by Ivy Fox
When I feel his hands unwrap themselves from their hold on me, I almost sigh out in relief.
“I wasn’t trying to be an asshole to you, Blondie. It’s just, I know the bossman won’t see you,” he informs, eyeing me apologetically. “And I don’t know why you need to see him so bad, but a girl like you shouldn’t even want to be alone with a man like him. Trust me, doll. I’ve seen him chew out meaner people than you for breakfast,” he warns cautiously.
I grab my wrist and take off the bracelet which holds the tiara Giovanni gave me for graduation. It sits right beside Dominic’s wings. Both keepsakes have gotten me through more somber days than I can count. I have never once taken the delicate bracelet off my wrist, but desperate times call for desperate measures.
“Here. Give him this. I promise you he’ll want to see me once you’ve shown him this,” I explain, hoping the trinket will remind the hard man to recollect a time when his heart still held nothing but love.
The brooding man takes the frail, silver bracelet in his calloused hands and gives me a small nod and a thin, worried grin.
“Fine. But you have to promise you won’t follow me down there and that you’ll behave while I’m gone. I still think you should run your pretty little ass out of here, but it’s your funeral. Promise you’ll stay put?” I cross my heart with my finger, and he smirks, amused.
Once he goes off behind the bar and down the stairs, where Gio must be holed up, I allow myself to exhale and try to get my wits back. I’ll need to be steadfast and clearheaded, which will prove difficult when I finally come face to face with the new consigliere of the Outfit. I stay in my place as promised, only letting my eyes wander the area around me.
I know it was a risk coming here, but if Mammà’s intel is good, then Giovanni’s father no longer has any ties to the syndicate, which means his clubs will fall onto Gio’s shoulders to deal with. As much as the big guy insisted I make my visit during normal working hours, I know that would be an even riskier move—too many made men hang out at this club. I got lucky the first time I came with Pietro when I was seventeen, but I won’t tempt fate so easily now.
Seems like a lifetime ago he brought me here. Whatever his intentions were that night, he had always been my friend. He might have deserved my wrath at the end, but he never deserved the grave outcome he was given. That night he had made me feel like a normal for the first time ever. It was also the night Gio had danced with me, making my heart yearn even more for such a beautiful, ordinary existence.
I pray he will be able to help me today. My feeble hopes are that he’s forgiven me for leaving him all those years ago and that he’ll come to my aid this one last time. I’m also praying that he’s still as defiant as ever; since he’ll need to be, where Vincent is concerned. I had no illusions that facing him would be anything less than difficult. I just never assumed I’d see so much hate in his eyes. He has grown up to be a beautiful, cold monster, just like he always aspired to be; like the Outfit demanded him to become. They won their champion while I lost the troubled boy I will never stop loving.
Vincent may kill me if I so much set foot on his property again, but does Giovanni share the same hatred? I hope not. Because as much as seeing Vincent was both gut-wrenchingly painful and depressing, I desperately need to put my eyes on the curly-haired boy I once vowed my heart to.
My ears pick up the sound of the huge bouncer walking back to me, and he finally comes into view with a puzzled look on his face.
“Well, Blondie, I don’t know if I should be happy for you or concerned, but bossman wants a word with you after all.”
I give him a tight nod and stiffen my back to follow him behind the bar to the stairs leading to the basement. The bouncer’s guess on the result of my little unannounced visit is as good as mine, unfortunately. If Gio and Vincent share the same animosity toward me, then in the best case scenario I leave here empty-handed, and the worst… well, the worst is that not even dental records will help identify my body once the Outfit is through with me.
The corridor is long and oddly well lit, with only two closed doors on each wall, but it’s the door marked ‘office’ at the very end of the hall that makes my heart pitter-patter with equal parts wistfulness and trepidation.
“Just knock and go on in, Blondie. I’d say holler if you need any help, but you’re on your own,” he advises, shaking his head in pity.
