When our lips unlock, it’s only been a second, but it feels like the world spun on its axis. Marcello hauls me up from the ground. “Find Ricardo. He’ll protect you. Go!”
I nod and don’t think twice before I make a run for it. I head straight for the mansion without looking back. Gunshots go off, but every time one of the men who made it over the fence tries to grab me, Marcello shoots them in the back. One by one, they all fall as I run like hell toward the guards in front of the house. I jump into their arms, and they clutch me firmly, fending off any of the attackers who followed me.
“Get in,” the guard barks at me. He must be Ricardo. I never learned their names, but I will remember this one. He pushes me aside and kicks open the door.
“Wait, Marcello isn’t here yet,” I say, gawking over his shoulder.
“Marcello gave us orders,” he quips, giving me a stern look.
I frown. “Marcello’s safety matters too.”
When he doesn’t say another word, I push past him.
Only to see the Irish swarm the ground.
Marcello is overwhelmed.
My pupils dilate, and I scream, “Marcello! Fight back!”
The guards shove me back into the house, but I keep pushing them away to get a glance at what’s going on. The Irish have surrounded him, and he’s resorted to throwing punches besides shooting his gun. But when he runs out of bullets, they strike him down.
“Marcello! NO!” I scream.
But as I run, Ricardo grabs my arm and hauls me back inside the mansion, sealing the door to lock me inside. I slam my fists onto the wood, screaming, “Let me out! Marcello needs help!”
“Our men are out there doing their best to save him.”
I redirect my attention to him and slam my hands flat onto his chest. “I didn’t ask you to lock me in here!”
“We have orders,” Ricardo barks back, clutching my wrist. “You are to be protected at all cost.”
“Even if it costs him his life?!” I scream in his face.
He tilts his head down and sneers, “It was his decision.”
I take a deep breath and turn around to march toward the window to have a look, but the guy grabs me and drags me along right down into the basement. “What are you doing? Let me go.”
He shoves me inside and closes the door behind us, shutting us in. “It’s safer here.”
I pause and look around at all the guns hanging on the walls. Even though I’ve been here before, it still is impressive and gulp-inducing. The silence between these walls is deafening, and every passing second feels like an hour while we wait for news from the outside. From the men fighting out there. From Marcello.
That last look of him getting hounded by a dozen men still haunts me, and I can’t shake the dread. What will happen to him? Will he make it out alive?
Marcello’s bruised, beaten, and bloodied body enters my mind, and I choke up.
I can’t think like that.
He’s strong, and he’s a goddamn mobster boss, for crying out loud. He will make it out alive.
He has to.
For us.
For our baby.
I clutch my belly and look down at my little baby growing inside, wishing now more than ever that we will have a lifetime to spend together. All three of us. As it should be.
Suddenly, the door bursts open, and a guard steps inside, frantically looking around. I hold my breath. He stares at Ricardo, lips parted as though he doesn’t know what to say.
“Marcello …”
My knees feel weak. Heavy.
I clutch the nearest table before my legs cave in on me.
“He’s been taken.”
Harper
Marcello … taken by the Irish?
I sink to the floor, clutching my belly. I can’t even process what he just said, nor can I form a proper response because of the shock.
Marcello is in the hands of the people he hates the most.
They’re going to destroy him.
Sudden gunshots make me look up at the door through which the guard came. Men flock at the door, punching and kicking each other. Panicked, I scramble up and run to Ricardo.
“It isn’t safe. They’ve broken through,” the guard at the top of the stairs yells at us. “C’mon! I know a way out.”
Ricardo pushes me forward, and we run up the stairs, where the other guard grabs my arm and hauls me away from the gun room. Men are fighting all around us, gunshots flying around everywhere, and I duck when one of them shoots right at us.
“Go, go, go!” the guard yells, and he pulls me along the hallway, past several Irish men, shooting them on the way. We walk over dead bodies like it means nothing, and fight our way into the corridor where Mario’s room is.
Where are we going? Why here?
“Isn’t the underground gun room safer?”