Chapter 39
Chapter Thirty-Nine
M y head hung low, blood dripping onto the floor as I sat tied to a chair next to a horse that was causing me to itch everywhere.
I clung to any hope that my old man would show up and catch me here with the Irish fucking mob pressing a gun to my throat. The only thing saving any ounce of sanity was that these idiots hadn't bothered to comb through the house. They found me in the barn, did a half-assed sweep of the property, and figured they'd dealt with all my guards at the front door.
I’d convinced them I was the lone occupant of the apartment above the barn, and the big house was a facade. Thank fuck my talent for lying hadn't deserted me. Maybe my sanity and brain were shot, but at least I could still spin a convincing tale.
"Why did you kill my fucking daughter?" The man in front of me seethed. He was a large redheaded guy, lanky and tall, but I recognized him as the head of the US division for the Irish mob. Truthfully, we’d always gotten along, as well as the Mafia could with the Irish, until the more recent years since this fucker took over.
"She was missing," I grumbled.
When I’d gotten the call from Enzo that someone breeched the property early this morning and was headed over to Rain’s house, I knew I was fucked. I had to somehow soothe my half-sleeping wife without alerting her that anyone was here. Thankful for my quick ability to think on my feet, I went to the barn to distract him when fucking Georgie grabbed me.
Part of me wondered if he knew I let him win the scuffle to tie me down. A few punches and bruises would obviously be the fallout, but knowing Enzo was coming back and going to mow this fucker down was the only thing keeping me calm. That and the fact I needed this all to be over before my muse woke up. I promised her a fucking Christmas and needed to deliver.
"Liar," Georgie growled, giving me another slap across the face, this time the cool metal gun cracked along my jawline as I tried not to wince.
Blood pooled at my feet. "Gotta try a little harder than that to break me." I sneered, baring my teeth at him.
Where the fuck was Enzo? It had been at least an hour with the way the light had shifted along the windows of the barn. This shit was getting old fast, and I really needed to get it over with before Madison woke.
"She was pronounced dead."
"There was never a body." I winced in pain. "Plus, you think somehow this is your time to avenge your daughter’s death after five fucking years?" I hissed back at him. The man, who was flanked by two taller ones, both with large Irish flags tattooed on their arms, stood behind where Fire was, with their arms crossed over their chests.
Amateurs. They should be on the alert at any time, hands on their weapons, pointed to shoot. Fucking dumbassess.
"I think you need to explain a little better why you are here," I huffed out. "Because without our trade routes, without our weapons, and our secrecy, your entire organization is going to shit."
The Irish needed us, which was why this whole thing was set up to begin with. The reason my father attempted to manufacture a deal between the Irish and the Italians was because the Irish needed us, and we needed to keep everyone calm so we could continue business as usual. The Irish were volatile little things, hence what was unfolding.
But hey, this was what I got for letting my guard down right? This only proved I should never let myself be this fucking loose again.
Fuck it. It was the happiest I’d ever been in my entire life. Last night watching my wife sleep peacefully in our bed was why I was still fighting—why I needed to keep going.
"It was a perfect fucking plan that you had to ruin. You left Seattle, to what? Get back to whatever whore you married."
"What plan?" I asked him, trying to waste time while waiting for Enzo to get here.
"We had it all set up for you. We were going to meet, fucking break you down until you agreed to marry Cairn?—"
"I was already fucking married," I spat at him, my blood flying across the barn toward him.
"Then I was going to keep you in my house." Georgie folded his arms across his chest as if that was going to make me listen better.
"That would have never happened. My father knew where I was, the entire organization knew. They would have found you and hurt you."
"But not before I could put a little dent into your arms dealers, maybe kill the capo aka your father."
I seethed in anger. "You never would have touched my dad."
"Which is exactly why you would have caved, annulled your little whore, and gotten married to Cairn."
I felt the anger as he spat the words in my direction. The word "whore" repeated over and over again in my head.
I looked at him. No, I glared with the demon that lived inside of my fucking cold heart and spat again in his direction, making sure to spray him with the blood pooling inside my mouth.
"You motherfucker?—"
"Don’t. Ever. Speak. About. My. Wife." If my hands hadn’t been tied behind my back, I would have fucking killed him. I wanted to make sure he understood no one fucking touched or talked about what was mine.
Georgie laughed, wiping blood off his smug face before turning his attention toward me. His hands were also weaponless, as if these fucking too-proud bastards thought they truly had a chance to enter my fucking fortress and wipe everyone out.
They were fucking idiots. Sure, they killed the two gate guards, whose families would be compensated very well, but they somehow believed this entire place would have no one else aside from the two guys in front? Were they that fucking idiotic?
"No one is coming for you now," Georgie sneered.
Yup. That idiotic.
