Chapter 37
CHAPTER 37
T akeshi
“When I get my hands on our wife?—”
“Keishi, don’t make promises you can’t keep. You’ll take one look at her and fold.”
I glance at the camera above our heads. We’re in the same spot we spoke to Lakeshia minutes ago.
Shinji rips through the cake masquerading as a false bottom for the box of cookies Lakeshia brought us. “How much time do you think we wasted pretending her ploy worked?”
“Too much fucking time. If not for Katsuo’s warning not to eat anything, we’d be knocked out for a long time. At least the mouthful we had didn’t do what she intended.”
Shinji piles a half dozen shurikens and handleless knives on the floor. “Katsuo for the win.” He holds up a lock pick with a triumphant grin.
“Let’s go. Before those assholes…” I stop, unable to repeat the filth Tomasso threatened.
Shinji rises with a wince, his injuries slowing his reaction time.
“When we’re on the other side of this, I’m spoiling everybody with a vacation.” I knock the camera askew, pointing it away from the door.
“Looking forward to it.” Shinji unlocks the door and peeks through the gap. “Way’s clear.”
I hand him half the weapons and take the lead.
Raucous voices lead us to a former break room. Seven men in various states of undress, some with beer bottles in hand, some with guns, joke, but their subject matter has me seeing red.
“Did you see the piece they’re holding?”
“Yeah, I rarely do fat bitches, but there’s something about her.”
“After the boss and his shadow finish with her, it’s our turn.” A man with slick-backed hair grabs his crotch. “We’ll show her what real men are working with.”
I’ve heard enough. I hurl a blade, lodging it in the man’s throat.
One.
Before anyone registers what’s happening, Shinji and I rush into the room. I dodge a swing directed at my head, capture the arm, and snap it at an unnatural angle until the bone breaks through the skin. He screams in pain, and I shove the splintered bone through his throat.
Two.
A flying dart whizzes by my ear to stab a man in the middle of his head. He falls forward with a thud.
Three.
One by one, Shinji and I take out each man, ignoring the pain in our sides and limbs. The last body falls at Shinji’s feet.
Seven.
Other than confiscating our blades and the dead men’s weapons, we don’t waste time dwelling over their deaths. Their bad intentions guaranteed they wouldn’t breathe again. We quickly search the back rooms, eliminating the enemy as they appear. Once we clear the back rooms of the rundown mattress store, we creep toward the showroom floor.
“And to keep my promise,” Paul’s smug voice grates in my ears before I see him.
Shinji and I speed up while ducking low and out of sight.
“About your open casket, I’ll still honor your request, but not without making you regret living.”
Paul must be mistaken. Lakeisha would never willingly negotiate her death with him while Shinji and I draw breath.
I glance at my husband’s stricken eyes, and recall her farewell. As if an open casket funeral could ever make losing her bearable.
Paul’s smarmy voice reflects a level of sadistic enjoyment as he torments my wife. “In your last moments, I’ll make you ride my gun. I think your bullet-ridden womb will be a wonderful gift, forever memorialized on camera for that asshole family.”
A tall, muscular man blocks my view. Shinji aims while I continue my approach. Lakeshia’s silence reminds me of her catatonic response to Paul. All her training means shit when his presence transports her into a defenseless kitten.
The big man falls, clearing our view. Tomasso’s body lies on top of Lakeshia.
“Why are you loose?” Paul’s panicked gaze bounces between me, Shinji, and the bed where Lakeshia hasn’t budged. “We have a deal. You aren’t supposed to retaliate.”
“We didn’t agree to shit,” Shinji says and shoots at the gun in Paul’s hands.
He drops it and turns to run.
“Not happening asshole.” I throw two stars, taking out his knees.
He drops to the floor. In fear, he crawls toward a door I failed to notice earlier, dragging a trail of blood behind him while groaning in pain. “Fucking bastards. I’ll kill every last one of you,” he weeps.
I’m not pressed to go after him. At his speed, I won’t have to run to catch up when I’m ready for him.
“Lakeshia? Can you hear me?” Shinji runs toward the bed where there’s still no movement from her or Tomasso.
Shinji shoves Tomasso off our wife. Blood covers her face, but we can’t tell if it belongs to her.
He cradles her head while wiping her forehead and cheeks, smearing the gore across her skin. She stares in the distance with no recognition, not dissimilar from Tomasso’s gaze with one exception. A spark of life remains in Lakeshia’s eyes. Thanks to the gash in Tomasso’s throat and the blade sticking out, the head of the Giametti family is no longer a threat to anyone.
Before Paul slinks through the exit, Katsuo strolls in followed by his men rushing through the entry to flank him.
“Is this him?” Katsuo sneers down at the bleeding man.
“Yes. I have plans for him and need him alive.” I return my attention to my wife and husband. We wrap the sheet around her body and help her from the bed.
“We had a deal,” Paul repeats his earlier complaint.
“The deal was when you delivered my family to me. You failed on your end before I took the initiative.” My cousin eyes Lakeshia then Tomasso, dismissing the one responsible for my wife’s trauma. “Who’s responsible for him?”
“Lakeshia,” Shinji says, a mixture of pride and worry coloring his voice.
Katsuo nods and peers around the room. Something snags his attention and I follow his stare to the camera. “Burn everything to the ground,” he tells his men.
While Shinji and I usher Lakeshia out of the building, two people drag Paul by his arms. We pass by countless dead bodies Katsuo must have dealt with while we rushed to Lakeshia’s rescue.
Shinji settles our wife in the back of a Kimura ride and I join on her other side. I take her hand, squeezing it while whispering reassuring nonsense in her ear.
