12. SCARLET
I've never held a gun before. It's shockingly comforting in a strange way.
The metal is cold in my hand, and the grip panel is rough to ensure it won't slip through my sweaty hands.
And they are sweating. I'm nervous as hell.
Not only because of the gun, but because Antonio is standing so close to me.
Close enough that I can feel his warm breath caressing my neck.
Caressing? You've read too many smut novels , I call myself out.
He's only breathing, like people do. Caressing .
A snort reverberates through my head. Did I just snort at myself?
The gun isn't as heavy as I thought it would be; it’s astonishingly easy to pull the trigger, and the light click that follows is like a letdown.
Antonio must be reading the disappointment on my face, because he surprises me once again with his caring, "What's wrong?"
"I thought you were going to show me something that would make me feel better," I admit, biting my lower lip.
"Ah, passerotta, we're just warming up to it."
I don't know why he's calling me a little sparrow, but I like the way he says it. His voice is already deep, but when he speaks Italian, it adds a musical note to it that makes me crave more.
With a grin, he ejects the magazine and opens another drawer, extracting a new one.
It takes me a second to realize that this one is loaded with bullets.
It should scare me the way he handles his gun, a loaded gun.
But it doesn't. It fascinates me. His strong, practiced fingers work nimbly, and it’s fucking sexy when he slaps the magazine in with a louder and more satisfying click than I got from pulling the trigger.
"Now, I think this will make you feel better.
" Not letting go of the gun, he carries me over to the other side, which is divided by cubicles like you see on police shows on TV.
He puts me on my feet. Standing behind me, he aligns the gun in my hands again.
I feel his breath by my ear, and something hard, something I know is not a gun, pokes my back.
Everything about this situation should be off-putting.
I remind myself he is a mafia boss, but the more I do that, the more it excites me.
I don't see Antonio the mafia boss, I see Antonio the man. Which is scaring the hell out of me.
"This time, you will feel a kickback when you pull the trigger. Don't worry. I've got you."
I'm not worried, I'm turned on beyond belief, and I'm curious. Holding this gun is making me feel more powerful than I ever have in my life.
The wall across from us is several hundred feet away, and markers on the right and left indicate the distance. Antonio brings a paper target forward with the touch of a button until it's ten feet away. He reminds me to align my front and back sight and to pull the trigger whenever I'm ready.
I've never handled a gun before. I've seen them, of course.
I'm a judge’s daughter, and many cops have been around our house, but I've also seen the damage guns can do in the reports my dad brings home.
I've never had an opinion for or against them, but now that I'm holding one, I see the allure.
Even more so, when I pull the trigger and the gun bucks in my hand, surprising me, but Antonio's hands on my arms keep me steady.
Ahead of us, the paper target flutters. I hit it! I didn't hit the black painted form on it, but I hit the paper.
"Good," Antonio praises.
I look at him, certain I'm beaming, because my entire body seems to be on fire. "Can I do it again?"
"I would be disappointed if you didn't." He grins back.
We align ourselves, and I fire off another shot.
"Good, now it's all you." Antonio steps away from me. He's still close, but not right behind me, and that feels… disappointing.
But the lure of shooting is greater. I empty the entire magazine into the paper target, and wordlessly, Antonio hands me another and shows me how to reload.
I thought hearing the click when he pushed the magazine in was satisfying, but doing it myself is a whole other level.
I feel like a total badass. Like one of those heroines on TV.
Antonio brings in the paper target and shows me that I hit it eight times.
"The mags hold fifteen rounds, so you did pretty well for your first time shooting," he praises.
He doesn't understand me; I don't do very well . It's a hundred percent or nothing. He inserts a new sheet and moves it back.
"Imagine it's one of the men who took you," he whispers.
His words have the desired effect. I make sure I aim each time before I pull the trigger.
My arms hurt by the time I shoot the fifteen rounds, but when Antonio brings the sheet in and I count fifteen rounds, one even in the center where the heart would be, a feeling of accomplishment rushes through me.
"Thank you," I say, meaning it.
"You're a natural. Tomorrow we'll try a greater distance." He takes the gun and puts it down before he picks me up to carry me back to his bedroom.
When I'm in his arms, I realize two things. One, my legs are rubber and my arms are screaming at me, and two, I was holding a gun—a loaded gun—and I didn’t turn it on him.
It never even crossed my mind. Even now, as I'm thinking it, I'm not slapping myself in the head that I didn’t, and that confuses the hell out of me.
I could have been free. I could have been running home, right now—well, probably not running—I could have called my dad to come get me.
He would have figured out where I was. What scares me is the realization that, as much as I want Hank, Marco, and the accountant guy dead, I don't want Antonio dead.
I imagined those three men on the target when I shot at it, and it felt so, so good.
But not once was it Antonio, despite him being just as guilty of holding me against my will.
Despite my being sure that he would hurt me if my dad misbehaved .
Would he, though ? I'm not sure if that is a serious question from my mind or just wishful thinking.
I only know that over the course of the day, I've come to see a side of the mafia man I didn't expect to see.
He seems to sincerely care about my emotions and well-being, which confuses me on so many levels.