My head hurts, and my vision is all groggy from the impact against the tree.
It takes me a while to orient myself.
Where the hell am I? What happened?
Slowly but surely, my mind begins to string itself back together and bear witness to the onslaught around me. The car is in shambles, and the driver’s head has … exploded.
Oh God!
Two of the dudes who were seated beside me have their hands splayed all over my bathrobe, one of them still pinching my boob as they attempted to take what wasn’t theirs. I shove the one on top of me off, and he groans in pain, blood caking his head. He probably hit it on the roof of the car.
The other one opens the car door behind us, and we both fall out onto the grass beneath. I roll off him, coughing while I try to get myself together so I can escape.
But then the dude opens his eyes. “Don’t leave us. Call for help.”
He attempts to chuck his phone my way, but failsmiserably.
The passenger-side door cracks open, and the guy crawls out of the car, just as disoriented as he gets up to walk around aimlessly. “Patrick got shot in the head,” he screams. “Patrick is dead. He’s dead.”
He clutches his face like he can’t believe what he just saw, then he turns around to puke against the tree we just hit.
I crawl farther away from them and the scene of the crime while the smoke begins to gather around the car.
I have to run. I have to get away before they catch me again and do God knows what else they have planned.
BANG!
The sudden gunshot has me jolting up and down on the ground as the bullet ricochets off the tree trunk near the guy’s head. He abruptly turns around after he’s done vomiting his guts out. His eyes widen as he points at something behind me. “It’s you. You shot us. Are you insane?”
The guy who was groping me gets up from the mossy ground and pulls out a knife. I crawl back even farther until I’m behind the car but then bump into something else.
I look up. Behind me are two sturdy legs along with a massive frame. It’s none other than Matteo De Silva, in all his murderous glory.
He glares down at me with those stern eyes that could make anyone fall to their knees without so much as a single word. There’s a gun in his hand, and he raises it.
BANG!
The guy who was puking against the tree falls to the ground like a sack of potatoes, bleeding profusely from the wound in his head. Dead on impact.
I shudder in disbelief.
This has to be a nightmare. It doesn’t feel real.
The one who had his fingers on my boob opens up the car door and stumbles out too, confused. He screams his lungs out when he sees the guy with the exploded head sitting behind the wheel. “What the fuck?”
“Get over there.” Matteo beckons him, pointing his gun at the other side of the car where his friend is crawling on the ground.
He raises his hands, and with a quivering lip, he says, “Oh my God, please don’t kill me. Please, please, I’m begging you.”
“Do what I say,” Matteo barks.
The guy immediately walks to the other side of the car to his buddy and helps pick him up.
“What were you doing with her?” Matteo asks.
“Nothing, sir,” they reply in unison. “We were taking her to Zara like she asked.”
“Yeah, she was a hitchhiker,” the other one says.
