Chapter 33
Hollis
“Can I call you Donnie?”
I smack Nash in the chest, holding my fist up in front of his face to threaten him. His dopey smile tells me he won’t even consider growing up to take care of such a dangerous matter. The man will quite possibly get us all killed.
“Not if you want to live,” the man grumbles, his mic going scratchy as if the thing bumps his cheek when he talks. “Can we get this shit done?”
“Now’s a good a time as any to fucking die,” Nash mutters, his normal happy-go-lucky demeanor suddenly gone. He looks over at me, covering the tiny microphone near his mouth with his right hand. “I still think he’s fucking setting us up with his I’ll take the back bullshit.”
I clench my jaw.
“You can fucking walk away right now, and it wouldn’t make any fucking difference to me,” Donavan growls into the mic.
Nash looks shocked as if he can’t believe the extremely expensive headsets would still work if he covered the little microphone.
“I was umm… just kidding?” Nash laughs, the sound more fake than anything I’ve ever heard.
We’re all going to fucking die tonight. I’m certain of it, especially with these two bickering like old men around the early morning meetup at the local coffee shop.
I’m considering taking his advice and just walking away before I hear Donavan once again.
“I’m thirty seconds from the back guard station. You guys better hurry the fuck up if you’re coming.”
Another round of static and then silence.
“Donavan?” I hiss.
Nash shakes his head. “He pulled his headset off. I bet this is a fucking setup.”
I clench my jaw in irritation but shake my head.
I don’t know the man well, but he needs vengeance as much as I need to protect Madelene.
I may not be able to stop the Severino family from catching her eventually, but I hope I can slow them down, giving them something else to focus on for a while, like burying their dead after tonight.
“I hope I’m fucking wrong,” Nash says as we slowly make our way to the front guard station.
Before I can lift my weapon, Nash puts a single bullet in each guard’s forehead, proving that he’s more skilled than I ever imagined. It proves that his goofy, carefree attitude doesn’t carry over into his work.
I don’t have time to commend him for his accuracy as we approach the front door.
“Fuck,” Nash whispers, his voice louder in my ear due to the mic.
Donavan was coming in through the back, but it’s clear he’s already made it through the house and up the stairs.
“What the he—”
Nash drops the man before he can finish his question and fully enter the room.
“Really?” I growl, looking over at the older man that was once carrying a tray with a glass on it.
“We said kill them all,” Nash grumbles as we approach the man, blood pooling around his head from the bullet Nash put in it.
“An old man?” I hiss, trying to keep my voice down.
Nash, using the tip of his foot, kicks the man’s jacket open.
“We said everyone,” he snaps, pointing at the gun tucked into the man’s slacks.
A door creaking upstairs has us on the move again.
We check the house, and I grow increasingly annoyed with the locked doors around this place. We can’t exactly kick them in. It would draw too much attention to us.
Nash gives me weird-as-fuck hand signals like I speak fucking commando before pointing to a slightly ajar door. I just wave him on. He’s been a badass so far, might as well let him take point. Heaven forbid a child walks out of one of the rooms.
He frowns as he enters the room. “Are you fucking kidding me?”
I take a step further, looking into the room.
“Jesus, Donavan is getting to have all the fun,” Nash complains as we both look at the man leaned back in a leather office chair.
“He’s going to get to Alessio before we even locate them.”
Nash points at Lucian Severino, his eyes open, unseeing, with his head pointed to the ceiling.
“I’m going to be pissed if all I get to kill are a couple guards and the strapped fucking butler.”
I wave him on, knowing we’re heading upstairs next, unsure if we’ll find anything.
Donavan taking his headset off is complicating the shit out of things.
I had plans for how I wanted all of this to go, and the kingpin, the leader of the most dangerous part of the Italian Mafia, being shot in the head without being tortured, without hearing him beg for mercy, wasn’t a part of it at all.
I’m annoyed, irritated so much my skin itches, as Nash and I climb the stairs.
I know better than to think everyone we will encounter has already been killed, but we haven’t heard any gunfire.
The Severino men probably wouldn’t have silencers on their weapons like we do, and we’ve yet to hear a single round pop off.
Our footfalls are soft, the carpet in the hallway and rooms muffling the sound, as we clear room after room upstairs.
The silence is weird. I don’t doubt Donavan has wiped all these men, including Lucian, off the face of the earth, but I don’t hear a damn thing as we approach the last door.
Nash does those hand movements again, pointing and jerking. I frown at him, walking ahead and pushing the last door open.
Cool metal presses to my right temple, a hand reaching out and pulling my weapon from my grip.
Whoever it is has given me more of a chance than Donavan or Nash has given the other men in the house.
I know not to count it as a good thing just yet as I look around the room and see Donavan.
His face is a mask of fury as a man holds a gun to his temple.
“Fuck,” Nash says, handing over his weapon when he sees the one pointed at me.
I don’t know how to feel about it. Nash could easily kill both of these men, but he paused because my life was in danger. My skin crawls with the consideration because I don’t know that’d I’d do the same for either of them if the roles were reversed.
I’m half a breath away from taking my chances and attempting to get the gun away from the Severino man when I hear a feminine whimper.
