I never should have doubted her.
"I'm sending you my location," Nico says. "My father's car is right in front of mine. It’s another hour before he arrives home. And once he does, you’ll be too late."
"Nico—"
"Get going, Romanov,” he says. "Before you lose another woman you love because of him."
I'm movingbefore my brain catches up.
Clothes. I need clothes. I tear through my closet, grabbing the first things my hands find—dark pants, a shirt I don't bother to button, boots I shove my feet into without tying. My gun is in the bedroom safe, and I punch the code wrong twice before my fingers cooperate.
That monster has Bella.
He’s going to rape her.
He’s going to murder her.
I won’t let that happen. I can’t let that happen. I will tear him apart with my bare hands before I let that happen, break every bone in his body, and make him beg for a death that I won’t give him so I can draw out his suffering, nice and slow.
As soon as the elevator doors open, I step inside and hit the button for the parking garage. Gravity shifts, and I urge the elevator to fall faster. My reflection in the polished steel is wild as he looks back at me. My shirt is unbuttoned, my shoes are unkempt and unpolished. The gun in my hand is shaking.
I look like a man who's on the verge of losing everything again.
52
BELLA
Anthony is cryingand I can’t reach him.
Don Leo is wedged between us like a wall of decaying flesh, and no matter how badly my heart aches to comfort him, I can’t.
So, I’m forced to repeat the same lie that I’ve been saying to him ever since Don Leo dragged us into his car.
"I'm here, peanut. I'm right here. You’re okay. You’ll be okay."
Don Leo chortles, and his jowls shake as he does so. His thick fingers pat the back of Anthony's head, and he turns his face toward him.
"Dry your tears,now." His words are wet and phlegmy. "You're almost a man now, so act like one."
Something snaps in my chest. Something that should probably stay leashed given the current circumstances but doesn't. "Leave him alone!"
The snarl tears out of me before I can stop it and suddenly, Don Leo's hand stills on Anthony's head.
The familiar oily smile turns toward me, and my stomach lurches when I see it spread wider as he leers at me with his sagging features.
"Then give me something to occupy my hands with,ragazza."
"You're sick."
I know exactly what he means, and I have no choice, none at all, if I want to keep Anthony safe.
Don Leo laughs, and his laugh reminds me of a hippo from an animal documentary—a snorting wet echo that sends dread shivering down my spine. His other hand finds my neck, and thick sausage fingers start stroking my skin with a hunger that makes bile rise in my throat.
When they brush the chain of my necklace, he pauses, and then gives it a tug to reveal the seven-pointed star.
Just like on the yacht, his eyes flare, and that pure, festering rage surfaces from underneath his oily smile.
"You don't know the half of it,ragazza."
