully carried me downstairs, cradling me close to his chest, and we made our way outside. He tenderly placed me in the backseat of his car and belted me in. Then he got behind the wheel. Taking me away from my prison. Taking me to the hospital.

  I was free.

  But I still felt trapped.

  Chapter 34

  Anton

  Leaving wasn’t easy. I had hit Vanya Golovkin hard in the temple with the butt of my gun, but he was just unconscious. He wasn’t dead. I hadn’t had my revenge. I had gone upstairs, hoping to find either Golovkin or Lily.

  And I did find Golovkin, or rather he found me.

  Maybe because of his cousin, or maybe because I was growing more desperate and just wanted to find Lily as quickly as possible, I found myself aiming for legs rather than head shots. I was shooting to stop rather than kill. Might be stupid, but I did find that since I changed my shot location, my bullets were hitting their mark with more precision.

  The amount of Golovkin’s goons up here was insane. It was a blessing I didn’t come up by myself. The ringing in my ears was growing worse, and my arms were growing sore from holding up the guns, but I didn’t stop. I didn’t quit.

  My guys and I were in a tight circle, back to back, firing both sides of the hallway. Golovkin’s guys flooded the hallway, though some stayed in the doorways, using them as a shield to pop out from behind.


  A few of my men, myself included, wore Kevlar. It wasn’t easy to get hands on it, or else I would’ve gotten enough for every single one of us.

  Up and down the hall, I noticed which doors guys had left from and which had guys hiding in. Two doors had no activity, both on the left.

  I motioned for the man next to me to cover me, and I darted down the hallway. The gun from Golovkin’s cousin ran out of bullets, and I used the butt of it to slam into the temple of a guy who rushed me. After I shot off another couple of shots, I knocked a guy down, shoved another toward one of his mates, and tackled yet another one. The useless gun smacked against his face, and he stopped moving.

  More volleys of shots fired overhead, and I kept low as I neared the doors in question.

  One of them opened, and I darted inside to see none other than Vanya Golovkin, surrounded by no less than ten of his men.

  “Leave us,” Golovkin demanded. “He’s mine.”

  I dropped the gun that held no bullets and stepped forward to allow his men enough space to be able to live. How fitting that it would come down to this — to just him versus just me.

  “You never should’ve taken her,” I growled.

  Golovkin shrugged. “You never should’ve had your man sniff around my daughter.”

  I circled around him, my gun raised and aimed directly at his. “If your daughter wouldn’t have talked so freely, he wouldn’t have bothered with her skirts.”

  He sneered and fired a shot that I jerked to the side to avoid.

  “Oh, did I hit a nerve?” I mocked.

  “You’re too arrogant and cocky for someone who has lost so much already. Or have you forgotten what I did to your parents? It was my mistake that I didn’t kill you off then.”

  I smirked at him. “There’s a reason why you haven’t tried harder to kill me. You need the ransom money more than you need me dead. Oh, I’m sure you’ll kill me if I bothered to pay you, but—”

  “I fired a shot at you,” he growled. “I could easily kill you right now.

  “Then pull the trigger,” I said hotly. I damn near pulled the trigger myself. The firepower going off in the hallway was increasing, and a few guys were backing up and into my line of sight through the open door. Chaos, that’s what this was, and it would be a miracle if I could get Lily and myself out of here alive.

  Golovkin hesitated.

  I barked a laugh. “You won’t, and I know why. Because you need me alive for my money. You’re that desperate for the ransom money.”

  A loud explosion went off, and the house shook slightly. I darted forward and knocked Golovkin’s gun aside, clear across the room.

  He backed up slightly, hands raised. “Listen, I—”

  “No. You listen,” I hissed. “I don’t care who it is that kills you. Me. The police. The guys at Garcia Trucking. Oh, wait…didn’t you realize I knew about that? About how you’re a wanted man? Because I did. You’re a dead man any way you look at it, Golovkin, because I can’t pay you. I won’t. I refuse.”

  Sweat dotted his brow. I could hear a door swing open from nearby, more gunshots, too, but I didn’t glance away. I had Golovkin right where I wanted him.

  “I could ask you to beg. I could make you get down on your hands on knees and plead for me to spare you. I could grab your family from wherever you stashed them, bring them here, and kill them in retaliation for what you did to me.” Quick as a snake, I leaped forward and twisted him around, his head in the crook of my arm as I held him tight in a headlock. “I could, but what would be the sense in that?” I whispered in his ear. “I know you, Golovkin. You would rather die than be thrown in jail. You would kill yourself first if given the chance since you know neither I nor the guys you owe money to won’t give you a peaceful, merciful death.” I pistol whipped him, and he slumped to the ground, unconscious but still alive. I bent down over him. “You won’t get the chance to hurt anyone else that I care about.”

