There, with her back against a car door and with tears in her eyes, is my girl. They put a cheap veil on her and a sash that reads Bride-to-be over the clothes she was taken in.
But more important than that, Julio beside me cocks his gun. “I know exactly where they are. It’s fifteen minutes from here and behind a dingy strip mall away from the main casino area. It’s the part of Vegas most don’t see. The fucker who owns it will marry her against her will. Suit up. I’ll take you.”
35
THE PLACE IS just as Julio described.
Filthy.
Bad area.
A low-level criminal’s playground.
The chapel with its neon sign half working is isolated at the very end of this street and away from the normal traffic route—no walkways or performers working the passing crowds.
The place is perfect for the illicit, but today it will meet its end.
Outside the small building, we park our cars, closing in on the two already in the attached lot. There’s a newer-model Mercedes and a Toyota Prius, both tags from Nevada, and Julio makes quick work of slashing the tires with the two men he brought with him.
They’ll be staying outside and acting as guards because one way or another, this little family and the shop’s owner won’t be making it out alive.
Taking my gun from the back of my trousers, I walk up the small concrete pathway that leads toward two steps and the main entrance. The entrance is locked, and I stepped aside so Callum can shoot the lock using his silencer.
I chose not to use one. I want them to hear me.
A quick pop pop and he pushes the double doors open with his foot, leaving them open wide. There’s no movement from inside, no running or cursing, and we walk quietly through the small lobby and right into the room where an older gentleman sits at the organ playing the traditional wedding march.
Nobody’s standing, but there is a woman—familiar in her role as Aurora’s stepmother—all but dragging her down the narrow aisle while a group of ten random strangers watch this all unfold.
“Don’t do this, Samantha. Let me go!”
“Shut the fuck up, brat. I should’ve had you disposed of years ago.”
No one steps in.
No one moves a muscle to help a crying woman.
And yet, when I raise my gun and shoot the officiant in the neck, all hell breaks loose.
Now, they run. Like bloody cockroaches, they try and scatter but one by one begin to fall as bullets rain down on the sick bunch. Men and women, I no longer care as I aim and shoot.
The man on the organ.
The fucker sitting near the back drinking a beer from a paper bag.
Dominic’s sister who comes toward me with her own gun raised, firing off a bullet that grazes my sides as I reciprocate. “You had to make this difficult. You should’ve chosen me.”
The difference between her and I—I didn’t miss. I also don’t respond to her asinine bullshit.
Antonella Savino falls to the ground with a chest wound, bleeding out fast but still trying to reach for the gun that fell from her hand a few feet away. She’s determined if nothing else, dragging herself, and I follow behind her as she grunts in pain. It only takes a minute or two at best for her fingers to grip the handle, and when she does, I shoot the back of her skull, killing her instantly.
Then, there’s a sound I’ve come to enjoy over the years. Truly savor.
A loud screech that rents the air then, an agonized yell, and I meet the eyes of someone who should’ve known better. Who should’ve protected my Gem as if she were her own.
Prim and proper looking, her face is pinched tight—pure agony in her expression—before she takes off running in a ridiculous pair of heels.
“Ivan,” I yell, and he looks over. “The mom. Through the door on the left.”
“Got it.” Then he takes off, and as Thiago and Callum make quick work of everyone else—the entire staff on the clock included—I walk toward a scared Gem and a nearly pissing himself Dominic.
No one has touched them. They left him for me.
“Let her go.”
“I’ll kill her.”
“No, you won’t.” My eyes meet Aurora’s hazel ones and I smile. “Close your eyes and walk toward the sound of my voice, sweetheart.” The last body falls to the ground and the men with me turn and point at him. “Trust me, baby. Nothing will happen to you.”
“He’s got a gun to my back,” she whimpers, but I also take in how her shoulders pull back a bit. How she’s fighting the natural instinct to crumble in fear.
“He’ll die before a single bullet dislodges from his gun.”
“I’m right here, you piece of shit.”
Ignoring his idiotic cry for attention, I wink at Gem. She smiles back at me; it’s a tiny one, but there, and it grows just a little bit more when a crying banshee in the form of her stepmother is dragged in a minute later.
“Nico! Baby!”
“Mom!” Dominic yells out, and it’s his last mistake because he pulls the gun away from the only person keeping him alive.
The moment he does, Gem ducks and begins to crawl away as every gun goes off, emptying their rounds into his body. From the barrage he flies back against the wall, pulsating against the shattered mirror behind him.
And when the last bullet leaves my gun, hitting his mouth and ripping a part of his face wide open, his lifeless body falls to the ground riddled with holes. His blood is on the ground and splattered across the walls. His bullshit legacy, the one they were forcibly trying to create, will be nothing but a memory because in the very next moment, I have Gem back in my arms.
She’s all that matters. My entire world is back where it belongs, and I never want to be apart again.
“From now on...” my lips skim down her temple and cheek “...where you go, I go, and vice versa.”