"I am fucking sorry about what happened years ago to Cagen. I had no idea she was going to get in the crosshairs of the spring bonfire, but I do not understand why you’d want to spend more time with me as your son-in-law?" I paused. "Are you that desperate?"
Georgie’s guy slapped me across the face, and I tried not to wince after he hit an already extra sensitive spot. "Not desperate." Georgie leaned back on one of the wooden slats of an empty horse stall. "I wanted to see you suffer."
"Happy?" If I could move, I would have gestured around my body.
"No. I will not be happy until you fucking hurt. I will find that little wife of yours and make her suffer."
I lost it, rage coursing through my veins. "If you touch a single hair on her head, you will die, Cairn will suffer, and every single one of your family members will be hurt."
It was a threat I had full intentions of keeping if he hurt my muse. "You don’t even have the same last names…"
Fuck me for not checking on who Cagen was. All I knew was that she was popular and her family was in banking. I looked this man up and down in his ripped jeans and sweatshirt, struggling to imagine he was a finance guy.
"She’s my stepdaughter." Ah-ha. That explains it. "Her father died when she was young, and my daughter and her were raised as though they were blood."
Also explains why they had different fucking last names. See, I wasn’t losing it completely. But these little loopholes should have been double-checked before any of this went down.
"So, now you’re pissed because…?" I said as I realized one tooth hung by a loose thread.
Where the fuck was Enzo?!
"I knew Cagen’s death wasn’t what the cops told us. We know enough about the University of Isles and the spring bonfire to know it was too much of a coincidence." I refused to allow him to see me break, so I stayed as neutral as I could. "It took me a couple years to figure out you were there during her death, but no one will share who actually pulled the trigger."
"She went missing."
Georgie flinched. The barrier broke down. "It’s a sad fucking story, Georgie, but I am still not sure why after all these years?"
"I had to wait until my biological daughter, Cairn, was of age to get married."
"Yup, still not processing. If you forced me to marry your daughter, then what? You are going to kill her for what benefit?" It wasn’t fucking adding up.
Georgie laughed. "No. I love my daughter, but I also love my business."
Ah…It was about the money. The Irish needed the money, or guns, or power.
"Ever since you and the Cartel have been getting close, we have been cut out of a lot of deals, and we want back in. It feels as though we have been put in third position. Even this meeting felt like you suddenly needed to leave after waiting all that time at the hotel in Seattle, and I needed to get back up to the top, so marrying you off to my daughter seemed reasonable."
I sighed. This was why we needed a new generation of people taking over these fucking underground organizations because I swore my dad’s generation was exhausting and stupid to deal with. Rain had the same situation happen with the Cartel and gave it over to his buddy Pico. Now, it runs like a smooth machine. Instead, these older-generation men somehow think that marrying off women will solidify their business transactions.
I may be the big bad wolf, but I am a damn proud feminist at that.
"You sound fucking stupid—" Madison’s horse bolted out of its stall and down the small aisle of the barn. The horse blew right past us, causing the two bodyguards to panic and reach for their weapons.
"What did you do?" Georgie seethed. If I had the use of my hands, I would have raised them in a shrug.
"I am a little preoccupied here, so this one surprises me as much as it does you." I had assumed Enzo would come in here, guns blazing, and just kill the fucker. To somehow get into the horse stall and use it as a distraction didn’t seem like his style, but it was working.
All three men bolted out of the barn as if looking for Fire and whoever let him out of the stall. I got to work on getting my hands out of these amateur knots.
When I found my dad tied up and my mom dead when I was a kid, the first thing I forced myself to learn was knots because I never wanted to be in this situation. I just needed thirty seconds distraction-free to do it.
"Walsh?" a feminine voice echoed from the shadows of the barn. My eyes darted in the direction of my little muse on her hands and knees blending right in with the shadows. My queen of the night was here to rescue me.
"You did this?" I kept my voice low, but the shock was laden in my tone.
"I figured Fire would help me out. Are you okay? You look like shit."
I laughed as quietly as I could, a little blood spraying from my mouth.
I shook my head. Fucking unbelievable. I had an entire arsenal of men out there and none were smart like my muse. "I am so proud of you." I praised her over and over again.
"Do you need me to cut you out?" She stood tall, and I realized my girl was also carrying a handful of knives in her hoodie pocket, and she had two Glocks with her and a couple sleeves of extra ammo.
"How—" No. I was flabbergasted, but I needed to keep working to get out of the knots.
"Oh, well I figured since my hand scanned into the room with the computers, then the little palm scanner of the locker inside your office would probably work. Truthfully"—she gave me a little smile as she went behind me to help cut me out of the ropes—"it was pure luck."
My hands finally broke free, and the first thing I did was grab her face and bring her forehead down to mine. I didn't care that I was bloodied and bruised. I needed to feel her soothing touch against my skin.