  I might’ve killed him right then and there, but I hesitated. The gun ringing, the shouts and cries of those in pain…everything had been so crazy. All that death and destruction. We knew what to expect, but we still hadn’t been prepared, and I lost a lot of good men.

  But I had also found Lily. She needed me. She needed my help. And that was more important than getting my revenge. She had called my name and brought me back to her, and I couldn’t bear the thought of wasting one more second of my life without her in it. I also didn’t want her to witness me killing someone, even Golovkin, the man responsible for her abduction. I wanted her to be safe, and that overrode everything else, including my revenge.

  And here I was, holding her again, pressing her to me…it was amazing and wonderful but also absolutely terrifying. Someone had never meant this much to me before. I never needed someone else before. I had always kept walls up, to prevent myself from being hurt again, like I had when Golovkin had taken away my family. But Lily…she meant everything.

  And having her back again meant everything to me. For a moment, everything was perfect. It didn’t matter the world around us had descended into chaos, that guns were being fired, that we were still in danger. We were together.

  But then I noticed her clothes were wet. It wasn’t until she mentioned the baby that I realized she was soaked with blood — her blood. One need, one goal, pulsated through me, and I carefully, tenderly, but quickly got her out of there. Her safety and that of the baby’s far outweighed my desire for revenge.

  I carried her out of there. The fighting was slowing down some, but it hadn’t stopped. One bullet did hit me in the back, and I stumbled but didn’t fall. This Kevlar was shot — pun intended — but it was still holding up and absorbing the brunt of the impact and keeping me safe enough.

  Once outside, I winced at the sight of so many of my men lying dead on the grass. I had to step over one man, and I recognized him as Golovkin’s cousin. He had been killed. A spark of pity overwhelmed me. He had been a coward, yes, but he had only thought of his family. He had wanted to live another day for them. I’m sorry.

  But I couldn’t dawdle. I had to keep moving, and I made my way to my car. After I belted her in the backseat, I rushed to get behind the wheel. Right as I was turning off the street, the police with their sirens blaring rolled by, heading straight for Golovkin’s. I grinned with grim satisfaction. Vanya Golovkin would never hurt Lily, our child, or me ever again. Vanya Golovkin would rot in jail forever. He didn’t have the money to pay for a high profiled defense attorney. Between the weapons charges and everything else he’d be charged with today on top of the charges I helped to make stick, there was no way he’d be leaving jail unless it was in a body bag.

  Driving to the hospital was a blur. I drove as swiftly as I could, but also safely. My clothes clung to me, wet from sweat and Lily’s blood. I warred with myself, wanting to race there but not wanting to jar Lily, not wishing to cause her any more pain. She was crying softly, and I kept trying to reassure her she’d be all right, that everything would work out, but she never responded to me. I wasn’t sure she even heard me. I took turns as gently as I could and cursed every red light.

  As soon as I parked, I hurried out of the car and carried her straight inside to the emergency department. The staff was amazing, moving Lily to the front of the line. They took her back immediately, whisking her away, and I felt as if they took a part of me with her. They wouldn’t allow me to follow. My stature didn’t matter. My lying that I was her fiancé helped. She needed serious help, maybe even surgery, and there was nothing I could do other than to sit and think and wait and feel completely helpless.

  I couldn’t bear to lose her. I didn’t want to lose the child either, and the thought that she might lose the baby was devastating. I still wanted and needed an heir, but I wanted Lily just as much. This wasn’t about our deal anymore. This wasn’t about a deal of goods in exchange for money. This was about so much more than that. I didn’t just want to have a child. I wanted to have that child with Lily. I didn�
�t just want an heir. I wanted the mother of my children — boy or girl or boys or girls — to be with Lily. I wanted her period.

  I wasn’t a religious man. A mob boss couldn’t be. But here I was, in the hospital waiting room, my head in my hands, praying. Hoping. Wishing. Willing. I hoped and prayed the doctors could help her, could save the baby, but even if they couldn’t, we could always try again later.

  If Lily would still have me. There was no doubt in my mind that her experience would change her. She had been introduced to the darkest part of my life. I wouldn’t blame her if it made her want to turn tail and run away.

  But I sure hoped she wouldn’t.

  I prayed she wouldn’t.