Our roles had reversed.
Was this just him returning the favor? Or was there more going on that he wasn’t telling me? He’d looked…nearly demented…when he’d stepped into the pool. I dared say if anyone had come between the two of us in that moment, he would have snapped their neck without blinking.
His body slid off mine and dipped below the edge of the pool. I sat up straight to watch him sink beneath the clear blue water, totally submerged. His hair floated above his head, his arms motionless in front of him.
My mind instantly conjured up an image of him as a merman—shirtless, hair down to his shoulders, deceptively charming smile capturing the attention of lovesick sea-faring maidens everywhere.
Aquaman could kiss my arse.
When he surfaced, he shoved his hair off his face, slicking it back. His sodden white shirt was molded to the ridges of his shoulders and chest, highlighting the broadness of his form. So much masculinity. Water droplets fell from his eyelashes and short beard, sluicing down his pectorals—
The water around him was tinged with red.
“You’re hurt!” My eyes widened with horror at the giant bandage I finally noticed poking through a huge hole in his shirt. “Are you okay? What happened?”
I tried gently reaching for the injury, but he wrapped his brawny arms around me instead and dragged me into the water.
“Are you mad?” I screeched, wriggling in his hold. “Nico, put me down. You’re bleeding, for God’s sake. You’re going to hurt yourself worse.”
“Let me hold you, Lexi.”
I stopped struggling, not sure I’d heard him correctly.
He sighed. “Just…let me have you in my arms for a minute.”
When he sounded that bloody lost, I was willing to give him as many minutes as he needed.
And frankly, I needed to be held as much as he needed to hold.
He guided my legs to wrap around his waist. Mindful of his shoulder, I carefully slipped my arms around his neck. I desperately wanted to inspect his injury, but I sensed he wasn’t going to let me until he was ready to allow it.
Before, I felt boneless.
Now, I felt weightless.
Though I suspected it wasn’t just because of the water. In Nico’s arms, held up by his support and strength, I felt less burdened. Something told me he could bear any weight I placed on his shoulders. He could carry all of it.
“Will you please tell me?” I whispered. “I need to know.”
He lowered us further into the water and drifted backward. “Raphael Esposito is MIA.”
I reared back on reflex, but his hands were there to stop me, keeping me close. “He escaped?”
“Or was kidnapped. That’s what it looked like. Five men ambushed the van that was transporting him to the courthouse. They shot all the guards and took Esposito with them, claiming he had debts to pay before they killed him.”
“Do you have any idea who the men were?”
He grunted. “We have some theories, but nothing concrete. His son, Stefano, owed the Niners money before he was killed. Could have been them trying to pump Raphael for the money before killing him out of revenge. But the Niners have been pretty quiet ever since the shooting at the summit meeting. I’m having a hard time believing they would go to this extreme.”
We floated beside the waterfall in the grotto, the peaceful sound an ironic contrast to the ominous conversation.
“Could it have been a set-up?” I asked. “Would Raphael somehow have been able to stage something like that to escape custody and avoid going on trial?”
A few beats of silence passed. “It’s possible. He’s still been able to run the syndicate with his brother Benito from behind bars. But if that’s the case, then who’s he working with? Benito and pretty much the entire Esposito family were either in the courtroom or right outside the courthouse. Who else would have helped him escape?”
“Hired guns?”
He shook his head. “Not unless it was a team. These guys were familiar with each other. And they were professionals. They knew what the hell they were doing. Almost military-like. Which is another reason why I don’t think it was the Niners.”
“Wait, how do you know they were familiar with each other?” I leaned back to look at him. “You say that like you saw them with your own eyes.”
He averted his gaze. “I did.”
I grabbed his chin and forced him to look at me. “Stop evading me. How did you get your injury, Nico?”
His eyes went cold again, that lovely amber darkening. “I got hit with one of their bullets.”
I abruptly yanked my arms back, my eyes bugging out of my skull. “You were shot? Put me down! Pizdets, we need to take care of that!”
His mouth quirked up in a crooked, mysterious grin. “It went in and out. Didn’t hit any major veins or arteries. I already went to the hospital to get it stitched up.”
“You did?”
I couldn’t hide the hurt that laced the question.
His brow furrowed in confusion. “Yeah.”
I stared down at the water, feeling irrationally wounded. “You could have called me. My God, you were shot and I didn’t even know it.”
He tipped my chin up, his eyes searching mine. “You worried about me, legs?”
I swallowed. “Only because I wouldn’t have a sparring opponent if anything happened to you.”
He slowly nodded. “Right.”
“Besides, I just became a wife. I’d like to get used to that before I make myself a widow.”
It was a half-grin this time. “How long have I got before you make that happen?”
I shrugged. “I prefer it to be at a time and place of my choosing.”
“Any particular weapon you’re favoring for my death?”
I squinted up at the sky. “I’ve always thought a stiletto heel to the jugular had a nice, dramatic ring to it. Like something from a twisted soap opera. The type of murder a true femme-fatale would commit.”
He laughed.
I made Nico Rossetti actually laugh.
