Hunter

by Blaire Drake

  “What did he do when he found out you were lying?”

  “I told him you must have just moved, and because we were moving more drugs for him, I had less help to keep an eye out for you and your mom.”

  “And he bought that?”

  His lips twitched. “He was too concerned with the fact you were alive. He lives in fear that one day he'll be killed.”

  “So he should,” I muttered, picking the ham from the bread. Oddly enough, I wasn't hungry now I had food in front of me. “Does Armo know you're doing this? Gaige?”

  Angelo shook his head. “Dad has no idea. Gaige found out after Carlo showed up because he heard me on the phone.”

  “Is that why you didn't trust Hunter?” I looked up. “Wait—how did he even get to me?”

  “I had to let him. And, yes. I didn't trust him as a person, but I knew he wouldn't kill you, Adriana. I've been living between New York and L.A. for five years. There isn't a person in the Romano family that doesn't know how crazy he went when you supposedly died. They all think that although you were kids, he loved you so much that your death drove him half to madness. Nobody thinks he'd be half the killer he is if you hadn't disappeared.”

  I dropped the sandwich and looked down. “It doesn't matter, does it? None of it matters anymore. He lied to me about Darien's death, and if I kill Enzio, I can't lead the family unless I get married. Let's face it,” I glanced up, “Hunter isn't exactly Boss material, is he?”

  “And you think my brother is?” He smirked, one eyebrow lifting with the side of his mouth.

  “I didn't say that,” I said quickly. Too quickly.

  “No, but you were thinking it. Look, Addy.” He leaned forward. “I haven't been risking my life for you for five years so you can take the safe option and marry my brother just to lead this family. He loves you, but he loves the California girl who'll never have responsibility. Gaige wouldn't know it if it smacked him in the face and gave him a lap dance.”

  Well, there was some truth in that. “I don't know what to do, Angelo. I don't even know why I'm here or what you're doing here. Why go along with it?”

  “Because it's easier to kill someone when they trust you,” he said in a low voice. His dark eyes captured mine, and I clasped my hands in my lap. “When you're on the inside. And guess what, Adriana? You're on the inside.”

  I stared at him for the longest moment before drawing in a slow, long breath that filled me with a twisted sense of hope. He was right! I was on the inside now, in the house. I didn't have to worry about getting in, because—

  I had to worry about getting out.

  “Yeah, I am. The inside of essentially what is a fucking prison cell,” I snapped, looking down at my wrists. “Look, Angelo. He tied me up like a fucking wild animal.”

  “Because you scare him. He knows you'll fight back if you can. Especially with your smart mouth.”

  “I still have no idea how this is going to work. Has nobody considered it's easier to let me die? 'Cause, you know. I have. A lot of times.”

  “Don't make me punch you for talking that bullshit.”

  “Punch me and I'm gonna wring your balls into 2020.”

  “There's that fight.” He grinned. “Drink.” He pushed the water toward me and I took it. “I've been trying to keep you alive for the last five years. I'm not letting you die right now. And despite what Gaige thinks, it's not so you can go back to California and make tiny Pontarellis with him.”

  I shuddered. I was too young for babies. Killing the man who provided me with half my DNA? Not a problem. Marriage of convenience? If necessary, not a problem. Babies? Hell to the fuck no.

  “Exactly.” He snorted. “Your home is here. Always has been.”

  “Right, and that's great.” I screwed the cap on the bottle after a drink. “But that doesn't explain how I get out of this basement prison and kill that figa.”

  He didn't even blink when I said basement. Smart guy. That's why he was going to one day run the Pontarelli family. “Do you trust me?”

  “I don't trust anyone anymore. They keep pissing me off.”

  Another grin. “Legit reason. But for my plan to work, you have to trust me.”

  “I don't exactly have another choice, do I? Keep Isaiah and his dirty shit away from me, and you'll definitely have my trust.”

  He sobered. “He won't touch you. I promise.”

  “Okay. Then, yes. I trust you.”

