Chapter 43
AMELIA
Blade presses the button for the top floor, it takes a while to get going, and the hum of the elevator machinery is the only noise in the space. The walls are lined with sleek, mirrored panels, reflecting my nervous expression back to me from every angle.
I’m not nervous because I’m scared of John, actually quite the opposite—I hate the man. I’m just nervous he’ll say no, then what? I don’t know the extent of the evil my dad possesses in his heart. He’s always shown bits and pieces of his real self, but nothing this extreme. My mom is in real danger, and who knows what he’ll do to her if we don’t stop him? Plus with her mental health issues, she’s vulnerable, and I just want her out of there.
Blade’s hand finds mine, squeezing gently before he lifts it to his lips and presses a kiss to it. The small gesture does wonders to calm my nerves.
“Don’t worry, angel. He’s gonna say yes.” Somehow, he always knows exactly what I’m thinking.
“How do you know? Sometimes he can be a little… jackass-y.”
He smiles, his usual confident, almost cocky grin. I don’t understand how he’s always so calm in these situations. But then again, it’s not his mother on the line. “We kind of have a deal. He has to say yes to me. Anything I want.”
“Wow. Must be nice having a rich, powerful man always having to say yes to you.”
His grip on my hand tightens, his expression hardening. “Stop talking about another man like he’s God or something.” I shake my head to myself as he continues, a hint of a smile returning to his face. “Besides, I’m a rich and powerful man. So you do have one of those who always has to say yes to you.”
“Oh, really now? You always have to say yes to me?”
His eyes sparkle with amusement. “You know you have me wrapped around your little finger and I can’t say no.” He kisses my hand again.
“Hm. Buy me an island then,” I joke.
“White sand or regular sand?” he shoots back, without missing a beat.
I laugh, a real belly laugh and the sound echoes in the enclosed elevator. Blade’s smile widens at the sight of my laughing, but it’s short-lived as the elevator dings and the door slides open.
We move through the hallway, and then into the large frosted glass doors of John’s office. Blade’s hand rests on the small of my back, guiding me to a chair. I notice Cindy in the corner, who I’m guessing will be typing out the conversation again.
John sighs. “What is it that you want now?”
Here comes the jackass-y part.
I open my mouth to explain, but instead, Blade cuts in. “Don’t fucking talk to her like that.”
I smile to myself at his defense. Yeah John, don’t talk to me like that. John sighs again but keeps quiet. I guess John isn’t the one in charge here after all.
Blade starts filling him in. “We’re here because her mother needs to get away from her father again. She needs round-the-clock protection from one of your trained bodyguards, one of your houses that Harvey doesn’t know about, a car, and just give her some random job so she can earn an inco—”
The door swings open and Blade looks behind us. He tenses immediately. I’ve never known anyone who could draw that kind of sudden reaction out of him, except for me and his mom. So it must be—
“Hello,” comes a voice I haven’t heard in years. Jackie stands in the doorway, her presence like a cold wind blowing through the room. Everyone is stiff now.
John’s expression darkens as she comes closer. “What do you want, Jackie? And who the hell let you in?” John snaps, glancing towards the door. The guard who had been posted there is gone. John curses under his breath, slamming his fist on the desk.
I notice Blade’s finger tapping against his leg. I wonder what’s going through his head right now.
“What do I want? I want my life back,” Jackie says, her tone sharp, with a hint of pain behind it. The same pained voice she used when hugging me after we both found out my mother got into an accident. I had been over at her house hanging out with Jacob when we got the call.
Seeing her now hits me harder than I expected. Spending countless hours with her over my childhood, that’s what she represents for me. The time when I could run and play and the real world didn’t settle in yet. The time before my mom left, and my dad was a little nicer.
Jackie’s eyes find mine, and a cryptic smile plays on her lips. “Long time no see. After Jacob left for college, you stopped coming around. I guess I just wasn’t that important to you. My son left town, my best friend was dead, and the person who I thought of as my daughter couldn’t even bother to stop by anymore. Oh, and—” She turns her attention back to John. “My ex-husband had also gotten remarried around that time. How many marriages have you had so far, John? Five? Six?”
I glance between John and Jackie, trying to make sense of what I’m hearing. They were married? They don’t seem like they’d be a good fit, or like they even belong in the same world, let alone together. Then again, any outsider would probably say the same thing about Blade and me, but somehow we work.
John’s face contorts with frustration. “You lost me because of your own actions.”
“Oh, bullshit!” Jackie shouts. Before I can even blink, she pulls a gun from her jacket pocket and points it at Cindy.
What the…
The speed at which everyone ducks for cover makes my head spin, but my attention is focused more on Blade grabbing my arm and yanking me behind him. I’m glad he has fast reflexes because if it were up to me, I’d still be frozen, mouth wide open in the line of fire.
Growing up, always going over to Jackie’s house, I would never in a million years expect her to even know how to use a gun. She was always the sweetest little woman ever. I guess I stopped going over because she reminded me too much of my mother, and seeing her hurt. Especially after Jacob left town and I had to deal with two heartaches.
John crouches behind his desk, his eyes peeking over. “Why the fuck didn’t you check her for weapons? Where is Francesco?!”
The guard is back in his spot, stumbling over his words, flustered. “S-she...”
