Abducted

by K. I. Lynn

  I leaned back in my chair. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, you know I’m in contact with Al,” he said. Oh, that. “You went missing, and I don’t think you were in this state when that happened.”

  Meaning how did I end up with Domenico, looking like a half-dead human skeleton. Even with my improving physique, it would still take time to reverse the damage.

  “If I tell you it’s my father’s doing, will that satisfy you?” I asked.

  “No.”

  I pursed my lips as I stared at the fireplace across from me.

  How many years had it been since I’d last sat in this room? My grandfather had aged since the last time I saw him. His once salt-and-pepper hair was now all salt, and the lines on his face seemed deeper from the burden on his shoulders.

  I turned to him. “Answer this first: What happened?”

  “What do you mean?” he asked before taking another sip.

  “Why didn’t I see you anymore?”

  He regarded me as he scratched at his short beard. “When I first met your father, he was rising in his practice and was eager to work with our legal team. His ambition was strong, and he had a thirst. I knew when he asked for your mother’s hand not a month later that his reasoning was to have a foothold into the family. I would not allow him near the family business, but she was an adult and I couldn’t stop her. Shortly after was when he met Ferrante. Having your mother as his wife gave him an in.”

  “And you are enemies.”

  He nodded. “I forbid him to come anywhere near our organization. Your mother would bring you here as much as she could. The strain…She wasn’t as strong as you are. I feared for her, but the more I tried to remove her from that situation, the more he tightened her bonds until she couldn’t take it anymore.”

  I took a long gulp of my wine. It was always hard to talk about her, especially when my father barely let me grieve her death. “I don’t hate her for leaving me, but I do miss her.”

  He reached over and squeezed my hand. “She loved you so much, with all her heart.”

  “How did you get all of my mother’s things?” I asked. Even I wasn’t allowed any of it, so how did he attain it all?

  “I have informants. They knew who was tasked with disposing and selling her belongings. I used a third party to purchase as much as I could. I couldn’t just watch him throw her things away like he did her life.” Tears reflected in his eyes, and he blinked them away before clearing his throat. “The bastard even refused me entry to my own daughter’s funeral and kept you as far away from me as he could.”

  I stared down at the plates, wondering how my life might have been different. “I wish you could have gotten to me. Those years were hell.”

  His gaze locked onto me, his brow furrowed. “I tried. I lost over a dozen men trying, half of them to the man lying in this house.”

  My eyes widened. “Domenico?”

  He nodded. “He was younger then, still working his way up. The anger in him…there is good reason they call him la Bestia, mia bella.”

  “There are reasons not to call him that as well,” I said.

  “Perhaps.” He reached over and took my hand in his. “Tell me, how did you come to be with him?”

  Where to even begin? It seemed like a lifetime ago when I was surrounded on that bridge. “I’m not sure how long ago, five weeks, maybe six, they abducted me from my car on my way home. I spent weeks in a cage, where they held women to be sold off. Domenico…he had to put a claim on me.” My fingers danced around my collarbone.

  He released my hand and I could tell he was holding back anger as he stared at the script embedded in my skin. He knew what happened to those girls, and what I wasn’t saying. “How did you get out of there?”

  “Tensions rose. Roman Ferrante had been riling up the men, turning them against Domenico in a bid to get me. We just found out the whole thing was a plan hatched between Roman and my father. We fled one night and have been holed up in a motel until early today, when Roman found us. Domenico thought it would be safe with my father, that he would provide a place of sanctuary, but he didn’t. My father tried to kill me, but Domenico took the bullet. Guards turned on guards, and three men were dead at the end. Two of which I shot myself.”

  His eyes widened, and I knew the memories of him teaching me to shoot, to protect myself, were surfacing. Skills he no doubt feared I would need. “And your father?”

  “Domenico beat half the life from him, but sadly he is still alive.”

  There was so much to digest, to read between the lines, and to understand the deeper meaning, but I knew he was running through it all.

  “I can’t forgive all of Domenico’s sins against this family. I should have just let him bleed out. However, he did something I tried for years to do and failed—he protected you at all cost and brought you home.”

  My brow furrowed and I reached out for his hand. “Thank you, Nonno.”

  I knew it wasn’t an easy thing for him to do, and something many of his men would be against, but with his help, Domenico and I had a chance to make it to the other side. Unlike my father, the man sitting next to me was strong enough to stand down against a man who was his enemy. Because he valued my life—and showed it by allowing Domenico his own.

  After dinner I lost the heels and walked barefoot through the marble-lined halls. Once again, I was in awe at the space held under one roof. Each room was huge and decorated with such opulence. Chandeliers hung from the ceilings, large fireplaces filled many walls, and hardwood floors were covered with plush area rugs.

  I pulled a throw from one of the couches in one of the many sitting rooms. Luca was a ghost behind me, unobtrusive in my perusal. Oddly, little had changed from my memories. A few new pieces of furniture, an updated kitchen, but for the most part everything was the same down to the small plaster details that decorated the walls and ceilings.

  I wanted to change out of the dress, but I had a feeling everyone would be aghast at the state of my clothes in the trunk of Domenico’s car.