I understand his concern. No one in their right mind would seek out a made man so foolhardily. There are always repercussions where the Outfit is involved, especially when not adhering to syndicate laws. The stranger next to me is just clueless that I’m already very much aware of what they are. I was groomed to know them by heart. I refuse to let them cripple me now, but for the last decade, I have been haunted by one in particular—death to all traitors of the famiglia and to any who dare break the Omertà code. I’m a dead woman walking on both accounts.
“Thanks,” I mutter under my quaking breath. He gives me another grim smile and leaves me to my impending doom. I take a minute to get myself together, but the two hard knocks I intended to plant on the door are just as weak as I’m feeling.
“Come in,” I hear a man announce on the other side of the door.
I open it slowly and step inside, looking at the floor instead of the man I thirst to put my eyes on. I pinch my palms with my nails, raising the courage I need, and lift my head up to see a blond man almost as big and imposing as the one that brought me to his door. He’s sitting on a black leather couch, pinching the crown of his nose, and looking worse for wear. In his white dress shirt and black slacks, he looks far too sophisticated and handsome to be the one the Outfit turns to when it has enemies that need to be eliminated.
“I’m only going to ask this once, and I expect the truth out of you. Where did you find this bracelet?” Dominic growls, as he carefully traces each silver bead with tenderness, not once looking up at the girl he gave such a thoughtful gift to.
His roguish blond beard covers most of his angelic features, as do the small scars that weren’t there before, but I would have recognized my blue-eyed angel any day. My broken insides sing just by standing here, looking at the frown on his face growing wider as each second passes without me giving him a reply.
“You gave it to me on my eighteenth birthday,” I whisper, and his bowed head jerks up to cast his first sight on me. The corner of my mouth twitches when I see him pinch his wrist, to make sure he’s not hallucinating.
“Red?” he asks, his eyes wide in disbelief.
“Blondie, apparently,” I try to joke, but it falls flat on the hardwood floor.
He rises from his perched position and takes two steps in my direction, eating up most of the distance between us with those long strides.
“Red? Is it really you?” he questions again, his ocean-blue eyes resembling a perfect storm of tumultuous feelings.
“Hi, Dominic,” I whisper, my own greedy eyes taking in every large inch of him. I left him a boy, only to return to a marked, cut-up man.
“Jesus! Thank fuck!” he wails and takes me into his arms with such force it almost takes the wind out of me.
His hold is so tight, so warm and comforting, yet I feel myself trembling in his hold.
“Jesus, Red. I missed you so much,” he whispers in my ear, his fast heartbeat in symphony with my own. “So fucking much!”
And it’s in my angel’s embrace that I finally let myself shed tears for our lost youth.
For our lost love.
It’s in my protector’s arms that I shatter.
SEVEN
Dominic
“I thought you were fucking dead, Selene. Dead! Tell me I’m not losing my mind? Tell me it’s really you?” I beg as she holds onto my waist with such fervor, her silent tears inundating my chest, making it all the more difficult to keep my frail emotions at bay.
“It’s me, Dom. It’s really me,” she hiccups between tears and my own start to blind me f
rom this glorious sight.
“Fuck!” I growl, holding her close, placing my head in the crook of her neck, savoring her scent.
I tried not to believe in the lies we told ourselves. That somehow The Butcher had gotten to her without our knowledge and had her killed before we could intervene. I never believed it, but as the years passed, I must have begun to, because what other option was there? That my girl left us all in the dead of night to live blissfully, not giving another thought to us or our pain? Death was cold comfort in comparison with such cruelty.
But here she is—broken and in my arms at last. Her sweet breath fans my cheek, and a burning shiver dances up my spine. She threads her fingers through my short, dark-blond hair and I relish each tender pull.
“You cut your hair.”
“Hmm. Let’s not start with the hair, babe. Or I’ll have some words of my own about the monstrosity you’ve done to yours,” I taunt, getting up and close to her new golden locks and taking in the familiar, vanilla aroma her naturally copper hair always held.