I might as well have taken a stiletto heel to the heart because the man just slayed me.
He rolled his neck back on his shoulders and winced. Without invitation, my fingers instinctively went to his nape and massaged over that one spot he always seemed to be rubbing.
He stilled as my fingers worked.
Then he let out the longest groan of relief I’d ever heard. “Holy shiiiiiit.”
I chuckled. “Better?”
“You have no idea. Don’t stop.”
The fact that he thought I could was laughable. I didn’t know where it came from, but I was suddenly feeling protective of this man. I wanted to ease his stress, relieve his tension. I wanted to…take care of him.
Part of me was horrified at the realization. But that was quickly forgotten when his expression turned grateful. Had no one ever paid enough attention to him to know when he needed a neck massage? Judging from his reaction, I’d say no.
It took me several minutes to loosen the knot, but he was eventually able to rotate his neck around without trouble.
Then he rewarded me with the most spectacular smile. The first one he’d ever given me with teeth. “Amazing. Your fingers just did what mine are never able to. You sure you’re not a witch?”
I grinned. “That’s for me to know and you to find out.”
I couldn’t believe my eyes, but his gaze actually looked adoring. Never thought I’d ever see that emotion from him. Was he drunk?
My eyes fell back on his shoulder, my mood instantly sobering. “Are you sure you’re okay?”
I really didn’t want to think about the possibility of anything happening to him. I was doing my level best to mask how much the idea bothered me. I couldn’t even fathom him not being here tomorrow. Of him in pain.
His face softened. “Yeah. I’m okay, legs.”
“If you got stitches, why has it been bleeding?”
His grin was sheepish. “I m
ay have…punched something and opened a couple of them.”
I narrowed my eyes. “You punched something. What was it?”
“Might have been a wall.”
I fought back a smile. “And you punched a wall because…?”
His face hardened. “Esposito escaped on my watch. It’s my fault he’s out there right now, even if he is in the hands of murderous thugs.”
Incensed at his self-deprecation, I tried to break his hold so I could give him a firm talking to.
He only tightened it.
“It is not your fau—”
His hands froze on my back.
It wasn’t until that moment I realized where exactly on my back he was touching me. What exactly his fingertips were brushing over. They had snaked beneath my strapless bandeau top and were touching them.
His eyes flared wide, shock and outrage warring for prominence in his features. “Lexi? Is that…?”
It was going to happen sooner or later. Might as well get it over with.
With tender prodding, he turned me around before I could come up with a response. Gingerly lifting my top, he exposed the entire middle of my back.
Every inch of which was covered in burn scars.
I couldn’t believe what the hell I was seeing.
Scars spanned the center of Lexi’s back—burn scars by the looks of them. They were concentrated in a strip that was at least six inches wide. They stretched from her left kidney to just below her right shoulder blade. The skin was lighter colored and tighter than the surrounding tissue, suggesting they’d been healed for some time.
“Christ.” My fingers lightly caressed the burned areas. “Legs… How did you get these?”
I’d murder a motherfucker that second if she only gave me a name. If someone had actually done this to her, they would feel pain like they couldn’t possibly imagine.
And how had I not seen this before?
I thought back to everything she’d worn since I met her and realized with startingly clarity that she’s always managed to keep it covered. Clearly having become meticulous about the cuts of her clothing, every dress and top had always concealed this part of her back from view.
Guilt stabbed through me when she sighed wearily. I was about to tell her she didn’t have to talk about it if it was too difficult.
But then I didn’t.
I needed to know how she’d come to endure such pain. Hearing it from her somehow seemed…vital.
“It was in a fire at the orphanage in Siberia where I grew up.” She said it like a rote, as if she’d told this story one too many times. “I was seven.”
Seven?
Good God, she’d been a child.
If I thought too long about a tiny, blond-headed Lexi, surrounded by scorching flames and screaming in terror for help, I’d unravel into a psychotic, killing beast. So, I shoved those disturbing images out of my mind.
“The fire started upstairs in one of the storage rooms,” she continued. “Bad electrical wiring or something. It was down the hall from where all the kids slept, but the staff members were able to get everyone out before the flames reached the bedrooms. Everyone except me.”
Unholy fury had my blood boiling. “They left you?”
She shook her head. “No, they didn’t see me. I was hiding under my bed at the time because I’d had a nightmare. It happened a lot, and I always felt safer under my bed for some reason.” She chuckled mirthlessly. “Strange, isn’t it? Kids are always told that monsters lie beneath their beds, not comfort.”
Jesus, baby.
She was breaking my heart. Something I never thought could be broken because it had never felt whole to begin with.
“Anyway, I was under the bed when the staff members ran in and screamed for everyone to get out. I didn’t understand what was going on, but it scared me even more than the nightmare, so I stayed where I was. In the chaos and confusion, they must have assumed I was already with the group when they saw my empty bed.”
My fingers started stroking that strip of skin before I could command them to stop.
