by B. B. Hamel
Another voice, this one male. It was Manzi, but I couldn’t make out the words. He sounded angry, though, and I drifted toward them, heart racing.
What would he do to that poor girl, out here alone? Should I run inside and get Roman?
The girl let out a violent, pained gasp, like she’d been hit. I walked closer, one hand on my scar, the other at my throat like I needed to keep myself from screaming. I peered around the corner and saw them, backlit by streetlights beyond the parking lot.
The girl was down on her knees in front of a hulking shape. She stared up with a sneer and dabbed at her mouth with the back of her hand, then spit blood onto the wood.
Manzi stood over her, breathing hard.
“I told you not to embarrass me and this is what you do.”
“Fuck your mother, you weak little man. I told you the truth because you needed to know.”
He slapped her across the face. She gasped and clutched at her cheek but didn’t cry out.
I didn’t understand why she wouldn’t scream.
“You should’ve kept it to yourself then, you dumb bitch.” He pulled a gun from his waistband and held it against her head.
The girl went very, very still.
The rage drained from her face and her eyes went wide. Her lips dropped open—god, she was really pretty—and she put her hands up in the air.
“Okay, Manzi, let’s be careful, okay? I know I shouldn’t have slept with him. It was a very stupid mistake. I agree. You can slap me around. I deserve it. We both know that. But why bring out a gun? Why would you want to kill me?”
“You keep doing this, Dia. We keep playing this little fucking game, and you don’t seem to get it. Now maybe you’ll learn.” He sounded on the verge of losing his mind, his rage barely controlled. I didn’t know what to do, and as he stepped forward and pressed the gun against Dia’s head, I couldn’t move, couldn’t lift my limbs, couldn’t open my jaw.
My lips were stuck to my teeth.
My tongue was heavy and swollen.
My mouth was bone dry like chalk on a gravestone, and a buzzing pulse ran through my legs, an ice-cold sheen of fear that kept me frozen in place.
Just like that night, all over again. My fingers dug into the scar on my belly. The slash of pain. All that blood.
“Nobody has to know, baby,” Dia said softly, and her hands reached out like she wanted to pull him against her. “Come on, Manzi. You know how this goes. You fuck around, I fuck around, but I still love you, mi cielo. I always come back to you, mi rey, my king.”
“Why the fuck do you have to be like this, huh? Why the fuck do you always have to be like this?”
“Manzi, please—”
He pulled the trigger.
Her head jerked back and exploded outward in a cloud of red mist and skull shards and brain matter. She slumped down in a tangle of limbs, more blood pooling all around her gorgeous body, and I kept thinking, oh my god, oh my god, she was so pretty, my mind like a VCR on loop, like a rope thrown over a cliff. I took a single step forward, staring at Dia’s body as Manzi cursed and waved the gun around and stood over her grabbing at his hair like even he was shocked that he’d shot her—
I didn’t know what made him turn.
Maybe he felt me there, maybe he heard something.
But Manzi looked over his shoulder, and for one throat-clenching moment his eyes stuck to mine like daggers, and there was fear in his expression, definitely fear, but that quickly turned to anger as he leveled the gun right at my chest.
My legs were broken. My fingers pressed so hard against the scar it hurt.
I finally found the scream that was stuck in my throat.
Manzi cursed and lowered the pistol. His eyes leapt to the door, and he took one step away from me before shoving the gun into his belt. He turned and ran off into the night, leaving Dia alone on the wooden pier, her blood dripping down into the bay below, mingling with the ocean tides and the salt water, feeding the fishes and little creatures that feasted on life, her pretty hair drenched in the sticky red mess, her beautiful face absolutely ruined, and I was still screaming.
I must’ve been screaming the whole time until a hand pressed down over my mouth.
“What the hell happened?”
His voice. It barely cut through my total panic. His fingers were rough against my lips, and I forced myself to stop, took gasping breaths, blinked away the fear-induced tears that rolled down my cheeks, and looked back.
Roman stood just behind me, his chest like a prison and an escape.
I pushed his arm away and tried to get my looping brain under control.
“Manzi,” I said, breathless. “He shot her.”
Roman stared down at me, those ice-cold eyes calculating.
Weighing, measuring, judging.
“Did anyone else see?”
I shook my head. “We need to call the police.”
“Come on.” He grabbed my hand and pulled me toward the parking lot.
Toward Dia.
“No,” I said, resisting. “I don’t want to go near her. Please, we have to call the police.”
But Roman’s grip was iron and he didn’t stop. I struggled, but that only made him turn back and stare into my eyes.
“If you don’t follow me right now, I can’t promise you’ll survive tonight. Do you understand me? Do you have any clue what you just witnessed?”
“Who are you? Why are you doing this?”
A smile quirked at the corner of his handsome mouth. “I’m nobody. Now hurry.”
He pulled me again, and this time, I followed.
I didn’t know why, but I let him tug me along. We skirted around Dia’s body—so much blood, all of it ruining that gorgeous dress, why the hell do I care about her dress she’s dead—and out into the parking lot.
