“Fuck!” He falls on me, pushing me flat to the bed, covering my whole body with his. “You’re amazing, Anna. Abso-fucking-lutely amazing.”
I open my mouth to object, but remember his threat to gag me, so I flip that page too.
“I know. Now get off me, you big lug, I can’t breathe.”
Eric rolls off me, and falls down on his back, next to me, pulling me to him. He’s hot, his skin slick with sweat. “Now tell me. Are you good?”
I snuggle in, resting my head on his strong shoulder, making circles in his curly chest hair with my finger. “Yes. I’m very good. How did you know all these things? How did you know how to help me?”
“I didn’t. I had no idea. Just played it by ear.”
I raise my head and look at him. “Really? So you could have traumatized me for life?”
He laughs and pulls me to him for a quick kiss. “Nah. I knew you wanted me. Figured I’d make it work.”
“You’re such an ass.” But I don’t really mean it. I feel too damn good.
“Oh yes. You’ve only seen a fraction of it.”
A bolt shoots through me at what he’s implying.
“I think I’ve seen quite a lot,” I quip.
“Oh, I’m not talking about pushing you against a wall, trying to strangle the life out of you.”
I wince and touch my still bruised throat. “Did you mean what you said? That you… liked it?”
He licks his lips and regards me. “Does it freak you out if I say it turned me on?”
I swallow hard. “Yeah. A bit.”
“Violence, sex… it all goes hand in hand for me.”
I tense up, suddenly wary.
He pulls me closer. “Don’t be afraid of me. Never be afraid of me again, Anna.”
“Where do we go from here?”
Icy fingers grip my heart as his face falls. The atmosphere changes from the lighthearted feeling between us to something darker, something that frightens me. I tense and feel how I pull back, how I construct new walls, brick by brick.
Eric falls away and pushes his fingers through his hair. “We’ve got things… to discuss.”
My lips go numb with the sudden fear. “What?”
He sits up. “We should put some clothes back on.”
God! I just want him to spit it out! The thought that he is going to kill me despite what he’s said skirts my mind. Or that this was it, that he’s leaving. I can’t make up any other theory. I hop out of bed and find a pair of jeans and a sweater. I stare at my naked feet, aware of his movements as he puts his clothes back on.
“Let’s go make some coffee.” He takes my hand and leads me through the hallway, to the combined kitchen/living room. Then he stares at the cupboards. “Ehm…”
With jerky moves and a heavily pounding heart, I prepare coffee for us. While it brews, I spin around.
“For fuck’s sake! Tell me! I can’t stand these half-sentences.”
Eric grabs my hips and lifts me up on the counter, placing himself between my spread thighs, then he takes my hands.
“I’m gonna need you to come with me.”
Chapter 24
Anna
“What? What do you mean?”
“This isn’t exactly optimal, but I want to keep you safe and I can only do that if you stay by my side.”
I gape. “Safe? What do you mean safe? Am I not safe?”
“Anna,” he says in a tone as if he’s speaking to a toddler, “honey, you went to the cops and told on the mob. What did you think?”
Tears well up in my eyes. “You are here to kill me!”
Eric closes his eyes, inhales deeply, exhales, his jaw clenched. “No. I’m not. I’m trying to fucking save your life.”
“Who wants me dead, then? I don’t understand. That… Christian?”
“You’d do best forgetting that name, and no.”
“Who?”
“My boss, honey. He’s ordered your death unless I can vouch for you from now on and forever.”
My lips turn numb. I’m not sure I’m hearing this right. “Forever?”
“Yeah.”
“What the fuck? Like marriage?”
He sighs and a look of pain passes his features. “Yes.”
He doesn’t even want it. I know it judging from that grimace. And what would it be like for me? Locked up somewhere while he mounts one long-legged blonde after the other, spanking them as I sit in a dark corner, a mob wife? I push at his chest and he takes a step back. Jumping off the counter, I move away from him.
“I’m sorry, but that’s not an option.”