Jackie smirks. “I promised to suck his dick later if he let me in. It’s easy to seduce your guards, John. You barely leave them time to get laid. But I guess I did you a favor. Imagine if I were one of your real enemies. Now you know who to fire.”
The guard’s finger moves on the trigger of the gun he has pointed at Jackie, eyes squinting.
“Stand down,” John yells to him. “We don’t want any accidents or rouge bullets.”
Meanwhile, Cindy has been frozen in place this whole time, arms up, eyes popping out of her head. John didn’t even attempt to protect or cover her, just himself.
“I could’ve had everything! But no, John had to go and leave me for you, you whore !” Jackie screams at Cindy, the gun waving around as venom leaves her mouth. “I spent years being the perfect housewife, raising his son that wasn’t even mine.”
“Jackie, let’s put the gun down. Maybe we can work this out with a check,” John says, trying to reason with her.
“You think I want money?!” Jackie shrieks. “My son is dead! Our son is dead! All the times you came home late and they both came up running to your legs, and you don’t care that they’re gone? He was all I had left!” Her voice cracks, but her eyes never leave Cindy, and neither does the gun. “So I will take the only person you have left. I already took Noah. Now it’s just this bitch left.”
Now I understand why John was hesitant all those months back to claim Frankie as his daughter. In this world they’ve built, when someone wants to hurt you, they go after your loved ones.
Cindy gasps.
“That’s right, bitch. I’m the one who put a hit out with my buddy Alejandro to kill your little boy Noah. Who did John think he was, moving on and having the perfect little happy family? John knew it. Which is why he was going to torture Aiden until he killed him. Except he didn’t kill him.” Her attention moves to John. “Why’s that, John? Why didn’t you kill him?”
I can feel Blade’s slight tremor beneath my fingers, so I place my hand on his arm and gently rub it up and down, trying to soothe his tense body.
Cindy shakes her head, tears streaming down her face as she chokes out the words, “No, no, no. My Noah.” Her head drops into her hands, shoulders heaving with each gut-wrenching sob.
This is one of the reasons I’m on the fence about having kids with Blade. I do want them, at least two, ever since I was younger. But what kind of life would I be bringing them into? A life of crime, a life where someone could hurt them for revenge, a life getting a call one day that their father isn’t coming home?
“What do you want? Besides to kill Cindy. Whatever you want, I’ll give you. So we can get this over and done with,” John pleads.
“I want her out of the picture.” Jackie nods her head at Cindy. “And I want things back to what they were before with us. And a new son, even if we have to adopt. Aiden can move in too. It’ll be like old times, but better.” She smiles, and in a sick and twisted way, my heart breaks for her. She’s trapped in the past, desperate to fill the void left by her sons being gone.
“Jackie, stop being ridiculous,” John hisses.
“Ridiculous? Ridiculous ?!” Jackie’s eyes glint with wild intensity as if she’s teetering on the edge of madness. She lifts the gun and fires at the wall. The deafening crack of the gunshot reverberates through the room, and Cindy screams.
John, maintaining a calm exterior, stands up and begins to walk towards her slowly. “Give me the gun. C’mon, Jackie.” He holds out his hand as he stands in front of her.
Blade tilts his head ever so slightly—so subtle that I almost miss it—but it’s directed at the guard, who acknowledges it with a curt nod. So I can’t be imagining. Another silent exchange passes between them as Blade makes a quick hand gesture. The guard narrows his eyes, and without hesitation, pulls the trigger.
The gunshot rings out, deafening and quick. The bullet slices through the air before it rips through Jackie and John. There’s no time for anyone to react. It pierces their chests before embedding itself in the wall behind them. They collapse to the floor in unison, lifeless and crumpling like discarded puppets.
My eyes widen and my mind goes into overdrive as I cover my mouth with my hands. Am I reading this wrong? Or did Blade just tell that guard to… to kill them ? His own mother?
“Fuck,” Blade mutters, striding towards the fallen bodies. But as soon as he gets close, the guard turns his weapon on him and fires. The shot echoes in the room, amplifying my pulse beating in my ears as the bullet strikes Blade and sends him staggering back.
“No!” I scream, my heart feeling like it’s been ripped out of my chest and stomped on the curb.
A flood of memories crashes through me—our moments together, every stolen kiss, every touch, every sweet word. A painful sensation twists in my chest and my legs turn to jelly, barely able to keep me upright anymore. “No, no, no,” I whisper, the words slipping out in a broken, trembling voice that’s thick with pain. In the blink of an eye, I’m beside him, collapsing to my knees as hot tears spill down my cheeks.
“Please, please. I love you. I’ve never said it out loud before, but I love you,” I sob. My words are barely coherent.
He has a smile on his face. He just got shot yet he has the nerve to have a smile on his stupidly beautiful face. “Say it again.”
“I love you.”
“I love—” Before he can get the words out, his eyes get heavy and slowly close. A cold dread settles over me.
“No. No. No.”
Cindy has been wailing uncontrollably, her cries filled with raw anguish. Between sobs, she stammers, “I-I’ll go get help! There’s an at-home doctor who lives here, I’ll call an ambulance too.” She books it out of the room. As she disappears, I glance around and realize the guard who shot everyone is nowhere to be seen.
I place my head on Blade’s chest, listening to the faint rhythm of his heartbeat as I sob. I take his hand and place it over my torso, curling beside him just like he’s holding me. It’s the only thing stopping me from breaking down completely.