"Good," I nodded, pulling out my phone and opening the app that would show me Ivory's location. They were still moving, but it would take me time to assemble enough of a team to stage an invasion wherever they landed. "I want every man we have."
"You've got it. I'll call Don, get him on it too." I gave a last nod, calling the one other man I wanted at my side. The one man I could trust to make sure Adrian suffered a very slow, painful death while I tended to my angel.
As much as I wanted to deliver his punishment personally, I knew Ryker would be a far worse punishment than I could ever dream to be.
And that would have to be enough.
“Yeah?” he asked when he answered the phone. Simon stood at the front door and nodded to me as I made my way back to the car, hopping in the driver’s seat to be ready to go with me wherever I went.
“Adrian Ricci took Ivory. I need you to give him the worst death imaginable,” I hissed into the phone as I made my way back inside her mostly empty house.
“When and where?”
“Get your ass to her house,” I said, rattling off her address. “We’re mobilizing now.” I kicked one of his men’s bodies for good measure, wanting to make even their corpses suffer for the part they played in taking Ivory from me. The number of them was a sign of just how hard Scar had fought to protect her, taking out half a dozen men on his own before they took him down.
“On my way.”
Thirty-Three
Ivory
I woke up.
Slowly.
Disoriented.
The pillow beneath my face wasn't mine. It didn't smell like Matteo, and the fabric of the pillowcase was far too luxurious to be the cheap set I'd picked up at the store with Scar. My face throbbed as I moved, and my head swam the moment I peeled myself off the pillow.
Deep wood-paneled walls stared back at me from the edges of the room, a navy comforter draped over me. I touched the side of my head, wincing at the pain radiating from there and the dried blood that seemed so coarse against my fingers.
I ignored my swimming head, shoving the comforter off me and got to my feet slowly. I swallowed my nausea as my stomach rolled once I was standing, determined not to vomit until I figured out where I was.
The first door I came to was a bathroom, and I stared into the mirror at the huge, mottled bruise at my temple that covered my brow bone and the top of my cheekbone. The blood seemed to be from a minor cut, and I ignored it in favor of finding my way out of the bedroom.
Seeing the bruise, I knew without a doubt Adrian must have knocked me out. Everything came back to me in a rush of panic.
Scar was dead.
I swallowed back my tears, knowing I needed to find a way out of that sadistic fuck's home. That was what Scar would want. I could mourn him once I was safe, could tell him how sorry I was that my stupid decisions had gotten him killed.
I liked to think he would forgive me.
But I didn't think I'd ever forgive myself.
The door opened quietly, and I slipped out into the hall. For once, I was pleased my feet were bare. It let me slip through the house silently. The hall was an endless parade of closed doors, and I found my way to the staircase easily. I sprinted down it, the front door in sight.
I did not understand what might wait for me outside. I couldn't imagine Adrian would lock me somewhere and leave me unguarded.
All I knew was that I had to try.
My hand was only an inch from the front door when Adrian's voice made my skin crawl. "Going somewhere, my love?" he asked, and I froze in place. I spun to face him, noting that he looked more manic, more crazed than normal. His normally slicked black hair was a mess, sticking up at all angles like he couldn't keep from taking his frustrations out on it. "Ah, sweetheart. Your beautiful face," he whispered, stepping toward me with an expression of concern. Like he hadn't been the one to hurt me. "I wish I hadn't needed to hurt you. I never want to hurt you, Ivory."
"Matteo told me you like to hurt women." I stepped away, retreating until my back hit the door, and I was trapped.
Reaching out a hand to run his fingers over the bruise, his brow furrowed when I whimpered at the pain it sent shooting through my skull. "Whores. I like to hurt whores. You are not a whore, my little doll. You are pure. Innocent in a world of filth."
"I'm not innocent," I argued, shrinking further into the door. "I'm not some virgin—"
"You are loyal. Loving. Warm. All the things that made Bellandi choose you as his wife, yes?"