My head spins when I look to the other side of the room and see Madelene. She’s as gorgeous as ever, her wild hair pinned to the top of her head, tears streaking mascara down her pretty face.
This isn’t how things are supposed to play out. She was left in Texas. Donavan assured me she was safe.
I try to convey to her with a look that we’ll get out of this alive, but I can’t manage to even lie with my eyes right now.
Enraged, I look over at Donavan, his mouth turned down in a scowl, his body vibrating with unused violence. This is in no way a setup, and from the look in his eyes, he had no idea that Alessio had Madelene.
I swallow as the man motions for me to get on my knees.
Nash follows suit a second later.
“Now that everyone is here.”
I look to the left of Mads, feeling pain at the situation tangled with hatred, when my eyes fall on Alessio.
I focus on him because focusing on Madelene makes my brain go haywire. I get that feeling of empowerment, the lie that tells me I’m invincible, that I can protect her against three men, all while being unarmed and in a position of submission.
I also don’t want Alessio to sense the connection I feel to her. It will only make things worse for all of us, considering what she said about Alessio’s obsession with owning her, taking every chance he gets to remind her who she’s vowed to.
Maybe if I were closer, more connected to both Nash and Donavan, we could make a plan with simple glances, but I couldn’t figure out Nash’s train of thought looking directly at him, aided by hand signals.
One guard stands between Nash and me, a gun pointed at each of our heads, and Donavan is in no better a position with one man drawn down on him.
Alessio twists a knife in his hand, the tip digging into his finger and drawing a bead of blood, but the pain doesn’t even register on his face.
It’s the only weapon I see, making it obvious that Alessio has full faith in his men. He knows they will protect him.
“This knife, junior, is the same one I used to peel pieces off Ellie Baker.”
I stiffen. He called me the same thing my mom and brother always called me. I tremble with rage, fear for my family sneaking up on me. It means he knows not only who I am, but is very aware of the only other people, besides the woman sitting beside him that matter to me.
I kept my distance all this time because my mother demanded it, but a side benefit of that is they were safe from all the bad things that touch me in my world. I was certain they’d never be used against me.
My throat threatens to clog with the fear trying to take over, but I push it down, my body growing so stiff an ache settles in my spine with the effort.
“You seem shocked,” Alessio says. “Did you think I didn’t know about you?
That I don’t know about Connor and your mom?
I had you researched. It didn’t take long.
Hollis Ford isn’t really the greatest cover.
Fifteen minutes of my men working on your alias to find the connection, to figure out what pissed you off so bad that you’d kill my brother and start a war, was all it took. ”
I don’t say a word. The man doesn’t need confirmation. He seems more than a little informed.
I look back to Mads, wondering how much information she gave him, and how much effort it took to pull it out of her. My hope would be she talked before he had to cause her any harm. I’d never want her to suffer to defend me. She’s not supposed to be the protector. I am, and I’ve failed her.
Her tears are a constant stream down her face, and I have to look away from her. It pains me too much to see her so broken, both of us so close to our end.
“Seth here,” Alessio says, pointing at the guard with the gun to Donavan’s head. “Got a speeding ticket. Patrick Baker, the shithead cop that pulled him over was kind of an asshole.”
My blood runs cold. The reasoning Patrick tried to convince the district attorney’s office can’t possibly be the reason, but Alessio confirms it is.
“He needed to be taught that discretion is best used when anyone connected to the Severino family is concerned,” Alessio continues.
“I let Seth fuck her first. She screamed for her daddy when he stuck his cock in her. She begged for mercy when I took her ass. She was silent by the time the fifth guard got a hold of her.”
“That was a great night, boss,” Seth says, making my stomach turn.
“I can still hear her screams, the whimpering and whining. Even after all this time. I guess it’s true,” Alessio says, stepping closer to Mads and running the tip of his blade across her shoulder.
I can’t tell if he cut her or if the tiny red stain now marking her skin was from the wound on his own hand. “You never forget your first.”
He takes a step away, but his proximity is still too fucking close to her.
“Maybe I’ll test that,” he says, looking at her. “How do you feel about doing the honor with lover boy over there?”
“Alessio, please,” Mads begs, but it’s not in a way that she’s asking for the opportunity. She looks like she’s seconds away from puking.
“Oh sweetheart. I’ll let you kill Elio over there also,” Alessio says. “But honestly, he’s been one foot out of the grave since Marcello had fun with his girl.”
Donavan stiffens which is a feat, considering how rigid the man already was.
“Do it,” Seth says, moving his finger from the side of his handgun to the trigger when Donavan clenches his fists. “I fucking dare you.”
Alessio chuckles when Donavan remains still.
“He won’t risk it,” Alessio tells Seth. “You remember how much he cried, not saying a word, the night we watched Marcello cut his unborn baby from that bitch’s stomach?”
Madelene gasps, her eyes darting to her brother. She didn’t have a clue about an unborn baby. I have to presume he’s referring to Maya who she believed was Marcello’s first kill. But for a man to be able to do that, he had to have had prior experience.
“The way—”
Alessio’s words halt at the sound of gunfire.