36. Are you hurt?
MICHELA
36
One minute, I’m sipping a virgin pi?a colada with Daisy in the VIP room, and the next minute, I’m hiding behind the couch so I don’t catch a stray bullet from whoever is shooting up the club.
Dom, the son of Domenico Benvenuti, somehow recognized me as Corrado’s wife almost the moment we walked into the club and offered us the VIP treatment. Daisy and I have been hanging out in the VIP room, having a great time. I danced. She flirted with Dom.
Win-win.
Until now.
Dom rounds the couch and grabs my hand, starts pulling me toward the back. Pacho and the other three men in my security detail are shooting up the VIP door, trying to get in, and the last thing I see before Dom drags me out back is Pacho tumbling down the stairs.
We run down a narrow hallway. The neon lights flicker on and off. Dom’s men from the VIP room run behind us, shouting and shooting at someone. The gunshots, the shouting, the flickering lights, and the speed at which Dom’s moving and dragging me along all feel as if it’s happening to someone else.
“Daisy,” I hear myself saying.
Dom rushes down the steps, and I try to keep up, but slip and barely manage to catch myself before falling. One of my heels breaks, and I tug at Dom’s hand for him to stop. He doesn’t. Thankfully, my shoe comes off on its own, and the other follows, so I’m running barefoot across the parking lot, following Dom, who’s begun to sprint.
Again, I’m grateful for inheriting long legs; otherwise, I doubt I’d be able to keep up.
We reach a black SUV with tinted windows. Dom opens the door, grabs my arm, and forces me into the passenger seat. “Get in.”
I sit, expecting him to slam the door closed. Instead, I hear several muffled popping sounds. Something thuds on the ground. I look down and catch sight of Dom’s twitching feet on the concrete.
I hold my breath.
The flight, fright, or freeze response? Yeah, I’m frozen, holding my breath, awaiting my doom, thinking I’ll share Dom’s fate and bleed out in the parking lot. For a moment, I wonder how long it’ll be before my mom asks about me and they tell her I’ve died. Gordon will be devastated.
He’ll wither in that prison, knowing he couldn’t save me, that it was all for nothing.
Corrado will avenge me, though. I’m certain of it. Probably with dynamite. He’ll level the place to the ground. I find solace in that.
Dom’s men catch up and stop in front of the car, guns drawn and pointing at me. I bend and cover my head, whimpering, praying for it all to end swiftly. It does end, and the quiet comes.
I lift my head.
Beside me is Corrado under the cover of a ball cap. He’s carrying my shoes in one hand and his golden gun in the other. He smells of gunpowder and rage, his nostrils flaring, his chest heaving.
Saying nothing, he puts my heels in my lap, then slams the passenger door closed.
From the other side of the car, he slides into the driver seat and presses someone’s cut-off thumb on a button on the dashboard. The car reads the fingerprint and starts up at the same time that Corrado opens the window and throws the thumb away.
We peel out of the parking lot.
On the street, emergency responders with blaring sirens are rushing in the opposite direction while Corrado drives, his mood deadly and on high alert as he keeps checking the rearview mirror. Once we clear the neighborhood, he uses his hand to push his jaw to the side and crack his neck.
I lean against the seat back and pray for Daisy. I’ll check on her as soon as we get home, seeing as how I left my phone at home, on purpose and not by accident. I was mad at him for interfering with my job. In case Corrado called, I didn’t want to have to answer. But now…
“Corrado,” I start.
He presses his finger over his lips. “Shhh,” he says.
“I only have one question.”
He glares. “The answer is no.”
“No, you didn’t start shooting at the club?”
“With you inside? Most certainly not.”
“But you showed up, so I think you know what happened.”
In confirmation, he nods.
“Is Dom dead?”
Another nod.
“Are you hurt?”
A glance my way. “Yes.”
I turn in my seat and examine his body, but I can’t see anything. “Where?”
“On my side.”
“Is it serious?”
“It depends on how fast I can get where I’m going.”
“Are you bleeding?”
More nodding.
“Oh my God. Let me drive.”
Corrado hits his head on the back of the seat. “No.”
“Please, Corrado, let me drive so you can rest. Are you shot? Stabbed? What’s wrong with you?” When he won’t answer, I shout, “Tell me!”
At my tone, Corrado swerves to the side and hits the brakes. The car practically screams to a stop.
“What’s wrong with me?” He turns in his seat, hazel eyes ablaze. “I come home to find out my wife isn’t home like she told me she would be. Not only that, she left her phone on the couch. That was on purpose, wasn’t it?”
He pauses, then lifts a palm. “Wait, don’t answer that. I know it was. Then, I make a few calls and find out my wife went to a club where I know shit’s about to go down tonight. When I get there, shit’s already going down, and my wife is being used as a shield.”
“Things went crazy. I didn’t mean for it to all go crazy.”
“I understand, but you ditched your security detail.”
I swallow. “They were just outside the door. Besides, I didn’t mean to cause trouble. I just wanted to go out for a night.”
Corrado clenches his jaw. “We need to get out of the city as fast as possible.”
A wave of nausea hits my belly, but before I vomit all over the leather dash and myself, I open the door and bend over. As I throw up, my brain conjures an image of Dom’s twitching feet. His leather shoe had blood on it. His or Corrado’s?
“Here,” Corrado says, offering me a bottle of water after I close the door. “Your adrenaline is wearing off, and it’s near midnight.”
“Way past my bedtime,” I say.
“Way past your bedtime.” A small smile plays on his lips as he drives us away from the city.