She’s curled on her side, one hand tucked under her cheek, her black hair spread across the pillow like silk. She looks so peaceful, so innocent, completely unaware of how close she came to danger tonight. How close I came to losing her.
I stand there for a long moment, just watching her breathe. The rise and fall of her chest. The slight flutter of her eyelashes. She’s real. She’s safe. She’s mine.
But for how long?
Adrian’s words echo in my mind.“I know all about your pretty little wife.”
My sister was used against me, and I can’t let the past repeat.
I move to the bathroom and strip off my ruined clothes, washing the blood from body in a stinging shower.
The water runs red, then pink, then finally clear.
But I can still feel the weight of tonight’s deaths on my shoulders. Nine good men, gone because I wasn’t careful enough.
Because I underestimated Adrian’s reach and his willingness to escalate.
I won’t make that mistake again.
When I return to the bedroom, Sophia is still sleeping. I dress and slide into bed beside her, careful not to wake her, and pull her against my chest.
She makes a small sound and nestles closer, her body fitting perfectly against mine.
“I’ll keep you safe,” I whisper into her hair. “No matter what it costs. No matter who I have to kill.”
She doesn’t hear me. She’s lost in dreams, probably of a life where she’s not married to a monster. A life where she’s free.
But that life is gone now.
She’s mine, and I’m hers, bound together by violence and passion and something that terrifies me more than any bullet.
I close my eyes, but sleep won’t come. My mind is already working through the logistics. I need to double the guards. Triple them. I need to move Sophia somewhere safer, somewhere my enemies can’t reach.
And I need to kill Adrian Morello before he makes good on his threat.
The sun is fully up when I finally drift off, exhausted and still covered in the phantom smell of blood and gunpowder. My last thought before sleep takes me is of Sophia’s face, and how I’ll do anything, become anything, to keep her safe.
When I wake a few hours later, Sophia is gone. Panic jolts through me until I hear the shower running.
I force myself to relax, to breathe.
She’s just in the bathroom.
She’s fine.
She’s not Nicole.
I sit up and run my hands through my hair, pushing through the bone-deep exhaustion that’s set in after the adrenaline of last night wore off. My heart is racing, but it calms as remind myself that Sophia is okay.
A glimpse of white against the dark bedding catches my eye. A small white card, folded in half.
My blood turns to ice as I reach for it. I already know what it is before I open it.
Already know who it’s from.
The handwriting is elegant, almost mocking in its precision.
Your pretty wife would look lovely in chains. - A.M.