  Winding down to the basement, I found the infirmary next to the spa. There were four guards outside the door, and they blocked me from entering.

  “You can’t go in,” one of them said. They weren’t guards like Luca. No, these were associates and capos. Men who had retribution on their minds, and I refused to leave until I saw Domenico.

  “I’m not leaving.” At that, I sat down in one of the plush chairs a few feet away. I curled up on it, pulling the throw tighter around me.

  My stomach was in knots with each minute that passed. I needed to see him, to touch him. I needed him more than I could understand. Without him I had no idea what would happen to me, and I feared the unknown.

  “Miss, you can come in now,” the doctor called about an hour later.

  Immediately I was on my feet and racing through the open door. It wasn’t until I saw his face and heard his heart beating on the monitors that I began to relax.

  “How is he?” I asked as I took his hand in mine.

  “The bullet passed through.”

  “Passed through?”

  He nodded. “There was an exit wound.”

  I stared at him. If I’d been standing more to the right, would it have hit me too?

  “It struck to the far right. He is incredibly lucky all internal organs were missed. Half an inch to the left and there would be damage to his large intestines. He lost a lot of blood, and we’ve given him a transfusion.”

  “How long before he wakes?” I asked as I smoothed the hair from his forehead.

  When there was no answer, I turned toward him.

  The doctor looked over to the guard, then back to me and cleared his throat. “Due to his identity, we’ve put him in a medically induced coma.”

  “What?”

  “He’s a Ferrante,” the guard spit.

  “Who saved a Vitale life,” I bit out between clenched teeth.

  “Are you a Vitale?” he questioned.


  That was the moment I knew I needed to assert the authority of my identity. The identity I’d kept hidden for years. I stomped over to the guard and swung my hand back before whipping it across his face, then slammed my knee into his crotch.

  “Ask me something stupid like that again, and I will kill you with your own gun,” I growled into his ear.

  “The tactless ass said it because you’ve been under Ferrante control,” the doctor said to clarify. “Your father is high up in their internal hierarchy.”

  I turned to him. “And how did I have any control over my situation? I fled years ago to get away from him.”

  “And you showed up with a Ferrante in tow,” the doctor countered.

  “A man who took a bullet for me! Who pulled me away from them.”

  “We have to take every precaution,” he argued.

  “He’s been shot! What kind of danger is he in this condition?” I sat down in the chair next to Domenico and took his hand in mine. “Take him out of the coma.”

  The doctor sighed. “I’ll stop the medication, but it may take some time for him to wake.”

  I nodded, paying careful attention to everything the doctor did. I didn’t trust anyone near Domenico, even if my grandfather gave his word. There was bad blood, and I wouldn’t put it past any of them to seek retribution.

  “Wake up,” I whispered as a tear slid down my cheek. “I need you.”

  I awoke to the soft caress of fingers trailing up and down my arm. It lulled me awake, and I remembered where I was. I sat straight up and looked down to find Domenico staring at me.

  My heart skipped, and all the anxiety of him waking up flooded out of me. I draped my arms across his chest and held him close.

  “You’re awake.”

  “Where are we?” he asked, his voice hoarse. The once lax muscles beneath my touch began to coil.

  “At my grandfather’s house,” I said.

  His head cocked to the side. His gaze bounced around the room, at all the medical equipment, then back to me. “Ari, who is your grandfather?”

  “So many secrets between us,” I whispered as I met his eyes. “Laureano Vitale.”

  Domenico’s eyes widened and he sat up, a strangled groan escaping as he threw the covers from himself and frantically began pulling at the tubes and wires.

  “What are you doing?” I asked as I clamped my hand down before he could pull out the needle pumping him with much-needed blood and medicine.

  “I have to leave. I can’t stay here. They will kill me. It’s not safe here for me or for you.” He was frantic to get out. I’d never seen him anything but cool and collected.

  I cupped his face, trying to get him to focus on me. “They aren’t going to hurt you, I promise you.”

  His eyes were wild. “I trust you, but I don’t trust him, not with my life. Vitale hates me, and with good reason.”

  “He promised me he—”

  “A promise one of his men will break!” he yelled, his thoughts mirroring my own.

  “What is going on?” I’d never seen him so unraveled. There was something he wasn’t telling me. The answer to a whisper that had sat in the back of my mind for weeks. The last secret that needed to be revealed if we stood a chance of getting out of our cursed situation.

  Domenico gritted his teeth and ran his hand through his hair. “You’ve handed the Vitale a bargaining chip.”

  A bargaining chip? It made no sense, especially with the rose with his name on it losing petals daily. “What the hell does that mean? You said the Ferrante would kill you.”

  “My truths lacked some critical information, much like yours,” he ground out.

  The blood in my veins turned cold. “What information?”

  His eyes flitted between mine. “My name, like yours, is a half truth.”

  I blinked at him. That was the moment, the moment all secrets would be revealed. “What is your name?”

  His gaze locked on mine. “Giovanni Domenico Mancini Ferrante. My father is Giovanni Ferrante, head of the Ferrante family.”