Roman took out a phone and dialed a number. “Bring the car around. I’ll meet you out front. Hurry.” He shoved it back into his pocket as he dragged me toward the street.
“Wait, hold on.” My heart was racing, but my mind started to work again. I felt dizzy, like I might be sick, but at least I could think straight. “We’re calling the police, right? That was a murder back there.”
“You just witnessed the start of a war, you unlucky girl. There are men back in that building who will gladly throw you into the bay to make sure what happened just now never leaves this place. If you stay, they’ll make sure it happens.”
I tugged back against him. “What are you talking about? Are you crazy?”
He let out a frustrated growl. We were a few feet from the sidewalk and the streetlights, and for some reason, I didn’t want to go any farther with this man.
This terrifying monster. The sort of beautiful nightmare that was supposed to stay hidden beneath my bed or locked behind the closet of my childhood.
“Do you know who those men were back there? Do you remember the skinny guy with dark hair, looks like a school teacher? That’s Giatno Liberto, don of the Liberto Mafia. You just watched his son murder the daughter of a Ramos Cartel lieutenant. Can you begin to understand what that means?”
I opened my mouth to say something, but there were no words.
The worst part was, I did have some idea.
I had a shockingly good idea, in fact.
A black SUV screamed around the corner and pulled to a stop at the curb. The window rolled down and a young, handsome man with an intense jaw and a deep frown leaned toward us.
“You okay, Roman?”
“I’m fine.” Roman didn’t look back at the car, only stared at me with those killer eyes. He spoke softly, but with some urgency. “If you stay here, Giatno will make sure you can’t tell anyone your story. He’ll want to avoid a war with the Ramos Cartel at any cost. Do you understand how complicated everything’s going to be now?”
“Who the hell are you?” I drowned in that gaze. Roman was an avalanche, coming to bury me. I wanted to turn around and find Winter and tell her what had happened—she’d
know what to do, she’d have some smart comeback. Hell, maybe she’d even kick these guys in the crotch for me.
But the mafia. I knew a little bit about the mafia.
My father, those men in my past.
The scar across my belly.
I knew what those monsters were capable of, and Roman didn’t seem like the type to lie to me.
“I told you, I’m nobody. Get in that car right now or you’re going to end up like poor Dia.”
I blinked at him, then stared at the SUV. “I don’t do cars.” Another round of panic threatened to overwhelm me.
I hadn’t been in a car in three years.
“What are you talking about?”
“I ride my bike. I don’t do cars. Please, I can ride my bike and meet you—”
He let out another annoyed breath, then bent forward and lifted me up over his shoulder. I let out a shout and tried to hit him in the back, but it was like pounding against a brick wall. He opened the door and shoved me inside like luggage, then climbed in.
I scrambled for the door, but the driver locked it.
“Please let me out,” I said, hyperventilating. “Please, please, please, please let me out. I don’t do cars. I don’t ride in cars.”
Roman only stared at me with a frown. “Drive, Erick.”
“Where to, boss?”
“My house in Avalon.”
The car pulled out, and I sank down in the seat, breathing so hard I thought I might rip a hole in my throat, barely keeping the overwhelming animal fear at bay.
2
Roman
The girl was having a panic attack.
Interesting.
She hugged herself with one arm and with the other she traced a line across her belly. I didn’t know what that was all about. She looked tiny in that jacket, swallowed by the oversized sleeves and body, the big furry hood tossed gracelessly behind her.
She looked like a perfect, little doll.
I’d noticed her the moment I walked into that club. She was small, a foot shorter than me, with full, red lips and smooth, pale skin. She wore her dark hair up, with small strands framing her pretty face. Her hazel eyes were filled with utter, absolute terror, though they’d shone earlier in the night with something I didn’t quite understand.
She was panicking more over being in a car than she had over watching a girl get executed right in front of her eyes.
Which was very, very interesting.
I’d found myself drawn to her from that very first moment. She wore clothes that were slightly too large, as if she wanted to hide herself from the world, and that only made me want to peel her apart and inspect every inch of her body even more. I could tell she had a gorgeous figure hidden away, and I relished the challenge of breaking past her barriers.
But why a girl like that had barriers at all was a mystery.
And why she’d be so terrified of cars was even more fascinating.
I caught her eye, and she looked like she was on the verge of getting sick. I couldn’t have that, not when Erick had just recently gotten the car detailed.
I leaned closer and put my hand on her thigh.
“Do you know what’s happening?”
“Please let me out,” she whispered, sweat beading on her forehead.
“You’re having a panic attack. You need to take deep, steady breaths. What’s your name?”
“Callie.”
“All right, Callie. Breathe with me.” I took a deep breath, counted to three, released it. “Do you see? Breathe with me, Callie.”
She whimpered, bit her lip, but she obeyed.
There was something beautiful about the way she trembled as she hovered right on that line of pure fear. She was out of control, and that enthralled me—I was a man that never allowed myself to spiral. My entire world was built around my ability to influence my surroundings and to keep them subservient to my will.
Without that, I wouldn’t last long. Not in my line of work.
“Breathe, Callie.” I moved my hand up her leg along her simple black slacks toward the top of her thigh.