"Matteo chose to marry me because he loves me," I argued, probably stupidly. I shouldn't argue against the points the man gave for not wanting to hurt me, but I also figured he wouldn't risk Matteo's wrath over someone he thought of as a common whore. My eyes darted around the entryway of the house, taking in the oversized windows that reflected the woods surrounding the house.
Nothing but woods.
Where the fuck was I?
"And there is a reason he fell in love with you, out of all the women who throw themselves at his feet. Something about you, little doll, that just draws men like us in like moths to a flame." Those dark eyes of his glittered as he stared at me in fixation, an intensity that might have rivaled Matteo's, if not for the unhinged quality that Adrian had.
Where Matteo's fixation always felt like coming home, even in his darkest moments, Adrian's was nothing but haunting. "Matteo will come for me," I whispered.
"He'll have to find you first." He grinned, looking confident in his intention to hide me away. I felt my lips twitch but disguised it with a grimace. I owed Matteo an apology for fighting him so intently on the tracker he'd put beneath my skin.
I felt nothing but gratitude for it in that moment.
"And what is it that you plan to do with me?" I let my lip tremble, because I knew it didn't take long to break someone. And having Adrian's hands on me might be my breaking point.
"I want what he has. I want his businesses, his control of the streets, you as my wife, and to see you swell with our child." He stepped back from me, moving to the couch visible from the door, completely unconcerned that I might try to run out the door. He raised a brow, as if daring me to try it.
I knew I wouldn't get far. Not with how arrogant he was, and I knew in that moment that my best odds laid in waiting for Matteo to come.
And I knew he would.
He would always come for me, that I knew.
"I can't give you Matteo's businesses."
"I think you underestimate what he would do to see you returned to him safely. Once he has signed everything over to me, I'll kill him." He shrugged, as if Matteo's death didn't truly matter.
My lungs seized in my chest. "You can't," I begged finally stepping away from the door and approaching him somewhat. I kept my distance, stayed away from the couch and stood on shaky legs. "I won't survive if you kill him."
"You'll do whatever I tell you to do," he barked as he lit up a cigar and poured himself a scotch. "Because if you do, I'll let you keep your baby." I flinched, staring at him with horror-filled eyes. My hands wrapped around my waist on instinct, protecting the baby from the monster who would threaten something that hadn't even lived.
"H—how?" I stuttered. It didn't seem possible. I'd told only Sadie, Duke, and Scar about the baby.
"I bugged your friend Sadie's home." He grinned, pride in every feature of his exotically handsome face. If he hadn't been so deranged, he might have been attractive, but as it was, he just couldn't ever be anything but terrifying. "Imagine my surprise when she went on and on about being a godmother to her best friend's baby."
"You can't—" I started.
"I've no desire to hurt your baby, my doll. It is my insurance to be sure you do as you're told. If you behave, you can keep it, and I'll even claim it as my own. If you don't, well, I could sell it for quite a hefty sum. So many sick people in this world that would love a baby."
I blanched, and I knew my face must have paled when I dropped into the armchair with a
gasp. "Please," I whispered.
"As I said, I have no desire to do that. Hopefully, the child will be a girl, and no one need know she's not mine since she won't cause problems with the succession." He stood, smoothing his suit as if he were some classy, elegant businessman and not a monster who trafficked women and children. People.
He sold people, and for the first time in my life, a lust for blood pumped in my veins. I wanted him to suffer, wanted to watch him bleed out for the children he hurt. For the threat to my baby. I knew Matteo would have plans to handle it and probably be able to ensure he suffered more efficiently.
But it didn't stop me from wanting to be the one to do it when he approached me with an arrogant swagger to his hips. He'd thought he'd trapped me. Cornered me in a way that I could never escape.
He didn't know I was a survivor, and he didn’t know I'd promised myself a long time ago that I would never be somebody's victim again.
His hand tilted my head up to look me in the eye, his thumb stroking over my injured cheek gently. "Come to bed, my doll," he drawled in a voice that was nothing but a mockery of men who knew how to seduce a woman to their beds.
I stood, trying to rein in my venomous glare when he smirked at me triumphantly. My vision lined with red, the call for his blood something fierce within me.