  Angelo stood, kissed the top of my head, and made for the door. “I'll be back as soon as I can.”

  “Sure.”

  The door shut behind him, and I hoped I wasn't making yet another mistake.

  Chapter Twenty-Four – Hunter

  “Carlo?” Mom's voice breaks through my concentration.

  I hate math. I don't understand its purpose—unless these angles are going to teach me how to kill a deer more accurately, it doesn't make much of a difference to me. “Hang on,” I reply, scribbling a—probably wrong—answer in the space on the sheet. “What's up?” I spin on my chair to look at her.

  She's pale, except for pink blotches around her eyes.

  “Are you crying?” I get up and walk to her, but she holds out her arms.

  “Sit down, baby,” she whispers.

  I want to tell her not to call me baby since I'm fifteen, but she looks so distraught, I don't care. “Mom, please tell me what's wrong. Is it Dad?”

  She shakes her head and squeezes her eyes shut, then pulls the spare office chair in front of me and sits on it. “I need you to promise me you won't lose your temper when I tell you this, okay?”

  “You're starting to scare me. Just tell me what's wrong.”

  She opens her mouth several times before she closes it. “Carlo...” She takes a deep breath. “Adriana died this morning.”

  I don't understand what she just said.

  “No she didn't. We spoke just last night. We're getting a movie tonight.”

  Mom shakes her head. “I'm sorry, Carlo. Darien took her and Alexandria to the store but they were in a crash. None of them survived.”

  I stare at her.

  It doesn't make sense.

  I don't understand. She can't be dead. Adriana can't be. That's not how it works.

  “No.”

  Mom nods slowly, more tears spilling over her eyes onto her cheeks.

  I shake my head, over and over. I don't know if I'm denying it or if I'm trying to remove the though from my head. Pretend I never heard her say it. Addy can't be dead. Not my Addy. She wouldn't leave me like that, I know it.

  “Tell me it isn't true,” I whisper shakily. “Mom.” My voice cracks, my throat tightening. “Please. Tell me it isn't true. Tell me she's alive.”

  She doesn't. She just cries. Cries. And cries. And cries.

  My heart breaks in slow motion. Everything is ripped away from me in agonizing slowness. My future—our future. Our dreams. Our plans. Everything shatters irreparably, and with her, a piece of me dies.

  I feel it break away from my soul. The part that she owned sinks out of me.

  I can't cry. I can't move. I'm frozen, paralyzed by the knowledge that I'll never see her again. Never see her smile, hear her laugh... I'll never get flicked by her stupid long hair or prodded by her long, black nails. I'll never look into her bright blue eyes and learn what love is every time she blinks.

  Nothing.

  My world blurs.

  Without her.

  I have nothing.

  ***

  I rubbed my eyes as I sat up in bed. It was the same dream, over and over, the day I found out she was dead. Of course now I know differently, but the thought that she'll choose Gaige one day has stirred up all that pain all over again.

  I had to ignore it. She was mine to protect, but not mine to love. I knew that the moment she recognized me in her house. She never would be, but fuck, a part of me couldn't let it go. A part of me couldn't let go of the idea of having her for myself.

  I needed her in a way he'd
never understand. She silenced the demons that plagued me relentlessly. She made me want to be better, for her, although I knew I could never touch upon redemption for all the lives that had been destroyed by my actions.

  Adriana Romano was my soul.

  And Gaige Pontarelli would never understand what that felt like.

  I swung my legs out of the bed and headed for the shower. I had no idea where he was, and I didn't care. We'd driven all night, switching out every few hours, and reached New York some time early this morning. We'd stopped to sleep on Gaige's demand, and now it was well past lunch and I was getting antsy.

  I had no idea if Adriana was okay. His reassurances that Angelo would keep her safe didn't do much to assuage my worry, given that Angelo was the fucking reason she was in the Romano house.

  I knew that place well.

  She'd be the only dark in its dark existence. Nothing good lived in that house. Not even Angelo, even if his double act was to be believed.

