20. Rufino
CHAPTER TWENTY
Rufino
T he world is spinning in and out of darkness while I fight against it. She needs me. She needs me now more than ever. I can’t let them take her.
I promised to keep her safe.
I push myself up onto my arms. Squeezing my eyes shut for a second to force away the fog infecting my head.
Pain shoots down my neck and into my shoulder. My skull is about to explode with pain.
It doesn’t matter.
All that matters is her.
I push myself up onto my haunches and then stand on shaky legs.
Her voice is swimming in and out of my mind.
“Rufino - are you ok - Rufino?” There’s a quiver of tears in her words.
They fuel me, driving me and giving me the strength I need to stand.
When I spin around, I throw another punch at the guy standing closest to me.
He falls to the floor.
“Enough.” Luca screams.
Two men lift their rifles to my head, the barrels pushed against my skull. I freeze and look towards Verity, trapped against another man, his gun against her temple. “No.” I mutter, hopeless to save her.
Luca pushes one man out of his way and stands glaring at me. He’s close enough that I can smell the stale heat of his breath.
“I would have killed you if it were up to me.” He snarls.
“You are going to regret not killing me.” I assure him. “When I come after you and tear your world apart, brick by brick. It’s not too late to walk away now and leave us in peace.”
He laughs.
“Are you fucking stupid? Look how easy it was to get to you. Your own family gave you up.”
“What?” I stammer.
“How the fuck do you think I found you?” he laughs.
“My brothers?—”
“You didn’t know your car had tracking installed on it, did you? A second device linked to their security systems, not yours.”
I shake my head. No, this can’t be happening.
“Masaccio was more than happy to give me the location, but he made me promise to leave you alive. And - I am a man of my word. But you are testing my patience, Rufino Vece, and if I have to go back to your brother and tell him there was an accident and one gun went off - well?—”
“Dad.” Verity sobs. “I’ll come with you. I won’t fight. Please leave him alone.”
Luca spins towards his daughter. “You are disgusting, Verity. I am ashamed of you. Ashamed to call you my own.” He hisses into her face. She winces away from him and the man holding her prisoner tightens his grip around her throat.
My insides are like liquid. Lava, thick and hot, burning away everything inside me. The pain of betrayal, confusing my family being willing to throw me to the wolves like this - the anger.
“Let’s go.” Luca demands and one at a time I watch his men leave, and I watch Verity being dragged away from me.
She doesn’t fight.
She gets into the back of the car without even trying to push them away.
I know she has to. I know she has no choice.
But what cuts me deep in my heart is that she doesn’t even look back - not once.
Listening to the sound of their engines starting and the tires crunching against old dry gravel as one by one they drive away from the motel - it’s pure torture. I stand frozen for a long time, aching in every inch of my body, my heart shattered and my soul sinking fast.
I don’t know how long I am lost in my anger for, but when I snap out of it the sun is gone. The night sky is dark, pierced with sharp points of light where millions of stars shine like bullets in the blackness.
I look down at my fists, bleeding, the skin torn off my knuckles. Then I look around the motel room.
I trashed it.
I don’t remember doing it.
The bed rests on its side against the wall, and the lamps are shattered. The small wooden table and chair from the corner are lying in broken pieces near the bathroom door. The windows are glittering shards of glass, patterned across the old worn carpet.
My breath is heavy. My chest is tight.
I blacked out and let my rage loose on this room.
Clenching my fists I let out a gut wrenching scream.
There is no time for this. I should chase after her already.
I grab my things, toss them into the backseat of my car and floor the gas back towards the city.
“I’m coming for you, little vixen.” My voice is a low growl in the chilly night air.
I drive with a single focus.
To find her.
But where do I start? And how can I do this alone? Because my brothers have clarified that they have no intention of helping me. In fact, they would rather help her father - our enemy - instead of helping their own brother.
This marks another moment of truth. Their wordless confession of their disloyalty to me. Their belief that I don’t belong with them.
Fuck them all.
Every single one of them can burn in hell for all I care.
Verity is my universe, my everything.
Tears fall from my eyes, rolling silent and deadly down my cheeks. I brush them away with anger in my heart. I’ve never cried in my life. But I’ve also never lost something this important to me.
I drive without stopping until I reach my penthouse in the city. I need to get online and start trying to figure out where Luca would have taken his daughter for safe keeping. He’s not a stupid man. Yes, his conceit is impossible to ignore. Cold and cruel, yes. But not stupid. Knowing I’m coming for him, he will be prepared.
