Stolen Bride (Vows of Violence #1)

Chapter 1

EMMA

I’m beginning my procession down the aisle of St. Patrick’s Cathedral when I see him.

Leonardo “Leo” Santoro.

I know his face from surveillance photos my father keeps locked in his study—that I’ve seen because Dad’s hiding spots are too easy—and from whispered warnings about the Santoro boss who’s cold as ice and twice as deadly.

He’s standing in the back of the church, watching me with dark eyes as I pass by him and walk down the aisle, my steps faltering.

My hand tightens on my father’s arm.

“Keep walking,” Dad murmurs beside me, but his voice has gone tense and his blue eyes narrow as they take in the new threat.

My heart hammers against my ribs as I force myself forward.

The organ music swells, drowning out the whispers starting to ripple through the pews.

Why is Leonardo Santoro at my wedding?

The Santoros weren’t invited.

They’re enemies and have been for five years.

At the altar, Tony Lombardo shifts nervously, sensing something wrong.

Three hundred guests watch me proceed down the aisle in this ridiculous dress made of Italian lace and seed pearls.

I don’t recognize the woman I saw in the mirror an hour ago, all dewy makeup and elaborate updo, looking like some magazine-perfect bride on the happiest day of her life.

“You look absolutely stunning, darling,” my mother had said, adjusting my veil for the twentieth time, her fingers shaking slightly.

Teresa Brennan had been crying on and off since seven this morning, playing the perfect Irish mob matriarch in her champagne silk and pearls.

“It’s every mother’s dream, you know, seeing her daughter get married.”

I wonder if she actually believed that.

If she remembered standing in her own bride’s room twenty-eight years ago, wearing her own expensive dress and feeling just as trapped.

I’m supposed to be Mrs. Tony Lombardo.

Mrs. Antonio Lombardo Jr., to be exact, because even his name feels like a hand-me-down from his father.

The wedding will seal an alliance between the Irish Brennan clan and the New Jersey Lombardo family. Everyone wins.

Except maybe me.

But that’s not how this works.

I’m twenty-four years old and this is my duty.

My father’s word is law.

The Lombardo shipping routes will strengthen our position against the Santoros, and I’m the price of that power.

The bargaining chip.

The diamond necklace at my throat, Tony’s wedding gift, feels like a collar.

Three strands of diamonds that scream “I have money and I want everyone to know it.” We’ve been engaged for four months and I’ve seen him maybe a dozen times.

We’ve kissed exactly three times, each one brief and passionless.

Like checking a box on a to-do list.

Kissing a frog would be much more enjoyable than kissing my fiancé.

I don’t love Tony Lombardo.

I barely know him.

But Emma Brennan does her duty.

Except now Leo Santoro is here, and something is about to go very, very wrong.

I’m ten feet from the altar when the back doors of the cathedral explode open with a sound like thunder.

For one suspended second, everything stops.

The organ music cuts off mid-note.

Every head turns toward the entrance.

Then men flood through the doors.

There are ten, no, maybe fifteen of them, all in black suits with very obvious guns.

My heart sinks as I notice the firearms are pointed at the crowd with clear intent.

Someone screams.

Chaos erupts.

Guests dive from the pews, scrambling for cover.

Women shriek and men shout.

I hear my mother’s voice rising above it all, high and frightened, calling my name.

My father shoves me behind him so hard I stumble, the heavy wedding dress tangling around my legs.

His hand goes to his jacket reaching for his gun.

“Dad,” I start, but he’s not listening.

“Get down!” he roars.

But I don’t. I can’t. I’m frozen, my heart hammering so violently I can feel it in my throat, drowning out everything except the sound of footsteps—steady, unhurried footsteps—walking down the center aisle.

Leo Santoro walks through the chaos like he’s strolling through a garden.

He moves with absolute confidence that borders on arrogance, his men flanking him, and everyone instinctively clears a path.

He’s tall—at least six-three—with dark hair and darker eyes and the kind of face that would be handsome if it wasn’t currently set in an expression of such coldness that it makes my blood run icy.

He’s wearing a black suit, no tie, the top button of his white shirt undone.

There’s something almost casual about it that makes this more terrifying—like he’s so confident he didn’t even bother to dress up.

“Connor Brennan!” Leo’s voice cuts through the screaming, cold and controlled and absolutely lethal. He doesn’t shout, but he doesn’t need to. “I believe you have something that belongs to me.”

My father steps fully in front of me, his gun drawn and pointed at Leo’s chest.

Around the cathedral, I can see his men doing the same, weapons appearing from jacket holsters and ankle straps and God knows where else.

The Lombardos are armed too.

Tony’s father and brothers form a protective line near the altar.

At least thirty guns are now pointed at Leo and his men.

Leo doesn’t even flinch.

“You’ve got about five seconds to turn around and walk out of here before I put a bullet between your eyes,” my father growls. I’ve heard that tone before. It’s the voice he uses right before someone dies.

“I don’t think so.” Leo’s still walking and rapidly closing the distance between us with measured steps, his gaze locked on something—someone—behind my father.

