Chapter 18 Captured #2
“Are you saying Luca shot himself?”
“I’m saying the gun that shot Luca was up tight to his leg.
” Ivers moved his right hand into position, like a gun, and pressed his extended fingers into his own thigh.
“And from the angle of the bullet’s trajectory, it was about held like this.
So, if it wasn’t Luca, the shooter was pretty up in his space. ”
Santino ground his teeth until he just about saw stars. “You’ve been around the block, Ivers. If you had to lobby a guess, where would you put your money?”
Ivers sighed. “No one else saw or heard anything, but somehow Luca got into a big, knock-down fight. A fight that left him with a plethora of nothing and somehow resulted in him becoming delirious. I wouldn’t trust it, if I were in your shoes.”
Santino clapped a hand on Ivers’s shoulder. “Appreciate the house call, Doc. You’ll have your payment tomorrow, like always. But for now, you might wanna find your way home. What happens next is beyond your purview.”
Ivers gave a curt nod.
Santino stepped up to the door that barred him from Luca, rolled his neck side-to-side, and walked in.
Luca was reclined in the bed, propped up by several pillows, Band-Aids on his face and arms. His left leg was propped up on yet more pillows, his pants cut high enough to turn them into a half-pair of booty shorts.
His eyes were clearer than they’d been the last time Santino had seen him.
Calmer. His head was downcast and his fists curled in his lap as if he were frustrated.
“Boss,” he said, his voice cracking, “I’m fucking sorry. I don’t— I don’t have an excuse.”
Uh-huh. Santino dropped onto the footstool he assumed Ivers had been using previously, since it was still closest to the bedside. “No one else has a goddamn clue what happened,” he said. “I need it from you, Luca. How did you get shot and where the hell is my fiancée?”
Luca heaved a breath, his jaw jumped, and he spoke in a low and steady voice.
“It had been quiet, so I made the assumption the upper level was secure. And maybe half an hour after she turned in, I thought I heard something while patrolling past a stairwell. So, I ran up to take a look, and next thing I’m seeing a body that’s too”—he gestured like a fucking mushroom—“big up-top to be a regular body, and I just knew. So, I chased. They took the northside exit out of the house, I caught up to them in time to see Miss Reiko go into the trunk, and I tackled the fucker. I didn’t wanna turn it into a shootout and risk a bullet going too wide, not with her so close.
We wrestled in the fucking bark next to the driveway, the bastard pulled a knife, and by the time I got that out of the way I see he’s got a partner coming out of the car with a gun on me.
The one who grabbed her jumps off, sprinting for the car, and as soon as I’m on my feet, the other guy pulls the trigger.
I don’t know if his aim fucking sucks, or if he can’t see in the dark, or maybe they wanted me alive to tell you all this.
” Luca paused, swallowing hard as if to restabilize himself before wrapping up.
“I just know I went down, they peeled out, and it was all I could do to raise the alarm so someone would signal you.” His shoulders sank with a deflated exhale.
“I’m so fucking sorry, Boss! I don’t know how they got in, but—”
“Yeah,” Santino said, cutting off the rest of Luca’s bullshit. “We both know that’s not how it happened.” Santino stood, put one knee on the bed, and pressed his still-bloodied knuckles into Luca’s collar until Luca was forced as far backward as he could go.
Luca’s eyes widened, his nostrils flaring.
“You fucking hurt her,” Santino growled.
“And maybe you had a conspirator to drive her off-property, but you know what else I know for goddamn certain?” He didn’t wait for Luca to respond.
“I know you weren’t shot by some asshole with perfect opportunity and shit aim.
You shot you, Luca. And don’t think that hole in your leg will spare you now. ”
Fear flared in Luca’s eyes and the color drained from his face. “No, Boss, I didn’t—”
Santino latched on to Luca’s wrapped wrist and twisted the wrong way.
“Where is she, Luca?” He maneuvered himself until he was straddling Luca’s imbalanced legs, his ass resting on Luca’s left knee, and leaned forward.
He wanted Luca to see the fury in his eyes, and he wanted to feel every tremor of terror. “Where. Is. My. Reiko?”
Luca grunted, his body tense as he fought his natural need to squirm and retreat from the pain. But there would be no retreat. “I-I don’t know,” he said. “I really don’t know!”
“Not good enough.” Santino released Luca’s fully broken wrist, reached between them, and tore at the wrapping around Luca’s leg.