  My stomach dropped. The room seemed to spin and I grabbed hold of him, my eyes never leaving his. “You’re a Ferrante?”

  Of all the secrets, I was not expecting that.

  “Technically, yes.”

  “Technically? If he’s your father, if your true last name is Ferrante, you are.”

  He blew out a breath and sat back on the bed but refused to release me. “I am the second-youngest son, but born of his mistress, Ileana Mancini. Illegitimate. Bastard.”

  All the stories clicked, the animosities and fighting. “That’s why they all hated you. That’s why they picked on you and your mother could do nothing.” So much made sense, and all bad thoughts of his mother disappeared.

  He nodded. “My siblings have hated me for not only being the child of a mistress, but because our father gave me his name. I’ve gone by Domenico since I was six, unable to stand being called Giovanni. Then started using Mancini as my last name when I was eighteen.”

  “That’s why you command so much respect.” Santiago had called him sir. At the time I thought it was odd, but there was too much going on to think on it for long.

  “Not everyone knows. When he put me to work, I dropped Ferrante, determined to make a name for myself, and not because of who my father is.”

  “Why did he give you his name?” I asked. With three other sons, why give that name to your bastard child?

  He shook his head. “He married out of family loyalty and obligation, but it was my mother he loved. Divorce wasn’t an option, and neither was denying that I was his son. Sure enough, my older siblings and Roman grew up to be disappointments, just like their mother.”

  “What do you mean they are disappointments?” I asked. For all the years my father worked for them, I may have seen all of the Ferrante children once, maybe twice, and mostly due to them being older than me.

  “There are four with his wife, Renata. Antonio is the oldest and thinks with his temper and not his brain. I’ve had to clean up more than a few of his messes. Manetto is all about drugs and partying. Valentina is a spoiled bitch with only materialism on her mind. And Roman you know.”

  Oh, I knew Roman. “He’s a two-faced bastard who can’t seem to do anything on his own.”

  He nodded. “Roman is Renata’s baby, and two months younger than me. He wants what he wants, but he expects others to give it to him. And Renata coddles them all, giving them whatever they want.”

  “What about you?” I asked.

  “You already know how I grew up,” he said. “Yes, I grew up with the best of everything, including education, but I worked for everything I have.”

  The status of our births should have pitted us against each other, and maybe it would have—if pieces of the puzzle had been reshaped or the chessboard skewed. Yet, while we were supposed to be mortal enemies, trapped in an epic battle between families, circumstances had made us so much more. Regardless of our hidden identities.

  Everyone around us was either a monster in the form of a man, or a man in the form of a monster.

  “Did my father know?”

  “At one point, before the scar, but after Roman’s attack is when I started using Mancini. In Maurizio’s arrogance, I think he forgot.”

  That sounded about right. “What are we going to do?” I asked.

  He shook his head and pulled me closer. “We have to get out of here.”

  “And go where? Do what? You were just shot. You shouldn’t even be moving this much.”

  His skin was pale and sweat littered his forehead. How much pain was he in that he was keeping inside?

  “Lie back,” I ordered. The last thing I needed was him passing out, and he looked close to it.

  He let out a breath as he relaxed against the bed. “I knew there was more to you, but I didn’t expect this.”

  “I haven’t seen my grandfather since I was thirteen,” I said in explanation.

  “Your father didn’t want La
ureano interfering with his plans.” He tugged on my hand. “Closer.”

  “You’re hurt,” I argued. I wanted to be closer, but the last thing I wanted to do was cause him to be in any more pain.

  He sat back up and swung his legs over the side. “Then I’ll come to you.” He wrapped his arms around me and pulled me until we were chest to chest.

  “I don’t want to hurt you.”

  He pulled back and brushed a lock of hair behind my ear. “I don’t care if you do.” Leaning forward, his lips pressed against mine.

  A small moan left me. I was cocooned in the security of his embrace. I felt the rise and fall of his chest beneath my hands, the warmth of his arms, and the gentle caress of his breath across my skin.

  “Lie back down,” I said after a few minutes.

  He begrudgingly followed my instructions, but I could tell when his head hit the pillow and his eyes closed that he needed it. I crawled up onto the bed, keeping clear of his right side, and nestled into his left side.

  I rested my head on his chest. His arms wrapped around me, holding me close.

  “It’s a good thing your father is a shitty shot,” he grumbled.

  I couldn’t agree more. “I can’t lose you.”

  “You won’t. I promise you I will keep you safe. No matter what. I will burn the Ferrante empire down to the ground, kill everyone, if that’s what it takes.”

  “You’d go that far?” I asked.

  He tilted my head back until our eyes met. That reserved calmness, the one I’d seen so many times, burned deep in his eyes. The intensity was staggering up close and caused me to swallow. “Io sono tuo.”

  I am yours.

  I pressed my lips to his. “From this life to the next.”

  It was officially me and la Bestia against the world. However, I had a feeling we had an ally in my grandfather—a grudging one that came about because of the cameras in the infirmary.

  He heard Domenico’s declarations, and though he still didn’t like him, it was his promise that struck him.

  “La Bestia doesn’t give false promises,” he said as we sat down for breakfast. “I will help you two.”