“Deal.” Gem pulls back and tilts her head up, locking those watery eyes with mine, and the world fades away. “I knew you were going to come for me.”
“Always, Gem. I’ll always be but two steps behind you.” Then I’m kissing her. Completely losing myself in her taste in the middle of a corrupt wedding chapel littered with dead bodies. I ignore the hysterical stepmother and her pleas while she’s being removed. I ignore someone pouring gasoline throughout the room until we need to leave.
And yet, I’ll always remember the very moment I fell in love with her all over again.
Once outside, Aurora walks up to each man and gives them a hug, the last being me—she held me tighter. Longer. And when she pulls back, Gem holds out her hand for the box of matches Julio had given me when we exited the building.
“Let me do the honors,” she says, and I couldn’t be prouder.
In that moment, I know she’ll be okay. That she’ll stand beside me through anything the world sends our way.
We leave Vegas without looking back two days after seeing the others off. Thiago and Ivan flew back to Miami that same evening while Callum disappeared last night after dinner.
We don’t know where he went or why, but the man had a look of determination that rivaled mine when it comes to Gem.
On the news, the incident was reported as a gang-affiliated crime, a local dispute between the owners of the shady chapel and a meth ring that left a total of fifteen dead. The authorities are asking the community to come forward with any information that can help locate those responsible, but no one will say a word.
Not when they fear becoming the next victim on the five o’clock news. Not when the bodies were burned to a crisp, and the medical examiner is having to pull dental records to identify each one.
“You are thinking hard again, Mr. Jameson?”
“More like missing you, Mrs. Jameson.” I hum and look over, catching her wicked grin a second before she unclips her seatbelt, ignoring the sign. Then, she’s up and shaking those hips, exaggerating the four steps it takes to make it across the aisle and into my lap where she burrows her face into the crook of m
y neck. “Are we a little needy after our nap, love?”
“Always want you close.”
“I love you, Gem.” Bringing her face up to mine with the tips of two fingers, I stare deeply into her hazel eyes. Let her feel the full weight of my words—almost the exact same ones— before saying I do in our private ceremony inside the Bellagio with no one but Callum in attendance.
“Gem, since the moment I saw your beautiful face across the room from me, I’ve been yours. Completely and irrevocably owned.” Callum snickers beside us and I subtly flip him off, making Aurora giggle. And because I’m a man with zero patience, I bend down quickly and steal a kiss. She gasps and I wink, squeezing her hands once before continuing. “You make me want to be a better version of myself each day, and I hope that over the next fifty or more years, I can make you proud to be my wife. I promise to always be faithful, honest, and more than anything else...to be your best friend and partner in crime. I love you, beautiful, and I can’t wait to spend the rest of my life waking up to your smile every day that the Lord blesses me with life.”
We got married our way.
Privately, and inside the room we stayed in with an officiant that for a few extra grand made the early morning trip to see us. She wore a simple cotton dress I brought with me in a pale lavender color, and I wore a button-down and a pair of trousers, both in black. Our rings are basic and not the ones I’ll have her design with me and the family jeweler, however, if I go by the smile on her face each time she sees the solid band, I’d say these aren’t going anywhere.
That I’ll just have to find a way to incorporate them into the new set.
“I can’t wait to start this next chapter of our lives, Casper. To move on from the bad and build a new world together.”
“You rocked my world in a way I wasn’t prepared for, Mr. Jameson. You were determined, hardheaded...” I couldn’t help but laugh at that “...and ready to bulldoze your way through all of my preconceived notions of what a man like you is and not who you are. And I couldn’t love you more for that. For not giving up on me when I was lost and afraid. For not walking away when I made things tough.” Aurora’s voice becomes thick then, her emotions rising to the surface as I fight back my own. These words are the greatest gift she could ever have given me. “You’ve always had my back, let me lean on you, and now it’s my turn to show you that I got you. That I’m where you can rest your head at night because I will protect you just as fiercely. I love you, Casper. Love you with every bit of my heart, and I promise to always be faithful, honest, and stand by your side through the good and bad.”
And I believe her. Wholeheartedly.
Because my girl is strong. Her heart is pure.
And while the road to forgetting this entire ordeal won’t be easy, she showed her determination by turning this negative into a positive. This, as crazy as it may sound, is where our life together begins.
We still have a mess to deal with back home and with her father, but we’ll be okay. She’ll get through the trauma, will come out stronger, and I will cheer her on every fucking step of the way because that’s what love does to you. You live for your other half and become what they need at any given moment.
As long as we have each other, everything else can go and fuck itself.
Epilogue #1
Four months later…
“DAD, THIS CAN wait. She isn’t going anywhere,” I say, trying to make the stubborn man back down. There’s no reason, no value, in seeing Samantha at all. For me, she could rot away for the rest of her life right where she is.
A location that only Casper knows about and is keeping it that way. He’s handling her. He’s delivering her punishment for what he considers to be an unforgivable crime: touching me.