His hand darts out to grip my wrist. “It’s your only choice.”
My heart jumps to my throat at his dark tone and his rough grip. “No. No, it can’t be. Just… just tell him I won’t say another word. Ever.”
Eric licks his lips and sighs. “I had a feeling you maybe wanted to be with me anyway. I figured we could take it from there.”
“I… Maybe, but not like this. It’s… I don’t wanna be some mob wife.”
He lets me go and walks up to the window, his back to me, his hands clasped on his back. “Would you rather be dead?”
The question hangs heavy in the air. Honestly, I don’t know. Both options seem like death to me. I look at his broad back, at this unreal creature from a world I wish I had never known existed. I’m just getting back on my feet, tiny, tiny steps, can I really throw it all away for a life in a gilded cage? Can I leave everything and be his—what? Mistress? My gut clenches at the thought for more reasons than one. Wife? Would I stand, demure, waiting to wash his bloodied shirts when he comes home? Something else? Prisoner? That’s what I’d be.
“I can go somewhere.”
Eric scoffs and spins around, his eyes dark. “There is nowhere you could go where Salvatore wouldn’t find you.”
The skin on my back crawls. “Someone would come for me?”
He nods.
“You?”
“No, not me.”
“Chr— sorry, the man whose name I must forget?”
Eric hesitates and looks at his feet, then he takes a step closer. “No, Christian wouldn’t come for you either, but someone would, Anna. I can only keep you alive if you come with me.”
I bite my lip to keep it from trembling. “Marry you?”
He frowns. He’s stopped within arm’s reach, but he doesn’t touch me. “Would that be so bad?”
I throw up my hands and move away from him, toward the large panoramic windows on the far wall. “You don’t understand! I’d trade one prison for another. You can’t force someone to be with you!”
He cocks his head as he regards me, his mouth a thin line. “Well, technically I can.”
My chest tightens. “Don’t do this. Please.”
Eric stalks closer, I move back.
“Eric! Please.”
I jerk as he grips both my wrists in a vice hold. “Come with me.”
“Don’t do this to me.”
He begins to pull me toward him. I jerk and lean back, digging my heels into the carpet, trying to stop the onward movement.
“Eric, don’t just take me. Please! Leave me a choice! You can’t just kidnap me and force me. You’d have to force me the rest of my life!”
He stops abruptly and lets me loose. I nearly fall on my butt but manage to grip the armrest of the couch and stay on my feet. I pant and stare at him, taking him in, from top to toe. His dirty-blond hair, high cheekbones, heavy eyebrows and clear green eyes. His full lips that I know all too well what they taste like, what they feel like all over me.
“Are you done taking stock?”
I twitch and meet his gaze. “You gotta leave me an option. You have to let me think about all this. Can’t we just explain to—the man whose name I probably shouldn’t know either, that I won’t be a threat?”
The look in Eric’s eyes scares me. There’s no mirth there, no tease, no desire, and no threat. He looks defeated.
“No, Anna
. We can’t.”
I cross my arms over my chest, shivering, fighting the searing pain in my heart. “Just let me disappear,” I whisper.
The muscle in his jaw clenches and his lips tighten into a thin line. “You’ve got two days. That’s all. Either you come with me, I wed you, and you’ll live, or you choose to stay here, and you’ll be dead in three. But sure, I’ll let you think about it.”
He almost spits out the last words.
“If you at least sounded like you wanted to marry me!” I cry.
The rattling sound of a key in my front door pierces the silence. I gape and stare at Eric, who looks just as surprised for one moment before the door swings open. I spin around.
“Dad! What are you doing here?” I gasp.
My father stares at me, and then at the man next to me.
“Anna, I… I tried calling. You didn’t answer the phone, and I got worried. I thought...” His eyes dart between me and Eric and then they widen. I see how it dawns on him, how recognition strikes him. He sat next to me as I helped the cops create an image of Eric. His hand slides inside one of his pockets. I whirl around in time to see Eric pull out a knife. My legs weaken, and I twist back to Dad. There’s a gun in his hand.
