Chapter 26 Stella
STELLA
I kick the car doors as hard as I can to try to escape.
“Settle down,” one of Lucio’s men barks at me, swatting with his free hand while trying to drive with the other.
My hands and feet have been zip-tied, and I can’t fucking move, but that won’t stop me from trying to free myself.
Lucio is right there in the passenger’s seat, and when I get out of these restraints, I’m going to wrap them around his neck and choke him myself, that bastard.
“You’ve evaded me long enough, Stella,” Lucio tells me. “Do you know what it cost me? I can’t even wield a gun in my good hand anymore, let alone my own damn cock,” he says. “I have to use my left hand now, and it fucking sucks.”
“I don’t fucking care!” I shout back.
He strikes me right in the face, and it makes me gasp in shock.
He hit me. He actually hit me, just like he did back when I was still his fiancée.
I’d almost forgotten what it was like to be mistreated like that.
Almost.
“You should learn to keep your filthy mouth shut when a man is talking.”
Bastard.
“Fuck you,” I spit.
“When we’re home, we will get reacquainted with each other’s bodies, don’t you worry.”
Fuck. Just the thought of him having his way with me just so he can get his hands on my father’s money makes bile rise in my throat, but I won’t allow myself to become a victim a second time.
“Over my dead body,” I yell, kicking away at the car. “Let me go!”
“Yeah, you’d like that, wouldn’t you?” He chuckles. “So you can run back to your shit-faced husband.”
“You will never be even half the man Matteo is, you absolute piece of shit,” I say, and I spit at him.
“That’s it,” Lucio growls, and he grabs something from the glove box.
“What’s that?”
He holds up a needle, and my eyes widen, adrenaline and pure panic flooding my veins.
“It won’t hurt.” Lucio smiles. “Maybe just a little.”
“No, no, no!” I shriek, louder each time as he lowers the syringe toward my body.
My breathing falters as my lungs constrict, just as they did way back when.
Not now, please, I can’t have a panic attack now.
I roll around the car, trying to evade Lucio, but eventually he grabs my thigh and shoves the needle right into my skin.
“NO!”
Fuck. He’s got me.
I don’t know what in there or what it’s going to do to me. Within seconds, my body heats up, as my eyes grow weary and my heart rate slows. The world begins to spin, and slowly, the light is overtaken by darkness.
Lucio grins. “Sleep tight, bitch.”
When I wake up again, my head is roaring, the headache so harsh that for one second I doubt if I’m actually still alive.
What kind of drugs did he give me?
My eyes slowly open so I can inspect my surroundings, while I make an effort not to groan so no one hears I’m awake. I don’t know where Lucio has taken me, and I don’t know if it’s even safe for me to be awake.
Beneath me, the thing I’m lying on dents in.
A bed.
A hand slithers up my waist.
“Finally, I have you back again.”
The hand slowly slides down my thigh.
“I should’ve drugged you much sooner. This is far easier if you’re not aware enough to protest.”
His hand slips down lower and lower, and I grind my teeth and gather all of the energy I’ve regained before I abruptly turn around and slap him right in the face. “You b-bastard!” I lisp.
My body feels like a limp noodle, but I still manage to swat his hand off my body.
Suddenly, Lucio grabs my throat with his left hand and crawls on top of me, and I gasp for air while staring right into his face as he crushes my windpipe.
“You should’ve apologized and begged for forgiveness when you had the chance,” he growls. “Do you know what your stunt fucking cost me?”
He holds his right hand in front of my face, showing the remaining stumps after Matteo cut everything off, most of it still in bandages. “Everything!” he spits in my face.
I turn my head, not wanting to look at him.
“Yeah, that’s right, you look away, you bitch.”
He slaps me again, but I force the tears to stay at bay while he’s still choking the life out of me, my feet scrunching up against the bed in an effort to fight him off. But the medicine he injected is still coursing through my veins, and I’m not nearly as strong as this wretched man is.
I bring my hands up to his face and poke at his eyeballs to make him stop. “Let. Go. Of. Me.”