"Of course the locks work. I told you, it’s your house, too," I murmured into her face knowing we had only seconds left before the fuckers would come back in with full vengeance.
"It’s Cagen’s stepdad. He’s the head of the Irish mob and he’s pissed about Cagen and mad that I didn’t marry his daughter and give him the connections the Cartel got when Rain married Ember." She nodded, soaking in the information as I tried to catch her up as quickly as I could.
Also, where the fuck was Enzo?
"I don’t suppose that you know how to shoot a gun, Muse?" I asked her, and she shook her head.
"Just aim and shoot." I grabbed the two Glocks in her hand and set one up for her so all she had to do was pull the trigger. I hoped for a miracle, that my men would come running through the forest, but the adrenaline coursing through me to make sure Madison stayed safe was what was holding me sane. "Stay behind me."
"Okay," she whispered.
I jumped out of the chair. Fuck, that hurt. My ribs were definitely broken, but I’d deal with that later. I needed to get her to safety and get on with my fucking day.
That’s when we heard the crunching of boots coming back in and unintelligible words from Georgie’s minions. I grabbed her hand, putting it on the waistband of my pants, as a signal for her to hold on tight. Although my first instinct was to tell her to run upstairs, she would be first in line when they entered into the barn again, so there was no other option. Plus, she was safer behind me. I was confident in my ability to protect her.
"Never again will you feel unprotected, Muse," I whispered. "Never again will you feel unsafe. Never again will you spend a holiday without your family, because you are mine and I am yours."
That’s when the barn door flung open again. The first man was unprepared to see me standing and with a weapon, so he was an easy shot in the chest. Madison gasped, but I kept us going forward, her finger wrapped around my belt loop as I moved forward.
"You're a dead motherfucker," Enzo screamed from outside, and a few shots were fired.
"Fucking finally," I huffed.
"We’re moving outside, toward the door." I needed to protect what was mine—at all costs.
We quickly ducked beneath the large barn door, walking along the wooden slats.
"Me first," I told her as I popped my head out, gun raised and ready to shoot to kill. To my right was clear. Over toward the woods on the left was Enzo and about a dozen of my men. I knew they were outnumbered, but Enzo’s voice confirmed it.
"Two cars out front. Eliminated. The only target missing via the thermal cameras is Georgie, but we cannot seem to locate him."
"Take Madison," I demanded as he made his way over toward me, flanked by two armed guys. Madison let go of my waistband, and my attention snapped to her.
"Turn. Around." Her voice was even and cool while her hands lay in fists to her side. There he was. Georgie had a rifle in his hand and pointed at all of us.
"Ah, so now I see who you’ve decided to marry," Georgie said, approaching us. Any fucking closer and I would give the signal to blow his brains out to the sniper sitting on my roof behind him. A man I had a clear view of while Georgie had no clue.
"You are outnumbered," I told him, trying to make sure he didn’t come any fucking closer to my wife.
"Did you have this all figured out when you were living with my daughter?” He addressed Madison this time. “When you were hooking up with her boyfriend behind her back?"
I paused. Well, shit. He almost fucking had me there.
"How did you know?" Madison asked, her face scrunched. What a good little muse. She had mimicked the exact way my gun was held in Georgie’s direction. She looked like she knew what she was doing.
"I knew he was fucking around when I saw all the surveillance cameras being installed in your apartment one day. That afternoon, I went in with a device that showed where they were, and sure enough, none were in my daughter’s bedroom, but there were tons of cameras on your side of the room."
The corners of Madison’s lips tugged into a smile. "That’s why I love him, you know?"
My breath caught in my throat. She…she fucking loved me? Holy shit. I know I’d told her last night I loved her, and I meant every fucking word of it, but I didn’t realize…
"You love me?" I asked, my voice almost a whisper. The world seemed to fade away, leaving only Madison and the weight of those three words hanging between us. If I had to die right here, staring at my beautiful wife after she’d told me she loved me, I’d go happily. I didn’t care that this crazed man had a gun in my face. All I wanted to hear were those words come out of her mouth over and over again. It was a revelation that shook me to my core, and I found myself captivated by the authenticity in her eyes.
Her response echoed in the stillness, cracking the walls I'd built around my heart. "Yes, Walsh. I love you. More than I ever thought possible."
For a moment, time stood still. The gravity of those words sunk in, unraveling a cascade of emotions I never thought I'd experience. Madison, my muse, my solace—she loved me.
"If I could, I'd shout it from the mountaintops, carve it into the stars, and etch it into the very fabric of the universe. You, Walsh Solis, my husband, have become the meaning of my existence."
A lump formed in my throat, a mixture of overwhelming joy and a touch of disbelief. Madison, the woman who had seen me at my worst, who had stood by me when I pushed her away, loved me. The revelation resonated through the barriers I'd erected around my heart, crumbling them with each heartfelt word she spoke.