“I don’t know what snapped me out of it, but I eventually figured out that the building was on fire. I ran out of the bedroom and made it to the stairwell before the fire blocked it from me. But just as I reached the first level, part of the ceiling collapsed on me.”
It felt like there were flames in my fucking throat.
I couldn’t talk, couldn’t swallow, could barely breathe.
She reached back and ran her index finger along the path of scars. “I was trapped under a wooden support beam for a while until a fireman eventually came in and found me. I tried to move it so many times, but it was too heavy. So, I had to just lie there screaming while it burned me. I think I passed out at some point, because I don’t remember much before the fireman was lifting me into his arms.”
The pain she suffered. The agony. God, I couldn’t imagine.
And at seven years old.
She must have been terrified beyond all belief. On top of it all, she hadn’t even had parents to comfort her afterward. No one to hold her, kiss her, help her heal. No one to tell her everything was going to be okay. To love her.
“Is that why you like swimming so much?” I rasped. “Because water represents the opposite of fire?”
She stilled. “I’ve…never thought about it before. Maybe? I’ve never been able to explain it, but I’ve always felt safe in the water.”
“That makes sense.”
When she cleared her throat, I wondered if she was choking back tears. “Anyway, the hospital did what they could for me, but they were grossly underfunded, same with the orphanage. Medical care at that time was abysmal. After they released me, I decided I didn’t want to go back to the orphanage. I figured if something like that was going to happen to me there, I might as well take my chances on my own.”
My muscles locked up. “On your own? But you were seven.”
She nodded. “I found some people who helped homeless kids like me survive Siberian winters on their own. They helped me find food and taught me how to keep myself warm.”
My hands grabbed her upper arms. She sucked in a breath. I was probably holding her too roughly, but I couldn’t have let go if my life depended on it.
“You lived on the streets of Siberia when you were seven years old?”
“Only for about six months or so,” she said shakily. “Then Sergei found me. His driver almost ran me over actually. When he realized I had no one, he took me home with him. Because he didn’t have anyone either. Ever since his wife Claudia died years before, he’d been depressed and lonely. I guess we were both looking for a family, and we found it in each other.”
The man hadn’t just lost his wife—he’d lost a baby, too. I couldn’t begin to imagine the holes that kind of loss leaves in a person. And Lexi had literally never had anyone.
“He saved me,” she stated emphatically. “The most powerful and dangerous man in the Russian mafia saved me. That’s why I’ll do anything for him.”
Which explained why she’d gone along with the marriage. Everything else I’d learned about her clicked into place after hearing her story. The medical bills Sergei paid for in Moscow after adopting her. The malnutrition, the dehydration, the protein deficiency.
And no fucking wonder if she’d been living on the streets for half a year!
It was a complete mystery how she’d even survived in those harsh conditions. The climate alone, not to mention the crime-ridden streets. She’d miraculously survived a fire, and then somehow scraped by on her own until being rescued.
So many times she could have died.
“I was able to work around the scars during my modeling days,” she went on, her voice pitching lower. “The photographers and my agency always managed to hide them in every shot. But they eventually said I needed to do something about covering them up. Skin grafts with plastic surgery and all that.”
The thought enraged me.
If that had be
en her choice, I wouldn’t care. But being forced to cover up the evidence of her survival, like something to be ashamed of? That was unacceptable. Those scars were a mark of her bravery and will to live. She should wear them proudly, like a badge of courage.
“I’d had enough at that point,” she continued, cutting into my thoughts. “I wasn’t about to go through major surgery to fix something that didn’t bother me, just to propagate some unattainable image of perfection. I didn’t want to be a part of spreading that message to women. Didn’t feel right.” She shrugged. “So, I quit modeling. Terminated my contract and walked away. It was so much easier than I’d thought it would be.”
Another piece added to the puzzle. This woman was far more worldly, far tougher, and far wiser than I’d initially given her credit for.
This woman was a survivor.
I was in awe of her spirit, especially after everything that had happened to her. She needed to know that I could see how strong she’d remained. That I saw her resilience and felt her own fire still burning bright, no matter how many times life had tried to snuff it out. I felt her anguish, but I relished in her courage.
And she needed to fucking know how much it meant that she’d shared her sorrow with me. That she’d trusted me enough to expose her grief.
Without any thought to the consequences, I cupped her cheek and turned her face to mine. My mouth came down on hers in a fusion of unrestraint and blinding passion.
My mind didn’t even catalog it as a sexual act at first. It was simply essential, something I had to do. Connecting our bodies in that moment was as necessary as breathing.
Necessary for life to even continue.
She froze in shock at the initial contact, though it didn’t take long for her mouth to begin moving beneath mine. For her sigh to melt into a yearning moan. For her arms to wrap around my neck and pull me closer. My own circled her front to hold her flush against me, unwilling to let any space slip between our bodies.
Normally, I never cared to kiss the women I bedded. It wasn’t that I didn’t like it—I could just take it or leave it. Kissing a woman’s mouth wasn’t something I put great emphasis on. Now, kissing other parts of her…that was a different story.
Booze and Bullets (Brooklyn Brothers #3) Page 18