“No,” Luca panted, finally squirming. “No, wait, Boss, please—”
Ivers had stitched the wound itself, of course, so there wasn’t an actual hole hiding beneath all the gauze. But that was of little concern.
Luca tried pushing Santino’s arm away, his breathing coming faster and harder. “Don’t, no, I don’t—”
Santino ignored the sloppy pushing at his arm and pressed his thumb to the stitching, pushing hard enough to stretch and surely hurt like a bitch, but not yet popping them open. “You know something, you slimy fuck, and you better tell me all of it.”
Luca tugged at Santino’s sleeve, a strained outcry rolling up his chest and pain flushing the skin fear had previously drained. “I don’t! I don’t know!”
“Bullshit.” Santino shoved his thumb past the fresh stitching.
Warm blood rushed up, spilling over the fleshly ledge and running down Luca’s thigh to soil Santino’s bedding.
It soaked his own skin, too, but the gratification he usually took from feeling his enemy’s blood on his hands was dulled in comparison to the untampered storm raging in his chest.
Luca, meanwhile, let out a surprisingly healthy scream. Seemed he had no pain threshold.
Armando leaned into the room. “Boss?”
“Unless you have news, I’m busy.”
Armando grunted and the door clicked shut.
Santino lifted his other hand from where he’d kept it pressed against Luca’s upper chest and clamped it over Luca’s mouth, silencing the bastard and simultaneously helping refocus him.
He raised his bloodied thumb, which allowed more blood to seep from Luca’s leg.
“See, look at this. Now not only do I have to pay a good, loyal doctor for a house call at fucking midnight, but I’ve already gone and ruined his work.
All because of you. And you know what? I honestly don’t care about any of that, Luca.
” He bunched up Luca’s shirt, doing a haphazard but deliberately offensive job of wiping off his thumb, and said, “I only care to know what you’ve done with my woman.
It’s really not that complicated. You talk, you die much faster.
Less pain. You don’t talk, you die much slower.
” He let his voice harden. “That means a whole fuck-ton more pain, Luca. And you don’t seem to like pain. ”
Luca made a sound that came out only as muffled noise, so Santino readjusted to pressing his knuckles into Luca’s chest to hold him in place.
Luca drew a gasping breath. “I really don’t know,” he insisted, voice shaking.
“I was never supposed to. I was just supposed to get her in the car. Where she took her after she peeled out, I don’t know. I fucking swear.”
Santino rocked back. She? He shot his hand up to Luca’s throat, squeezed in warning, and demanded, “Who was your contact? Who drove the fucking car? Who else knew about this plan?”
Luca reached on reflex for the hand at his throat, but he used his dominant hand—the one with the broken wrist—and let out a whimper when the new contact sparked fresh pain.
“Aronne! Most of my instructions came from Aronne. And tonight, I didn’t know her.
Don’t even know how she got past the gate.
She never got out of the car. I swear, that’s all I know! ”
Back to Aronne, and another piece of the puzzle clicked. Aronne hadn’t been late because he was getting laid. He’d been late because he’d seen an opportunity to blindside Santino while he knew Santino was distracted.
Santino shoved off the two-faced bastard.
There was a woman working with them. With Aronne, or with Danilo?
Or was she just someone in between? He dismissed that thought as quickly as it formed.
Danilo and Aronne were equally pig-headed about women.
They viewed women as objects, toys to be played with and shown off for a length of time, but never anything to be trusted with a crucial secret.
So, if there was one in the mix, she had to be someone they couldn’t escape involving.
Someone who’d have too much to lose on her own and they would believe they could sway to their side.
His chest tightened. It could only be either Gisella or Adele. Aronne was also married, but only on paper.
Santino threw the door open and stalked into the hall. “I promised him a less painful death if he answered my questions,” he said to Armando and Ciro, both standing guard. He locked eyes with Ciro. “Gift him that.”
Ciro’s eyes darkened with understanding and he nodded.
Santino waited until the door was shut again, then reached for his phone. “Anything from the guards at the front?”
Armando shook his head before falling into step at Santino’s heel. “Ivers said they’re both concussed, and I saw for myself the computers were shot to shit. It’s over my knowledge base, Boss.”
“How convenient.” Santino tapped the green button that would irritate the shit out of the guy on the other end and put the phone to his ear. It was what it was sometimes.