The door opens, and Katsuo enters. “Was she?—”
“From Tomasso’s state, I doubt it.” I stop my cousin in case he sparks a memory that drives Lakeshia further inward.
Tomasso wasn’t fully exposed when I flipped him over, which is probably the only reason I’m holding myself together and not taking my rage out on Paul. Lakeshia comes first, and I can’t bear to let her out of my sight.
“I underestimated your wife. If there’s anything I can do to help her, I won’t hesitate.”
“Thanks, cousin.” I resume my positive reinforcement while offering a silent prayer that she hasn’t exhausted her resilience. “Chiisai senshi no megami, I can’t scold you for trying to leave us if you don’t return to your senses. So do us a favor and come back, okay?”
“Takeshi?” she whispers. “You aren’t a dream?” She raises her hand and I bring it to my cheek.
“Only the kind of dream reality is made of.”
Shinji brushes her hair from her face. He peers into her eyes until a small spark of recognition returns.
“Shinji…” she exhales. In the breath is relief and joy. “You’re alive. The plan worked.” She smiles, then her body slackens and she loses consciousness.
“It’s been a week. When are you going to let me out of bed?” Lakeshia’s complaint lacks heat as she cuddles into Shinji’s arms, her fingers stroking his bald pate.
Although he avoids calling attention to how Tomasso butchered his hair, the loss bothers him. He avoided looking at me while I did my best to repair the damage before we decided the shave everything. He clung to me afterward. The hair will regrow, but he didn’t choose what Tomasso’s man did to him. In the meantime, as if by tacit agreement, Lakeshia and I lavish him with praise, reminding him how beautiful, desired, and loved he is.
I shake my head from the brief distraction and remind myself of the long-overdue discussion I need to have with Lakeshia.
“Oh? Are you ready to discuss the shit you tried to pull on us?” I fold my arms and stand over her side of the bed.
She glares at me and pushes away from Shinji. “How about we go in chronological order? The two of you not only plotted behind my back, you were ready to leave the state without a word to me.”
“Katsuo has a big fucking mouth,” Shinji grumbles and pulls at her to resume her previous position, but she waves him off.
“Irrelevant,” I say. “We didn’t drug you and leave you with last words like your death would ever be something we could get over.”
“Or like we could replace your position in our family with some other woman. As if anyone would compare.” Shinji catches her waving hand and pulls her into his arms to nuzzle under her ear until she stops struggling against the affection he needs to give.
Hell, I haven’t gotten over the scare she put us through, and need to dish out some affection, too. I jump into bed and twist her head until she can only see my face. Light flickers in her warm sable eyes, and I’m almost appeased by the progress she’s made since our recent confrontation with her rapist.
Although she complains about us not letting her out of bed, she fails to include the one exception we allow, her intense therapy sessions. She goes every day, and Shinji and I have even joined her in one to learn ways we can support her.
Even so…
I brush her cheek, marveling at how close I came to not being able to do such a simple gesture.
“I was being pragmatic,” she whispers, her eyes tearing up. “I needed to say what I did. You faking being unconscious and eavesdropping on my confession wouldn’t change what I thought I had to do.” She tenderly strokes my beard, and I allow her to soothe me. “Despite what I said, I kept fighting. I had to because I’d vowed to return with you and start the family that put us on this path.”
Shinji tugs her hair to get her attention. “We can wait until we’ve truly put everything behind us. I know I pressured you two into starting a family, but if it’s just the three of us for the rest of our lives, I’ll still be the happiest man on earth.”
Lakeshia’s eyes widen and she extricates herself from between us. She crawls to the end of the bed to kneel facing us. “As sweet as you are for offering to wait, we have less than nine months to prepare.”
Shinji and I lurch forward at the same time.
“You’re…”
“We’re…”
“I found out the day you went missing.” She rubs her stomach.
All the emotions slam into me at once. Fear, joy, exhilaration, awe… even anger.
Shinji’s smile drops as he must have come to the same conclusion as me. “You mean, you walked into that viper’s den knowing you were pregnant? Risking not only your life but that of our child?”
Lakeshia takes a deep breath before meeting our gazes. The absence of the same whiplash of emotions I experienced silences me. “Now’s probably a good time to prepare you for what’s ahead.” She grabs our hands while hers are slightly damp and her grip is tight.
Unease slivers down my spine. One glance at Shinji tells me he feels the same.
“My mom died while having me. She developed a pulmonary embolism and the doctors didn’t catch it because she didn’t have symptoms.”
“Why are you telling us about your mother?” Shinji asks.
“Because I learned that long-term use of birth control puts me at advanced risk. Considering my family history?—”
“No. I’ve heard enough.” I drop her hand and leave the bed. “You are not your mother and this… you preparing us for the worst is bullshit… I’m not having it. You aren’t going to die.”
“Was that why you thought it was okay to make the deal you did with Paul?” A sad note rings through Shinji’s voice. “You thought you would save us future grief if you died before we knew?”
Lakeshia averts her eyes but she can’t hide the steady stream of tears dripping from her chin.
I return to the bed and grab her face. She blinks, taken aback by my fierce frown. “We’re going to fight this together. We know what your mom’s doctors didn’t. So no more of this fatalistic view, you got me? You’re our chiisai senshi no megami. You’re going to harness that stubborn streak that drives me and Shinji crazy with worry and you’re going to show our child what it means to go to battle with your army behind you.”
“Takeshi…”
“Tell me you understand.”
She sniffles and nods. “Yeah, I understand.”
“And you’ll fight?” Shinji asks, his protective instincts roused by our unseen enemy.
She nods again, this time with more determination. “With you two by my side, how can I not?”