“No, Roe. It’s time that you learned the truth on a few things. You need to hear the real story of how this mess began,” he grunts from the back seat. He’s still in some pain. The pothole we hit isn’t helping, and yet he still wants to do this. “I need you to see...to understand why things happened as they did. To realize that I do love you and always have.”
His words stop me, and I look toward the man driving us to her location. His words to me out on that private terrace slam into my consciousness and I nod.
A man in love can do some crazy and stupid things. Sometimes it’s a combination of both. Your father does care, Aurora, but circumstances put him in a position where he didn’t have a choice. I’m telling you this because when the time comes, I need you to listen to what he has to say. Really listen and try not to judge too harshly when there was more than one player involved.
Casper asked me all those months ago to listen. To really listen and try to understand that life isn’t always a cup of sugar sprinkled with rainbows, and I get that now. After Vegas, I see the world differently.
It’s one thing to know what people do and another to witness it firsthand. To be made a pawn in someone’s sick game.
Turning in my seat, I look at my father in the eye. “Okay. If you need to do this, then we will go, but I need you to understand something before we enter this building...I already know you love me. You showed it by discharging yourself out of a Boston hospital against their wishes and flying to see me in Chicago three days after you woke up. You proved it when you grabbed me and hugged me tight, begging for forgiveness for a crime you didn’t commit—”
“I am to blame, kid. This mess began a long time ago, and it’s because of love for family that I didn’t do what I should have.” And that right there is his demon. The cross that he shoulders.
“Dad, I don’t care—”
“We’re here.” Casper’s voice cuts through our conversation and we both turn to look out of the car’s window. The place is not what I thought it would be. Not at all, but I can see the why behind his actions.
Her home is nothing more than a private facility that takes in those that society won’t. Those that, for the right price, will lock you away in a padded room with nothing but a mattress in the corner. Most people don’t know that this asylum still exists; it’s not open to the public, but for criminals, the rules change.
They bend and don’t break.
“Nice,” my father says, opening his door and stepping out without help. I glare at that, but the man waves me off and walks toward the entrance where a large man dressed in scrubs awaits.
“Name?”
“Giada Savino and the code is 1982,” Casper says, stopping behind me.
He types the information into his tablet and then gives us a smile. “Thank you for your patronage, Mr. Jameson. Please enjoy your visit.”
“Cheers.” Then, he’s guiding me forward without a word. Dad follows; he’s looking around the place and chuckling to himself now and then. The place is creepy and nothing holds humor, but I can see how having a woman like her here is hilarious.
She went from everything to nothing in the blink of an eye.
At the end of the long hall to the right, there’s an elevator and we take that to the fourth floor. The door dings, we step outside, and right across from the only way out is her room. And more than that, she’s standing there looking at us through the small window.
I wave and her scowl deepens.
Casper takes a step forward, and she rushes away like the dogs of hell are after her.
He’s the first to step through, and I take in the empty room with nothing but a mattress on the floor. How the mighty have fallen.
“Take a seat.” My husband points at a small dinette set near the opposite wall that I didn’t take into account, I’ve been too busy looking in the general direction of where she is. “That was placed here for your use only.”
I take the offered seating while my father doesn’t. Instead, he walks slowly over to his ex-wife and when in reach, caresses her cheek. “How are you, Samantha? How’s this life treating you, princess?”
“Fuck you,” she sneers and tries to slap his hand away, but that’s a mistake on her part. Before she can take in h
er next lungful of air, my father has her throat in his hands and is squeezing, slamming her body hard against the wall behind them.
She turns red right away, her panicked eyes looking to me of all people for help.
“You do not look at her,” Matteo snarls; his demeanor is one I’ve never seen before. Never had to experience. “How fucking dare you...after everything I gave up helping you...to save your life and that of my brother.”
“Your brother?” I ask myself, not realizing I said it aloud until Dad turns his head toward me.
“I agreed to marry her because of a bounty placed on both you and your mother’s head, by her father. See, being the next in line, I was promised to her without my knowledge by our fathers. They wanted to join the families—our underworld dealings with their pharmaceutical company—and take over the global pandemic that was growing at the time for opioids.”
“How? But, I... what about Mom!” I’m not making any sense. This information cuts deep—is almost too much at once.
“She knew. I never hid who I was to her and after an attempt was made—”
“They tried to kill her?” I interrupt, angry at the fact that they tried.
“No.” His eyes are sad. “They tried to kill you by injection at a routine doctor’s appointment. I caught them, and after taking both of you home, I disposed of every employee at that office.”
“Then what happened?” Because I need to know. I want to have this hole inside my chest, the one that missed her father growing up, to be sealed. My heart needs to know that he didn’t abandon us. Me.
“I went back to the apartment I shared with your mother and found her bags packed. It hurt, but I understood. You were and will always be our greatest achievement, Roe, and above our love, your life came first. We spoke, planned, and made the right moves to keep you safe. If I gave in to their demands, nothing of this world would touch you.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. I’m not an angel and this has been my penance.”
Covet (Beautiful Sinner Series Book 2) Page 25