“Hang on.” Sage tucks himself away and buttons his pants before disappearing out the door. In less than two minutes, he returns with a cloth in his hand and proceeds to clean me up before tossing it on the empty desk.
“Thanks.” I smile at him as I struggle back into my cargo pants. Getting them over my shoes is more work than when I stripped out of them, but I finally redress. Sage watches me, his eyes shadowed with sadness and need.
“I hate this,” I tell him as he takes my hand and tugs me out of the room, leading me through the final door at the end of the hallway.
“Me too. How much longer are we going to do this?” he asks, and I shake my head.
“Wait, and I’ll tell you both everything.” I look around the room and find another dead guard slumped against a couch, but in the middle of the room, tied to a chair with something shoved into her mouth, is a woman. She glares at me as she struggles against the ropes binding her to the chair. She tries to scream something, but it’s muffled, and I snigger.
“Playing with your toys now, Mickey?” I ask my uncle, who is leaning against one of the walls.
He smirks, comes over, and gives me a big hug and a kiss on the cheek. I sigh at the familiar scent and warmth, and more tension leaks out of me. My family is back together, and it brings me so much comfort.
“This is the nasty bitch who put all those bruises on that darling girl,” he tells me as we both turn to face her, Sage joining me on the other side.
“Addi is here?” I ask, scanning the room with worry. What kind of trauma is she going to carry after seeing all this?
“Don’t stress. That wee darling is upstairs, tucked into bed and fast asleep, dreaming of unicorns and rainbows. She didn’t see any of this,” he assures me, “but we have been watching the house all day, and we heard everything. The way they talked to her, the slaps of punishment, and the cries of pain when this bitch dug her nails into the poor girl’s arms…”
“Wee darling?” I arch my eyebrow at him.
He blushes and rubs an embarrassed hand over his chin. “Maeve is rubbing off on me a bit.”
“That’s not all they’ve been rubbing off,” Sage mutters, and Mickey glares at him. A prickle of worry of what will become of them once he discovers Carla is alive sits in the back of my mind, but that’s a future problem. Instead, I focus on the one in front of me.
“Okay, so as much as I would like to take my time with her and make her scream, I can’t be gone too long, and I have a lot to tell you.” I’m disappointed, but time is of the essence. Xavier could return and find me gone at any moment.
“Boo.” Sage blows a raspberry, but Mickey pulls a gun from the back of his pants and pulls the trigger. The sound is just a pop with the silencer screwed onto the barrel. The nanny’s eyes widen in panic before the bullet smashes into the middle of her skull, then they go blank. Her body slumps, and blood dribbles down the middle of her face.
I don’t waste any more time on her. She’s paid for her sins. I wrinkle my nose as the smells of death and brain matter reach me. “Is there anywhere that isn’t covered in death so we can talk?”
“There’s a patio out back,” Sage suggests and heads toward a set of glass doors, pushing them open. Outside is a table and a number of chairs. Sage takes a seat and pulls me down into his lap. Mickey takes one across the table from us. I reach into my pocket, pull out the bag of weed, and wave it in front of Sage’s face.
His eyes light up. “I love you,” he murmurs before lifting me and placing me on my own seat. He opens the bag and inhales deeply. “Oh, my love, I missed you.”
I frown playfully at him. “Oh. I see how it is. Profess your love to me, but in the same breath, romance an inanimate bag of leaves.”
“Don’t you listen to her, she’s just jealous,” he purrs to the bag.
Mickey chuckles as Sage proceeds to ignore us and pull his ever present packet of papers and lighter out of his pocket. He begins rolling himself a joint while I fill them in on everything that has happened since Sage’s funeral, minus the details about Dad and Carla.
“You married him?” Sage’s hand freezes as he brings the joint up to his mouth to light it, and I can’t quite place the note in his voice. “Why on earth did you do that? With Gio out of the way, they had nothing to hold over you anymore. Why didn’t you wipe the floor with them?”
Fuck, what do I tell them? I can’t tell them the truth, but I haven’t prepared a lie either. I must take too long to respond, because Mickey growls, “Tori, what aren’t you telling us?”
“I can’t believe you married him,” Sage mutters, and this time I hear the hurt. “After all the betrayal.” He shakes his head. “Why?”
I splutter, racking my brain for a reason. “Because they threatened to kill every staff member of the Russo properties. There wasn’t enough time, nor could we take the loss of revenue if everyone went into hiding.”
They are both quiet for a moment as they consider this before Mickey gestures for me to carry on. I reach out and give Sage’s hand a squeeze. “Don’t worry, annulment is an option. Once we get rid of Mario, I’ll have our lawyers get right on it.”
I finish the story, explaining who Addison is, and by the time I’m done, both Mickey and Sage feel a little more forgiving toward the four traitors.
“Can you take Addi back to the lake with you? I want her out of the way until everything is finished,” I ask my uncle, who quickly agrees.
“Do you have a plan?” Sage asks me, holding out the joint, but I shake my head. I don’t need to return home smelling like weed. Xavier is already going to be suspicious, and I don’t need him clueing into the fact that Sage isn’t actually dead.
“Yeah. If everything goes as planned, I’m hoping we can sweep the Maricuso family off the board this week. Tristan is being forced to marry Stacey, and their wedding is on Wednesday. Everyone will be in one place. I’m thinking a gasleak and explosion at the reception will be just the thing we need to see the end of that empire.”