“No!” I croak and hold out my hands, panic squeezing my throat.
Stepping behind me, Eric says in a low voice that screams of lethal danger, “Put away that gun, old man, and I’ll leave your daughter unharmed.”
“What have you done to my girl?”
“Dad!” I shriek. “He’s… he’s leaving!”
My father gives me a short glance but doesn’t seem to hear me. His hand trembles. This is not happening! My heart slams in my chest and an increasingly high-pitched noise in my ears drowns out all sound. I have never seen my father with a handgun. I didn’t even know he owned one.
“What have you done to Anna?” he asks again and raises the weapon.
Eric moves, and then everything is too late. The sharp edge of a knife rests cold against the skin on my throat. His achingly familiar body is pressed against my back. My hands fly up to clutch at Eric’s arm.
“Don’t! Please.” I eye my father and the gun. My heart drops at the look of despair in my dad’s eyes.
“Drop the fucking gun and your daughter will be fine.” His voice holds a sharpness I recognize from when he pressed me against the wall in the elevator those first few minutes. When he promised me death. Pain and death.
My stomach plummets and the hair at my nape stands straight up. He’s not my lover anymore. He has slipped back to the stone-cold murderer. It changed within seconds. I shudder, nauseous, my head spinning. How can I have experienced such a beautiful night with this man? How can he be both so gentle and so cruel? Then I realize he isn’t trying to hurt me or my father. He could have done that a thousand times over by now. He just wants to get out. Alive. We can work this out. It’ll be okay.
Despite his grip on me, I take a chance and turn to face him. He eases the pressure of the knife and our eyes meet. His expression softens and speaks of tenderness and regret. Then I see my dad like a blur to my left. Oh God! I gave him a window of opportunity.
I throw myself at my father. A loud shot rings out. My chest explodes in pain. Someone screams.
My knees buckle and I drop. I put my hands to my chest, pushing against a warm, wet growing spot. I’ve been shot.
Well that solves everything, I guess.
Eric
For a moment everything is still. Anna lies bleeding by my feet. Her dad stands in shock, his features frozen.
A whimper from the floor kicks me into action. I clock the old man. He falls unconscious next to his daughter. Then I scoop up Anna in my arms and run.
She’s too pale. Her lips move, but no words come out. Tears trickle along her temples.
I throw her in the backseat of my car. Making a U-turn against all rules, I then break every traffic law invented by man as I drive the measly five blocks to the nearest hospital. It’s pure fucking luck I happened to notice it on my way here last night. The drive might take minutes. Or hours. I don’t know. I keep glancing over my shoulder. She doesn’t move. Her lips are white. Blood is pooling on the seat under her.
I drive up outside the ER, come to a screeching halt, hop out and grab Anna in my arms. The doors slide open much too slowly, then another set of doors.
“Help!” I scream. “She’s been shot!”
Anna doesn’t move. She hasn’t made any sign of life for several minutes.
Everyone comes rushing, a gurney, nurses, doctors. Anna is pulled from my arms and wheeled out of my sight.
She’s too pale. I didn’t see her breathing.
Someone lays an arm around my shoulders. Someone talks.
I shrug them off and walk back to my car, body and mind numb.
The drive from Los Angeles to San Francisco takes six hours. I don’t make one single stop. I don’t know where to go. If I go home, I’ll kill myself.
Salvatore’s gate guards wave me through.
The man at the door gives me a once-over with eyebrows that shoot up. He speaks into his radio, then he leads me through the house and into the dining room, pushing me down onto a chair.
After a few minutes Luciano himself appears, a cup of coffee in his hand, dressed in a thick striped bathrobe. He looks me over, narrowing his eyes.
“Talk to me, Eric.”
“I… need you to... lock me up,” I grit out.