Toward the warm spot between her legs.
Heat radiated from her body, and a sudden thrill ran down my spine.
She must’ve noticed. Her mouth fell open.
White teeth. A slight gap between the front two.
Fuck, she was pretty.
Gorgeous, actually.
I wanted to reach up and wrap my fingers in that thick hair and pull it tight. I wanted to chew on her lower lip, bite until it bled. I wanted to taste her and hear her moans and watch her slowly take off all that clothing until she revealed herself to me, all her glorious skin, all her little secrets.
I wanted to unfold her.
“Breathe, Callie.”
Slowly, she calmed. Not entirely—her hands still shook—but enough that she didn’t look like she was about to lose it all over the floor.
I left my palm on her thigh. I wanted to move it up further.
She leaned her head back against the seat and stared at the ceiling.
“I’m sorry. I don’t like cars.”
I forced myself to pull my hand away.
That shouldn’t have been difficult.
“I noticed.”
“Why are you helping me?”
“Because I want to.”
“That’s not really an answer.”
I took another deep breath. She breathed along with me. We were in sync, her body aching for mine as much as mine ached for hers, our chests rising and falling together. I let my gaze linger on her long, slender neck then travel up to her tight jaw, her button nose, her rosebud lips.
“I’m helping you because I don’t like it when innocent people get killed.”
She frowned, and her eyes rolled toward mine. The hazel sparked with each passing streetlight. “That seems odd, given the sort of company you keep. You’re one of them, right? You’re a mafia guy?”
I caught Erick’s look in the rearview mirror. He was grinning.
I looked back at Callie. Deep breath in, deep breath out. Still in sync.
“No, I’m not a mafia guy. I’m not in a bratva or a cartel or an organized crime family of any sort.”
“Then what were you doing back at that party or whatever the hell it was?”
“That was a celebration of a new business venture.”
“Whatever. Why were you hanging out with a bunch of mobsters?”
“I told you already. I’m nobody.” I patted her leg and felt a sudden surge of desire. I had to lean back in my seat and tear my eyes away from her to keep from doing something very stupid.
“Whatever you are, Manzi seemed afraid.”
“Ah, well. Manzi’s not so stupid. I may not be a mobster, but I am much, much worse.”
“Worse than a gangster? I find that hard to believe.”
“Just keep breathing, Callie. We’re almost home.”
She gave me a strange, uncertain look, but I took a deep breath in, and a deep breath out, and she followed my lead.
We kept breathing in silence for the rest of the ride.
Interesting. Very, very interesting.
3
Cassie
I practically kissed the driveway when Roman let me out of the car.
Three years. Three whole, agonizing years I’d spent avoiding car rides. That wasn’t exactly easy. I’d moved to Sea Isle because the town was small enough that I could bike pretty much anywhere. I biked to the grocery store, to the coffee shop, to any of my jobs. I could even bike to the other beach towns if I wanted.
It was easy to hide out and to blend in, and the ocean calmed me. I didn’t know why, maybe something about how big it was, how vast, how many secrets there were still at the bottom.
That comforted me, somehow. Like if people didn’t know everything about the planet we occupied, then maybe we couldn’t know everything about ourselves.
And I wasn’t doomed to be broken forever.
Roman’s hous
e in Avalon was a beachfront palace tucked back behind a screen of trees. I could only guess how much it cost—millions, at least. The building was glass and white stone with large peaked roofs.
The sound of the ocean droned in the background.
Roman took my arm gently and steered me to the front door while Erick parked the car. I wanted to ask about him, but I wasn’t sure how to phrase the question.
I wasn’t sure about much of anything.
What’s worse than a gangster? What sort of man were killers afraid of?
Because that was fear I’d seen in Manzi’s eyes when Roman confronted him, and fear again when he put the gun away and ran.
Fear of what Roman would do to him.
But what would the son of a mafia don have to fear?
The inside of Roman’s house smelled like saffron and cinnamon—a stronger version of his own scent. The floors were black tile grouted with gray, and the walls were a sleek, clean white. The decoration was minimal but obscenely expensive, and all the little details screamed wealth and power: real copper fixtures, brass railings, a chandelier that looked like it was straight out of Tiffany’s. Once we were inside, Roman tapped on a screen embedded in the wall near the front door and armed some kind of alarm.
“Do you live here?” I asked, staring around me like a little kid. I knew I should have other questions, like what the heck I was going to do, but I couldn’t help myself. I knew there were nice houses in Avalon—it was the rich beach, after all—but I hadn’t known they were this nice.
“Only on vacation. Come with me.” He strode down the hall, and I hurried to follow him.
“I’ve had panic attacks before, you know.” The words slipped out before I could think about it. I hugged my jacket tighter as he led me into a sleek, gorgeous kitchen. “But I’ve never been able to calm down like that before.”
“Breathing techniques work.” He took a bottle of red wine down from a rack, opened it with an easy, smooth motion, and poured two glasses. He pushed one over. “Drink.”
“I’m not sure that’s a good idea.” I looked around at the white cabinets, at the custom furniture. “I don’t really know you.”