The penthouse is empty, dark and uninviting. I am so used to having Verity by my side, close, in the next room. Even when we are fighting, I still had the comfort of her being near to me. Maybe I should have gone to my mansion where I might still smell her on the bedsheets. There would be remnants of her lying around. A hint. A warmth in the air.
There is nothing here.
With a pounding headache pulsing from the back of my skull I sit down at my computer and open the security app.
My phone rings.
Masaccio.
I pull the green button across the screen I set the phone to speaker and leave it lying on the desk.
“Rufino, my brother, I see you’ve just got back to the city.” He says.
My jaw clenches the pain of it vies with the pain of the headache.
“Rufino - we had to do it.” He tries to reason with me.
“Fuck you, Masaccio.” I snarl.
“You need to understand. You were asking us to risk everyone over one girl.”
“Not just any girl. My girl. My wife.”
“Be reasonable, Red. Come on, man. This is ludicrous. The safety of your own family?—”
“I have no family. I only have her.”
“For fuck’s sake.” He mutters. “You’re a fucking idiot. We did what was best for everyone - including you. You were on the run. You can’t live like that.”
“This conversation is over, Masaccio. Don’t call me again.”
“What are you going to do?” he shouts, trying to continue the conversation before I hang up.
“Whatever it takes. Whatever I have to do to get her back.”
“Leave it alone?—”
I click the red button to end the call and stare at the phone for a moment.
Whatever it takes.
I only realize I haven’t eaten or slept when I get dizzy with exhaustion and hunger.
It’s been almost thirty-six hours since I last saw Verity. Thirty-six hours and I’ve found nothing that might lead me to her.
But I’m no good to anyone in this state. I must sleep so that I can clear my head and start again in a few hours.
I push away from my desk and in a fit of rage I almost smash my laptop.
“Where the fuck is she?” I scream and it echoes through the penthouse.
Staggering, I walk to my bedroom and collapse onto the bed.
Dark visions haunt my dreams, intensifying my anger.
Masaccio is standing over Verity, smirking. The gun in his hand catches the light when he lifts it and points it at her head. She’s on the floor, her legs folded to the side. She lifts her hands up over her face and cries out in fear.
I try to run towards her, but my feet at sinking in thick black liquid. An oily, unforgiving syrup that is creeping up my legs. “Verity.” I scream.
They are moving further away from me. Masaccio turns to look at me and his eyes are empty socks. Black holes of nothingness.
“For the family.” He says, his voice robotic and his movements stiff.
His finger squeezes against the trigger and a sharp snap pulses through the air when the bullet fires from the gun.
Time moves slower. I can see the air moving, leaving a spinning trail behind the tail of the bullet as it arches towards her skull.
“Verity.” I scream again but now I’m underwater.
When I open my mouth, the liquid pours into my lungs and I can’t breathe.
I’m drowning. Kicking against nothing. The surface is so far above me I will never make it in time.
I reach up, towards the piercing rays of light stabbing into the dark blue endlessness around me.
Shadows swim beneath me.
I can’t see her anywhere.
I can’t escape.
“ V erity.” Her name falls from my lips and I find myself in my bed, sitting upright, sweat pooling off me.
My legs tangle in the blankets, and my pillow is soaked through with perspiration and dried blood.
I rub my eyes I try to push the nightmare away.
Masaccio’s empty eyes are clear in my mind.
Kicking the blankets away I look at the time. Three hours. I slept for three hours. It’s too long.
Anything could have happened to her during that time and I wasted it.
Shower. Eat. I have to keep moving.
The ice cold water hits my skin and makes every muscle in my body tense up. It pulls me awake though. That’s all I need.
Blood washes away from the wound on my skull, running in dark red streams over my naked skin, down onto the stark white tiles of the shower floor. It swirls and pools and then slips away, down the drain.
I stand under the cold flow until the water runs clear and my thoughts are less chaotic.
With a towel wrapped around my waist I rummage through the kitchen cupboards looking for something to eat. Frozen meals in the freezer, a packet of chips in the cupboard.
I toss a lasagna into the microwave and turn it on while I go upstairs to get dressed.
I need to pull a list of every property her father owns. If I had access to my computers at work, it would be easy. But my brothers would have locked me out. I’ll have to get in contact with the hacker.
It’s amazing what you can do when you throw money at a problem.
Dressed, fed and almost human again, I climb into my car and head into town. This is not something I want to do over the phone. I don’t trust anyone. I’ll give him the job face to face.