“Touché.” She chuckles between tears.
I lift her up from the ground, twirling my girl around the usually sullen room, like a love-struck fool.
“Damn, I missed you, babe.”
“Me too. So much,” she whispers in my ear, never once letting me go.
I wish I could freeze this moment and keep us both locked in it for eternity. How unkind this life has been; for me to have spent a single day without her in my arms; to have trudged on each day where her touch was absent from it. A malicious life forced on me, by the very one I can’t let go of now.
I place her back on to her feet, and put my finger under her chin, lifting her face so I can take in every change and still familiar feature she holds. My eyes wander all over her, memorizing each inch and comparing them to the image I have held dearly in my mind and tattooed to my heart.
“You’re even more beautiful,” I pledge, one hand on her curvier hip and the other on the nape of her long neck.
“It’s your eyes that fool you,” she falters, revealing that the damage she created also left her with scars where sight can’t reach.
“Nah, Red. It’s my heart. Always has been,” I declare sadly, finally breaking away from her and leading her to sit next to me on my office couch.
There is much I intend to say, and I’d rather have Selene off her feet for the long conversation to come. But if I’m honest with myself, I would gladly sit silently by her side, content in neither of us having to utter a word. Rehashing the past will only take the shine off this moment. Unfortunately, protectiveness speaks louder than my will to keep us in this enchanted limbo.
“It was risky, you coming here like this, Red. Someone might have seen you,” I explain, keeping her delicate hands in mine, perfectly satisfied with just stroking her soft skin for the time being.
“I know that,” she mumbles, leaning her head on my shoulder and allowing me to be as close as possible to the only girl I have ever loved. But my concern for her safety continues to take precedence to any loving caress I can offer.
“If your father gets wind of you being here, then what everyone in Chicago believes he’s done to you, he’ll make it a reality.”
“You thought my father killed me?” She questions, wide-eyed in puzzlement.
“We searched for you for two years straight. We searched high and low, Selene, and we couldn’t find a trace of you. After a couple of years, Big Sal ordered us back home and told the capos their services were better used to serve the syndicate needs on the street, not going after a spoiled principessa who was foolish enough to go against our code. But behind closed doors, he confessed to us a different reason as to why he called off the search. He told us that your father must have uncovered where you were and got to you before we could save you. It was the only possible explanation for an eighteen-year-old girl vanishing into thin air when she had never even been out in the real world before.”
“Not the only one,” she replies adamantly, and a slight wave of resentment slaps me across the face with the flicker of pride tainted in her words.
“Apparently not. You didn’t want to be found. Not even by us. Not even by me,” I reply back harshly.
She pulls away from our clasped hands and gently takes ahold of my scruffy face, pulling me toward her.
“I had my reasons, Dom. I know that doesn’t excuse the pain I brought you, but I’d do it again,” she explains with fierce certainty in her gaze, and my chest tightens with her blatant lack of compassion to our plight.
“Good to know,” I deadpan. Heartbroken, I pull away from her loving hold.
I stand up, looking down at her and wonder, when did I lose her for good? It was before graduation, that much is certain. But when? And how? A plethora of questions run rampant in my head, reminding me why I hate to be alone with my thoughts—they suffocate the life out of me.
“Dom…” she sighs, and starts to usher me to sit back beside her, but I don’t give in. Not when she can take it all away from me so cavalierly again.
“It’s all good, Selene. You went away because of something you don’t want to divulge, and now you’re back. But a betting man would wager that there is a reason for that too, only with this, you’ll be more forthcoming in telling me why,” I reply stoically, trying my hardest to invoke Vincent’s arctic way of dealing with all things Selene.
“You’re right. There is,” she informs me, standing up from her seat and facing me head-on without one look of remorse—enough to paralyze me where I stand and render me speechless.
“What is it then?” I finally question once I gain control of my vocal cords.
“I need your help,” she rebukes, with the same class and sophistication she used to adopt when shielding her true feelings.