  And I didn't. Believe it. Didn't believe anything that came out of a Pontarelli. I was with Gaige for one reason, but now I was in New York, I could disappear and be in the Hamptons probably before he even realized I was gone.

  I tied the towel around my waist as I finished showering and scrubbed my finger across my teeth. It figured that the toothbrushes we'd purchased before we left Vegas where in the bag Adriana had taken. That was always how it worked, wasn't it?

  I dressed and then stared out of the window. I could see the Manhattan skyline in the distance, but I was perhaps one of the only people in the world not amazed by it. I'd seen it too many times to count... killed too many people in the dark alleyways that ran between the tall, majestic buildings.

  Gave too few fucks about this whole damn state except for the girl in the Hamptons.

  Three knocks sounded at my door, and I crossed the room to open it. Gaige stood there holding two cups of Starbucks, and I stared at them. He shoved one at me.

  “Here,” he said.

  “Er, thanks.” I took it and walked into the room. Being nice to him was... strange. “Have you spoken to Angelo?”

  “Not much. She's okay. He's seen her twice—sometime in the middle of the night and again at lunchtime. He has to be careful so Enzio doesn't suspect he's helping her.” Gaige sat at the small table in the corner of the room.

  “They're keeping her downstairs?”

  “Downstairs?”

  “Enzio turned the basements into holding cells. Nothing in there except for blankets. You don't even know there's a light unless you're told. The switch is by the ceiling and tiny.”

  “Nice. He sounds like a right fucking party.”

  “If the party is a funeral,” I muttered. “What's your plan for today?”

  “Get as close to the Hamptons as possible and call Angelo to see if we can get her out.” He shrugged. “We can't do anything unless Enzio is here, which he isn't yet. Apparently he knows that she's there and is coming home today. Angelo couldn't put it off anymore.”

  I sat on the edge of the bed and rubbed my hand across my face. All the fucking apparentlys were driving me insane. Knowing she was down in the basement cells beneath the house—fuck, it ate at me. I knew what they were. I'd seen them. I'd fucking killed in them.

  If Gaige had any idea how shit those places were, he'd be a lot more agitated than he was. He looked calm. Like he'd wait for the storm to come to him.

  Fuck that.

  I was the storm, and I wanted to be headed right through the Hamptons.

  It was then, in that moment, looking at him sipping coffee and scrolling on his phone, that I knew.

  He couldn't have her.

  Whether I deserved her or not, he couldn't have Adriana.

  She belonged to me.

  I'd kill him before I'd let him touch her.

  “Then let's go,” I said, swallowing that resolve and standing.

  He looked up. “Right now?”

  “No, next fucking week, you prick.”

  “Hey.” He stood and squared up to me. “Calm the fuck down, Carlo. We're both trying to do the same thing here.”

  “Yeah? You think? Because you seem real fucking calm, Gaige. She's in a tiny room without a bed. She'll be lucky to have a pillow or more than two blankets, and that's if they don't have her tied up. If your brother really is helping her, then she's eating, when he can smuggle it down to her. She might not even be drinking. You have no idea what could be happening to her right now.”

  “Angelo will take care of her.” He was certain. “He won't let anything bad happen to her.”

  “He won't have a choice!” I clenched my fist and then pushed my knuckles into my temple before I stepped back. “Do you not understand that? Is your life in Los Angeles so fucking cushy that you have no idea how it works when you're kidnapped by the mafia, huh? You know how Enzio's men usually punish women, Pontarelli? They rape them. Numerous times. Numerous men. Over and over until they're broken spirits on the ground. If they want to do that to her, Angelo can't do a fucking thing about it, and we're still two and a half hours away from her.”

  His eyes widened.

  Yeah. He'd lived a fucking easy life in California, for sure. Running drugs. The occasional woman passing through. He had no idea what it was like to be in the middle of it.