He roars in pain when I shove my thumb into his eye, and he jolts up, so I kick him in the balls to get him to back off. Once his fingers unlatch from my throat, I suck in the dry air, my lungs expanding rapidly to oxygenate my body.
I cough and turn around on the bed to take a few more deep breaths while my heart tries to cope with the panic constricting my lungs again, but suddenly he’s on top of me again, squashing my body with his weight.
“You fucking bitch!” He rips at my hair to make my head tilt up until my gaze meets his one open eye.
“Look at me! You won’t ever get out of my grasp.
Your marriage with Matteo will be annulled, and I will remarry you and impregnate your body and make you carry my child.
After I’ve shown the baby to your father and he’s finally given me the money I’m owed, I will drown that kid. ”
I shudder at his cruel words.
“And then I will kill you, and I will take my fucking time.”
“You monster!” I yell.
Suddenly, a loud bang reverberates through the entire house, making the furniture shake, and Lucio stops moving entirely.
Another bang follows, and a ruckus explodes downstairs.
Someone has made their way into his house.
“WHERE IS MY WIFE?”
His voice booms through the hallways, and I shriek as loud as I can, “Matteo, up here!”
Lucio punches me again, and I sink into the mattress. “Keep quiet, and stay here!” he hisses, and he crawls off me to signal his guards outside. However, the moment he opens his door, someone bursts inside, topples the guard over, and slams him to the floor.
I look up to see what’s going on, but I don’t recognize the man even though that scruffy face and those brown eyes look very familiar for some reason. The man shoots the guard point-blank, but another one of Lucio’s guards catches him off guard and throws his arm around his neck, choking him out.
Lucio snatches the gun off the dead guard’s body and aims it at the man who raises his hands.
“Wow, you got me,” he jests.
“How many of you are here?” Lucio growls.
“Too many for you to fight,” the man retorts with a stupid shit-eating grin. “Guess what we’re here for?” His eyes suddenly connect with mine. “Or who?”
Lucio snatches the gun from the guy’s hand. “Take him downstairs,” Lucio barks at his guard.
“Get your fucking hands off me,” the man growls.
I can’t allow him to kill that man. He came here for me, so he must be one of Matteo’s men.
I crawl off the bed, stumbling on my feet because the drugs Lucio injected still haven’t worn off properly. My body is buzzing, and my nerves are on fire, but I’m relentless in my pursuit of justice as I approach the fighting men.
Behind them, more men storm up the staircase, and several shots go off, reverberating through the halls of Lucio’s house.
The De Silvas have come. Screams filter through while Lucio’s men stand off against Matteo’s.
It’s an onslaught of epic proportions. The sight makes me violently ill, but I keep it together so I can make my way to the scene of the crime.
Lucio’s guard hauls the man through the hallway, but is met by several of Matteo’s men blocking his path, and another fight for power ensues.
From the corner of my eye, I spot a small gun lying on the cabinet beside the door, and I lurch over to it to grab it, but Lucio suddenly marches back into the bedroom and shuts the door behind him, locking it to seal us both inside.
“You think that’s going to help you now?”
I clutch the gun tightly, my legs quaking as I step back to try to remain in control of my feeble body, still reeling from the medicine. Everything spins, but I will fucking fight him off with everything I have.
“Matteo is here. You know he’s going to win.”
Lucio laughs. “Bullshit. My men have got him cornered.”
“Lies,” I spit back.
Behind the door, several thumps make me look up, and the voice of the same man who tried to come in to help me can be heard. However, Lucio’s got his gaze fixated on me, and I raise the gun as he approaches.
“You think he’ll kill me because you’re in danger? Wrong. All he’s wanted since his mother died is for me to suffer,” he says through gritted teeth. “And that was his greatest mistake.”
He stalks at me, but it’s the evil glint in his eyes that throws me off the most.
Kill him. Just fucking kill him, and it’ll all be over.
But what about Matteo’s revenge?
Suddenly, the window shatters into a million pieces, and I fall to the floor and cover my face with my hands to stop the glass from hitting me. The gun flings out of my fingers and rolls onto the floor.
Fuck.
“Stella!”
His voice activates my neurons, and my head tilts up to meet his gaze, my eyes glazing over with tears. “Matteo!”