Call it a mother's need to protect her child. Call it a self-defense mechanism. Whatever came over me in that moment destroyed any perceptions I had of myself as a peaceful person. I never wanted to hurt anyone. Never wanted to resort to violence.
Where had that gotten me?
I opened my mouth to speak, releasing a gasp when gunshots made the windows vibrate. He narrowed his eyes on me, looking at me like I'd betrayed him and given away our location. When the gunfire sounded closer to the front door, he moved. I bolted, going for the stairs and a place to hide safely.
The hand he dug into my hair prevented me from getting far, and I screamed as he used it to force me back to him. An arm wrapped around my throat, until finally he pulled a knife from his pocket and held it to my throat, making me still immediately.
Deep breaths. I centered myself, those breaths becoming everything I would need to keep a clear head in the next moments. Sadie was at the forefront of my mind, and I swore I would never stop going to the gym with her and even stop complaining about it if I walked away alive.
The door burst open, and Adrian spun with me still in his hold, and my head cocked back as far as I could to avoid the piercing of the tip of the blade against my skin. Adrian raised a pistol, aiming it at the door as Matteo stepped inside. His eyes narrowed on the knife against my throat. "Adrian, put down the gun," I said on a wheeze. "You know he'll never let you walk away after this."
Matteo leveled his own gun on Adrian, but I knew from the look in his eye that he would never fire. He'd never risk me like that. "I don't need to walk away to break him," Adrian whispered, and I moved.
I kept my hands close to my body, raising them slowly until I was a breath away from touching his arm. I grabbed his forearm just as he tensed to slit my throat, pulling down and to the left while I cocked my right shoulder. My head slipped under his armpit, and I used his own twisted arm to stab him in the side three times.
Still he fought, and I knew from Sadie's lessons that the adrenaline pumping through him meant he hadn't even felt the wounds yet. I focused on that wrist, twisting until he released the knife and turned to thrust it up under his chin.
The gun dropped from his hand instantly, and the gurgling sound he made would haunt me for the rest of my life. But it didn't stop me from speaking to him, the last sound he ever heard my voice. "You shouldn't have threatened my baby." I yanked the knife free, watching as he flopped face first to the floor and the puddle of blood surrounding him grew. His lifeless eyes stared up at me, like a little broken doll. Horror spread through my veins, unable to believe what I’d done.
Unable to believe that I didn’t feel one bit of remorse for killing a man.
"Ivory," Matteo whispered, and I looked up at him. Blood coated my hands and my dress. "You're bleeding." I nodded, glancing down to my left hand where the knife had cut into my palm in the struggle. "Let's get you cleaned up and have that stitched, okay Angel?"
"Take me home," I whispered, feeling everything return as the haze of adrenaline faded. The pain, the horror over what I'd done.
"After we go to Doc," Matteo answered, wrapping an arm around me and guiding me from the house.
I didn't know when I started trembling. All I knew was that it didn't stop for a long, long time.
Thirty-Four
Ivory
The trembling continued, accompanied by silent tears streaking down my cheeks. "Angel," Matteo murmured, wrapping me up in his arms in the back of the car while Simon raced along the streets. Matteo had torn his jacket and held it to the wound in my hand, while I shook in his arms. "You should have just gotten away. If you hadn't been in the shot, I could have killed him."
"Fuck you," I whispered through chattering teeth. "He took me from my home. He threatened to sell our baby. I'm going to be a mother, and I will do whatever it takes to protect this baby," I whispered, glaring at him.
His mouth molded into a smirk at my ire. "You were a badass, Angel."
I groaned. "Don’t give me your shit right now. I just stabbed a man."
"Rather fantastically," he laughed. "Never would have thought you had that in you, my angel."
I glared at him mockingly. "Maybe I'll stab you next."
"What? Why?" he chuckled, and Simon made a noise while he tried to suppress his own laugh.
"Because you're pissing me off. Being all snuggly when I'm covered in blood. Fucking psychopath, that's what you are! I bet you're all turned on too, like a creep."