  “I don't know about you, but I'll be fucked if anyone touches her like that. And if they do, I'm gonna break their bones one by one, and I'd rather not wait. So let's fucking go.” I left the coffee on the side, grabbed my bag and my gun, and left the room, tucking the weapon into my jacket once more.

  I meant it, too.

  If anyone touched my girl, I'd shatter their bones so slowly and painfully they'd beg for death with every breath they took.

  No questions asked.

  “Give me the keys,” I demanded as we reached the car Gaige had hired.

  He stared at my outstretched hand. “Why?”

  “Have you ever been to New York? Ever driven to the Hamptons?”

  “No.”

  How the fuck had he never been to New York? Oh, yeah—the Pontarelli prince had a fucking cushy-cushy life. “Then hand 'em over now. I'm not being your human fucking GPS.”

  He threw them to me and walked around the car. I still didn't trust his ass, but he'd already followed me across the country because he didn't trust me. I figured it was easier to keep him close because he'd sure as hell follow me across a state.

  Once he'd figured out where to go, that was.

  Idiot.

  When I got in the car, his thumb was moving across the screen of his phone. I stared at him until he realized I was looking. It took him several minutes.

  “You know someone could kill you and you wouldn't even realize they were there?” I asked him.

  “I knew you were there. I was just ignoring you.” He tapped on the screen and showed it to me. “From Angelo.”

  Enzio lands 3hrs.

  That was all it said. “Right. We need to leave.” I shoved the key in the ignition and turned it harshly. The engine roared to life, and I was already talking before I'd pulled out of the parking lot. “Isaiah will collect him from the plane to bring him back to the house, along with a new security team. The house will be unmanned from the back, so Angelo needs to get as many people away by saying Enzio has ordered everyone out. They'll go. Clearly he has them all convinced he's on their side, and I didn't even know he was pretending to be a part of the family.” I snorted. I'd be pissed off if I wasn't kinda impressed at his secretive skill. “We need to get Adriana out of the basement and somewhere she can't be cornered.”

  “I could take her away. Get her completely out of the house.”

  “No. She's determined to be the one to pull the trigger on Enzio, and I respect that. She stays with me.” My grip on the steering wheel tightened.

  She always stays with me.

  ***

  The roads were long and familiar. I knew every one like I knew the lines of my palms, probably b
etter. I'd driven them more times than I could count, but this time, they felt wrong.

  I didn't want to be on them for the first time ever. I wanted to turn around, but I couldn't. Not without Adriana.

  Fuck, I wanted to go in, get all this done, and then take her somewhere. Some remote island in the middle of the ocean where nobody could ever touch her again.

  The guilt and regret I had over letting her go held onto me with an iron grip. I couldn't shake it. If it was true and Isaiah had been waiting for her to be alone, if I hadn't have let her go, she might have been safe. She might have gotten through her stupid mission without being taken from me.

  Of course, I still let her go. I still had to live with that.

  I just wanted her back. Right here where she was safe with me. Because that was all that mattered. That she was safe.

  With me.

  I used that thought to soothe my guilt. It didn't work. It took away the sting, but there was no soothing. I needed to see her, and I needed to see her soon. I needed to see her with my own eyes and touch her with my own hands and make sure she was okay.

  Possessiveness ripped through me. I'd never felt so protective over someone that wasn't right by my side. Hell, even in my whole life, I'd never felt this protective over her. That was saying something given how often she seemed to walk blindly into trouble when we were kids.

  I fought the smile that tried to form. Gaige already thought I was mad—I didn't need to reinforce that by smiling to myself as I drove. He hadn't said a word since we got in the car two hours ago, and now we were almost there, the most he'd moved was to check his phone.

  It was a pointless thing to do. Angelo would only message him if he could, and if he was still trying to send people out of the house on 'Enzio's orders' then that could take forever. Most of the guys who spent time at the Romano house were stubborn motherfuckers.

  I would know. I was one of them.

  If they knew what I knew, I wondered if they'd stay. Wondered if they'd be on Enzio's side or Adriana's.

  A war was brewing in the Romano family. It had been for ten years.