"From now on, we face whatever comes together, hand in hand. No more running, no more hiding. Just you and me against the world." She vowed.
"Down," Enzo screamed from behind us, snapping us back to reality. Blush rose to her cheeks as she realized she’d confessed all this outside her barn in the freezing cold with a gunman pointing a weapon in our faces. As soon as Enzo’s command registered, Madison ducked so her body was partially hidden behind mine.
"Are you fucking done with your love confession? I think it’s making everyone sick," Georgie huffed out.
"I am sorry about your daughter, Georgie." I stepped closer to him, leaving Madison next to Enzo. "She was in the middle of a conflict and got shot by our leader at the time who was high on adrenaline and alcohol."
I hesitated to look over at Madison, but I rotated slowly. Her eyes bulged out of her head with the truth that I was finally unleashing after all these years. "I begged her to go home, to not find me."
"But my baby girl had a heart of gold," he snarled at me.
"She did," I encouraged. "She was a good person and did nothing wrong. She was just at the wrong place at the wrong time, kind of like what you're doing now."
"I was there," Madison chimed from behind me. "I was there the night she went miss— died"
Madison looked at me, her face softened. "I can tell you truthfully, and I know my words may not mean a lot to you right now, but he didn’t hurt her."
"Oh, yeah?" Georgie’s weapon was now cocked, aimed right at me. My beautiful wife’s breathing intensified behind me, and I needed to get this fucking thing over with so I could go be with her. The faster I could get to her, the better this would all end up…for all of us.
"He didn’t. He tried to warn her to leave."
"And where were you?" Georgie spat at my wife, and I almost clocked him right then. In fact, the step forward I took had everyone quiet around me, but it was her voice that stopped me.
"I was not able to save her," Madison confessed. After what she’d told me last night, I knew the truth. She feared the fire. "I left because I couldn’t be there. I was scared of what was going to happen. I was weak?—"
"No, you were not." I snapped my head in her direction, not caring I had literally turned my back on the guy who had a gun on me.
She offered me a sad smile. "Listen, Georgie, I know what it feels like to lose family members. Walsh knows what it feels like to lose a family member. It’s a type of grief so great it consumes you. Look at you? Five years later and you’re still hunting for revenge. I’d imagine that you have spent every single day plotting and planning this."
Georgie said nothing, but the corners of his lips flinched, as if her words somehow struck a nerve. "But it doesn’t have to be like this. You can acknowledge your pain and not have to let it consume you. Do the right thing."
"Drop your weapon, Georgie. We’ve killed all your men. You know you have no way out of this."
Georgie scanned around him, but when he saw the shadows of my men surrounding him, realization flashed in his eyes.
"Now listen, you have another daughter at home, don't you?" I asked, approaching him and lowering my weapon.
Georgie nodded.
"We are going to come up with a solution. I have a man who is ready to marry Cairn."
I took another step closer.
"Drop it," I said, grabbing the barrel of his gun and putting it into the back of my pants. "I am going to let you walk out of here. We are all going to pretend this was a grave misunderstanding."
Enzo coughed behind me, likely to cover the shock in his voice. Because the big bad wolf was doing…a good deed? This was out of the ordinary, but something about needing to save Madison lit a switch in me. I wanted to show her I was a better man—no, that she made me a better man.
"I let your daughter get caught up in something she never should have been. Don’t put your other daughter in the same line of fire, knowing she will not have a father to come home to and she’d have a target on her back."
The moment Georgie declared war on me, I knew the Irish and the Italians would go head to head in a battle. This same realization Georgie seemed to understand, as he nodded in my direction and agreed.
"You are a lucky fucking man, letting you go with just a warning. You fucked me up, and I should shoot you." I wanted to, but this whole trying-to-do-better act was proving to be more difficult and against the norm of what I was taught, which was shoot to kill.
"How do I get home?" he asked. Gone was the man who thought he had the upper hand, but my kindness only went so far. I was about to speak when my beautiful wife slid next to me, and I pulled her to me so we were hip to hip. Equals in every way.
"I think our kindness has reached its limit there. We are allowing you to leave the gates of this house unarmed, but how or where you go from there is beyond our concern." She spoke with such confidence it surprised me as much as it did anyone else. The silence amongst my men and Georgie’s was so loud and telling.
"We will talk business at a later time," I assured him before he nodded and walked toward the front gates. None of us dared move until those gates opened to let him out and then closed again. The only indication that Madison was still breathing was the way her thumb circled my lower back.
Just as the guard at the front of the house gave us the signal that the gates were closed and he was well out of the way, I turned around and stared at everyone.
"Leave," I commanded with a lethal tone. Enzo attempted to talk to me, but I held up my hand. "Now."
I wasn’t fucking around. My men knew it, and as soon as the words came out of my mouth, I turned toward my beautiful wife.
"Get on your knees."