“My help?” I ask, stroking my beard in speculation.
“Yes. Yours and maybe Giovanni’s, too. I need my friends, Dom,” she ventures and it pierces an iron spear through my bleeding heart.
“You left your friends.”
She turns her face away from me with a tug of a frown still visibly clear. I can still see the tear tracks that mark her face, and it pulls on my heartstrings with such mastery. I question if any of her anguish is real.
“Do you need money?” I ask, wondering if this is why she showed up in the first place. Maybe she’s run out of funds to hide anymore. She lets out a small disgusted huff and narrows her sparkling green eyes at me once more.
“I have money, Dominic. I would never come back to Chicago in search of a handout. I’d rather saw my arm off.”
I rake my fingers behind my neck, massaging away the sudden pressure I feel there.
“If that’s true, then what else could you possibly need from me? From us?”
“The Outfit’s influence,” she replies, steadfast.
“You must be joking, Red! If any made man even knew you were here, they’d kill you on the spot. Maybe even me for not turning you in,” I shout out.
“But they won’t. You will not allow that to happen,” she counters, certain of it. My shoulders slump knowing how right she is.
I would never let anyone touch a hair on Selene’s head. I’d kill every last motherfucker who tried. She suffered that shit enough when she lived with her asshole of a father. No way I would let any bastardo hurt her that way again.
“Okay, let me think. Let me think,” I mumble, pacing manically around the room. “Does anyone else know you’re back? You weren’t followed or something, were you?” I question, panicked. Her composed frame tells me she’d be too smart for that.
“I saw Vincent,” she announces, at last, putting a stop to my frantic steps.
“You did? How did he take it?”
“Not well. He wants me gone,” she states matter-of-fact, but a mixture of regret and sorrow alters her controlled tone.
“As he should, Red. It’s dangerous for you to be here,” I plea, walking over to
her and grasping her hands in mine once more. It’s as close to her as I dare be.
“Dominic, I can’t go back. Not until I have your word you’ll help me. I need to make things right, and the syndicate can make it happen,” she insists, and I ponder if she has forgotten all she was taught about la famiglia. The only thing they’ll help with is digging up a grave for her, and perhaps not even that much.
“Broken men can only harm, not heal, Red. Whatever is broke in your life, we won’t be able to fix it. It’s not in our nature.”
“I don’t believe that, Dom. I can’t.” She shakes her head in denial.
“Believe what you want, but do it where you’ll be safe. Get out of town, Selene. I beg of you. Don’t come back,” I exclaim gruffly, with the thought of sending her away rioting my emotions. But she’ll die if she stays, and I can’t allow that.
She pulls me in and wraps her arms over my shoulders in a gentle hug. She places one small kiss to my cheek, creating a lump in my throat that I can’t swallow.
“I’m sorry, Dom. I just can’t,” she answers, before leaving me alone and bereft once again.
After I get my shit together, I jump in my car and drive like a lunatic up to Vincent’s house. I should have known something was up when he went MIA all day. I assumed he was balls-deep in meetings, but it was unlike him to not answer my calls.
Everyone believes Vincent is incapable of feeling. He has perfected the cold, calculating, emotionless mafia boss to a T. A trait I used to admire in him until I found out what a sham it was. Between the three of us, he’s probably the one who feels most deeply. The one that would stand impassively in his own pool of blood when cut. But not every nick summons such depth of twisted emotion.
I’ve only seen him lose his self-imposed control once. And that’s when our Red packed up her stuff and left us in the dead of night. For two long-ass years, Vincent wasn’t a man—he was an apocalypse lashing out at the world, seeking to destroy anything and anyone who stood in his way. And when we came up empty handed and returned to Chicago, it all came crashing down—and so did he. I was there to keep him somewhat sane throughout his self-destructive period, but thankfully it was Gio who gave him purpose to dig himself out of the hole he created, and become the Romano we all fear and love.