I could only describe the face him made as one of absolute glee as his body shook with his roar of laughter. "You wouldn't be entirely wrong."
"Gross!"
"Ivory?" he asked, and I turned to find him staring down at me. My breath caught from the emotion in those blue eyes as he pressed his forehead to mine. "I fucking love you. Whether you're my angel or a knife-wielding badass."
I rolled my eyes, "I love you too, Teo." His lips claimed mine in a slow caress that couldn't be described as anything other than making love to me with his mouth. I sighed into the contact, realizing just how much I'd missed it during our separation. As soon as the car stopped at the estate, Matteo tugged me out and into the house.
"How is he?" he barked at the two men gathered in the foyer.
"Stable," one said, nodding his head to the living room. I turned, my eyes landing on Scar's prone body laid out on the massage table where the doctor had put in my tracker.
"He's alive?" I whispered, and Matteo nodded, glancing at me uneasily.
"I didn't want to get your hopes up until I knew for sure." I slid out of Matteo's hold, moving to his body and staring down at his bare torso as I counted the bullet holes in his body.
Six.
He'd taken six bullets to protect me.
It was a miracle none of them aimed for his head. "When will he wake up?" I asked, turning wide eyes to the doctor who stood over him and looked exhausted.
"When he's ready," he breathed. His eyes examined me from head to toe. "Any of that blood yours?"
"Yes," I whispered.
"Go shower. Be quick about it. I'll look you over as soon as you're out." Matteo took my uninjured hand and started to guide me away, but I gave him pleading eyes.
"I don't want to leave him."
"We'll hurry back, Angel." Pressing a kiss to Scar's forehead briefly, I let Matteo take me upstairs to shower.
✽✽✽
My eyes never left Scar's chest, watching the rhythmic rise and fall as the doctor stitched up my hand. "It will scar," he warned, and I shrugged. It wasn't the first time I'd cut my hand with a knife, and it wouldn't be the last. If I walked away from being taken by a crazed human trafficker who wanted me to be hi
s wife with nothing but a scar, then I'd consider myself lucky. "Let me have a look at that head."
"It's nothing," I sighed.
"Doesn't look like nothing." I relented, turning in my seat so the doctor could poke and prod the wound. "Any loss of consciousness?"
"Yes. I don't know how long I was out, but I woke up in Adrian's bed." The room filled with Matteo's fury almost instantly, even from where he stood coordinating with his men regarding the cleanup at my house and Adrian's.
"Do we need to do an exam?" the doctor asked carefully.
"No." I shook my head. "He didn't touch me like that."
"You're certain? Maybe when you were unconscious?" I stilled, not having thought of the possibility.
"I don't—wouldn't I feel it? If he raped me?"
The doctor nodded. "Most likely, but there are no guarantees with these things. I'd like to do an exam—"
Matteo's bellow echoed through the room, and then he was punching numbers into his phone. "Ask the fucker if anybody touched Ivory while she was unconscious." He put the phone on speaker, and another man's screams of agony filled the room.
"Who is that?" I asked.
Matteo replied briskly. "Adrian's second in command. We took him alive."
Another man's cold, deadly quiet voice came over the phone as the screams died down. "Did anybody touch her? Was she raped or touched in any way when she was unconscious?" he asked, presumably to the man he tortured. I paled, and the doctor patted the back of my head to get my attention. Shining a light in my eyes, he sought to distract me while he checked for a concussion.
"No! We dropped her in the bedroom and left her to sleep it off! I swear! Normally, I'd have thought for sure Adrian would rape her, but he was different about this chick. Obsessed, man."
"You believe him?" Matteo asked the phone.
"Yeah, I do. He's singing like a canary, and so far everything checks out." I sighed in relief, and the doctor sat down next to me, patting my hand.
"You've got a nasty concussion, not surprising. I want you to take it easy for a few days, no cooking, nothing that strains your concentration like reading or long hours of television. Tylenol for the pain."
Bloodied Hands: A Dark Mafia Romance (Bellandi Crime Syndicate Book 1) Page 23
