The man nodded once in acknowledgment. He was wearing sunglasses so I couldn’t see much more than his slightly crooked nose and pierced lip.
He was so tall the top of his head nearly touched the roof of the UTV.
“Hop on,” Judas urged, giving my ass a small tap.
I sat in one of the rear seats. As soon as Judas was seated beside me Theo did a small U-turn and drove back the way he’d come.
There wasn’t much to see at first. The pathway wound behind the garage and then curved to the left, taking us into a small stretch of woods.
“Do you like it?” I glanced over and he nodded to indicate my ring.
I’d been absentmindedly spinning it back and forth. “Yeah, it’s beautiful. What made you choose this one?”
“Your eyes,” he replied simply.
“Oh…”
He looked down and became immersed in something on his phone.
“How much land do you have?”
“We have about thirty-six acres. All fenced and under surveillance.”
“Okay? I wasn’t asking so I could make a run for it.”
His eyes cut to mine, and I got the feeling he didn’t believe remotely believe me. “It wouldn’t matter if you did. I’d catch you and drag your ass back home.”
“You’re a real romantic, you know that?”
“Romance is overrated and you’re not that into it. You like me because I take away your choices, fuck you like a whore, own a private island, and have enough power to bring you the head of anyone that looks at you wrong.”
“You have a private island?”
“See?” He leaned over and dropped a quick kiss on my lips.
I’d genuinely been asking him that, but his attention was already back on his phone. I sighed and settled back in my seat to enjoy the brief ride to wherever we were going.
The weather was gorgeous, and the breeze felt good. It took a few minutes for us to travel through the cluster of woodland.
When we emerged into open space again, I was able to make out the silhouette of a large building surrounded by a tall fence straight ahead. I sat taller and tried to get a better look.
“What’s that?”
“Our first stop of the day,” Judas replied, slipping his phone into his pocket.
As we got closer, I could see barb wire running along the upper perimeter of the fence. There was a soft buzzer sound just before we reached the long gate barring entrance. It slid open and Theo drove right through, bypassing two guards that could have walked off a MIB set, and a few parked vehicles.
Seeing them indicated there was another road that led to this place.
If the building didn’t look like anything more than a large warehouse, I’d think Judas had a private prison in what was essentially his backyard.
Theo circled around and came to a stop alongside a stone walkway. Judas easily stepped out of the UTV. I made to exit on the opposite side, but he quickly stopped me. His hand shot out and wrapped around my wrist. I teetered and grabbed his arm to steady myself.
“What are you doing?” I snapped.
He pulled me out of the UTV and said something to Theo in Italian that had the man swiftly driving off.
“Don’t raise your voice at me,” he reprimanded as if I were a child. “You stay by my side, always.”
“Jesus, Judas!”
“Good analogy. You made the right choice,” he joked.
“You’re not funny.”
“I’m hilarious.” He released my wrist and slipped an arm around my waist to propel me up the walkway that was lined with a colorful variety of flowers. At the end were two solid steel doors with blacked-out windows.
“What is this place?”
“A lot of things. Today it’s where you’ll be doing target practice.”
I wasn’t sure what to make of his answer. This was far more than a simple shooting range. Those didn’t need to be surrounded by barbed wire fences and armed guards. I contemplated if I wanted to share with him that I’d already gone through the motions of learning to shoot, quite well in fact.
“I have my CCW,” I disclosed as we neared the end of the walkway.
He pulled one of the doors open and looked down at me with an amused smirk. “I know you do. So do I.”
That legit shocked me. I squeezed passed him and stepped inside the building. “But you’re a felon.” My voice echoed through the vast space. I winced and looked to see if anyone was around to hear that. “Sorry,” I murmured, offering him a sheepish smile.
The door shut behind him with a soft click. He stepped into my personal space and brought his hands to rest between my neck and shoulders.
“Your naivety is starting to grow on me, but you’re forgetting one crucial piece of information.”
“And what’s that?”
He lowered his mouth to my ear as if he were about to share a secret. “The mangled bodies, the missing persons, the lives I ruined. I’ve gotten away with everything.” He kissed my cheek and stepped away. “You’ll keep that between us, won’t you?”