“What the fuck’s the matter with you?” Behind Salvatore two of his bodyguards appear, huge, looming, mere shadows, but ready to spring into action if needed.
“She’s dead.”
He raises his eyebrows, then takes a slow sip from his mug. “Your doing?”
I shake my head. “Her dad.”
Salvatore stares at me, then he barks out a laugh. “Well, guess you’ll still be an eligible bachelor, then.”
I’m too numb to make an attempt on his life. This is who he is. I don’t care anymore.
“Go home, son. Pick yourself up. Take a fucking shower and down a bottle of whisky. You knew this girl what, a few hours? Get a grip on yourself for fuck’s sake.”
I stand, and for the first time I see my hands. They’re brown, drenched in her now-dried blood. I look at my clothes, stiff with too-large amounts of blood, soiled with the last of her life.
It was me.
If it hadn’t been for me, she’d still be alive. If I hadn’t appeared in her life that day, the standoff in the hallway would never have happened, and Anna would live.
I feel regret like I’ve never felt before, and still I’m grateful. She made me feel something again. Never have I had someone else’s complete and utter trust. She made me realize I can be something more than the stone-cold killer I’ve turned into.
Now, though, now there’s nothing else left for me.
Chapter 25
Anna
In the ER they work frantically around my body. I see myself as if from above. I’m floating. I’m free. There’s no pain. The girl on the gurney, the girl that is me, is so white. Tears leak from her eyes. Blood. There’s so much blood. Darkness closes in. A feeling of regret nips at my heart, but I can’t remember why.
“She’s the lady who prevented that murder the other day. The mafia thing.”
“Too bad he died anyway.”
“Her boss died? But I thought she saved him?”
“Nah, it was on the late news yesterday… he was murdered too.”
In the end I saved no one.
Eric is gone.
My life has been irrevocably changed.
I hope I’ll die.
Chapter 26
Eric
“Your chick’s alive.” Christian’s voice on the other end of the line is low, measured.
Everything stills.
“What?”
“You heard me. They saved her life. She’s in the ICU, on a ventilator and all pumped up on drugs. She’s unconscious. But not de
ad.”
I have to support myself not to fall. Hope and fear fight for a place in my already overloaded mind.
“Same hospital?”
“Yeah.”
“Does Luci know?”
“He’s the one who told me.”
My brain kicks into action, suddenly everything is crystal clear. “Fuck, dude. You gotta do something for me, and you gotta do it now.”
“What?”
“I need you there. You’ve gotta protect her.”
He scoffs. “Me? You go.”
“I can’t go,” I snarl. “Her dad will recognize me for sure. The staff might. They’ll call the cops in a second.”
He’s silent.
“Christian!”
“Fuck. Yeah. You don’t think that piece of shit will leave her alone at this point?”
“Do you?”
Christian doesn’t answer.
“Yeah, thought so.”
“What do I tell everybody? How the fuck do I explain my presence?”
“Fix a badge, be a cop. It’s extremely plausible considering everything. Go!”
“You’re gonna owe me for the rest of your life.”
He disconnects and I slump, breathing as if I’ve run a marathon. My mind spins. For three days, I’ve thought she was dead. For three days, I’ve had a turmoil inside I haven’t felt since my sister was murdered. For three days I’ve had a babysitter. Salvatore apparently considered me unstable and sent for one of his boys, yet another Russo. I’ve sometimes felt the Russo family are like vermin, like cockroaches, all over the fucking place, impossible to extinguish, but when Nathan Russo rang my doorbell late that first night, I was grateful to see his cool, always composed, annoyingly handsome face. Last time we worked together was a couple of years back, in the Dominican Republic, wreaking havoc with the local, small-time crime boss and his organization. Nathan was a mess, and afterward he took on a role on the less brutal side of Salvatore’s business. He found some chick, got married and supposedly there’s a baby about to pop out any day.
I twitch from the sound of the toilet flushing, and then he comes out of the bathroom. Apparently I look funny because he gives me a once-over and frowns.
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