On me, I realize with a jolt of terror.

He’s looking at me. “You took something from me five years ago, Connor. Today I’m returning the favor.”

Five years ago.

My mind races.

Five years ago I was nineteen, in my sophomore year at Sarah Lawrence, worried about finals and boys and all the normal things college girls worry about.

What could have possibly happened five years ago that would lead to this, to Leo Santoro crashing my wedding with an army of gunmen?

Wait. The Santoro underboss.

The one who died in that warehouse dispute.

I was away at school when it happened, insulated from the worst of the family business, but I remember the tension that summer.

The increased security.

The way my father seemed harder somehow, more volatile.

Oh god.

“My daughter has nothing to do with our business,” my father says, and there’s something in his voice I’ve never heard before. Is it…fear? “You walk out of here now, Santoro, and we’ll forget this ever happened.”

Leo laughs, but there’s no humor in it. “Forget? The way you forgot about Gabriel bleeding out on that warehouse floor? Or how about how he was begging for help while you walked away?"

Gabriel. The name echoes in my head.

Why does that sound so familiar?

The pieces fall into place and I nearly sway.

Gabriel. Gabriel Santoro.

Leo Santoro’s brother.

Holy fuck.

“Emma, run.” My father’s voice is urgent now and desperate. “Run, now!”

But before I can escape from a tangle of skirts, Leo closes the remaining distance in three long strides.

His hand shoots out and his fingers close around my wrist like an iron manacle, hard enough to bruise.

Which makes me react immediately and violently.

“Let go of me!” I wrench against his hold, my other hand coming up to slap him. The sound reverberates around the room and I hear my mother cry out. “Get your fucking hands off me!”

If he feels the pain, he doesn’t show it.

His expression doesn’t change at all, those dark eyes locked on mine with an intensity that feels like being pinned by a physical weight.

Up close, I can see his eyes aren’t pure brown—there are flecks of amber in them.

I can see the individual dark hairs of his stubble.

His cologne envelopes me, something masculine with notes of cedar and bergamot.

I can see the absolute determination on his face.

I’m not walking out of this cathedral with my father.

I’m not marrying Tony Lombardo today.

I’m being taken.

“You’re coming with me,” Leo says, deadly calm despite the chaos and the thirty-plus guns pointed at his head.

“Like hell I am!” I twist in his grip, bringing my knee up toward his groin with all the force I can muster.

Leo sidesteps so smoothly it’s like he expected it, his free hand catching my other wrist.

Now he’s got both my hands locked in his grip and he’s so close I can feel the heat radiating off his body.

“Let her go, Santoro!” my father bellows. “I will kill you where you stand!”

Leo shrugs. “Then you’ll have to shoot through your daughter to do it.” He shifts, pulling me against his chest so that I’m positioned between him and my father’s gun, like a human shield.

His arm wraps around my waist, pinning me to him, and despite my struggles I can’t break free.

He’s too strong, his hold too secure, and every time I move he just adjusts his grip and holds me tighter. “I’d rather not kill anyone today, Connor, but I will if I have to. Your choice.”

Gunfire erupts somewhere behind us and its sharp, deafening cracks make my ears ring.

I can’t see what’s happening, but I can hear screaming and my mother’s voice rising above it all, hysterical and terrified.

“Mom!” I scream, trying to crane my neck to see her.

Leo doesn’t give me the chance.

He starts moving, dragging me backward down the aisle toward the doors.

His men form a protective barrier around us, guns raised and ready, and they're moving in perfect synchronization like they’ve rehearsed this a hundred times.

They probably have.

I fight him every step of the way.

I dig my heels in—or try to, but the marble floor is too smooth and my wedding shoes have no traction.

I throw my weight backward, trying to make myself as difficult to move as possible, but Leo just adjusts and keeps walking like I weigh nothing at all.

I scream for my father, for Tony, for anyone who might help.

“Dad! Daddy, please!” My voice cracks on the words. I hate how desperate and frightened I sound, but I can’t help it. “Don’t let him take me!”

“Emma!” My father’s voice is raw with anguish and rage, and out of the corner of my eye I can see him trying to get a clear shot, trying to find an angle that won’t put me in the line of fire.

But Leo keeps me positioned perfectly with his men between us and any potential shooters.

Tony’s still at the altar and I can see him over Dad’s shoulder, frozen with his mouth open and his eyes wide, looking absolutely useless in his tuxedo.

He’s not moving to help me.

He’s not even reaching for a weapon.

He’s just standing there like a statue while his bride is being kidnapped right in front of him.

“Tony!” I scream at him, furious now along with the fear. “Do something!”

But he doesn’t.

He just stares, and in that moment I realize that Tony Lombardo would never have made me happy.

He wouldn’t have protected me or fought for me.

I would have spent the rest of my life married to a man who freezes when things get hard, who stands by while his wife needs help.

At least Leo Santoro has the courage to act, even if what he’s doing is monstrous.

We’re at the doors now, almost outside, and I can feel warm summer air mixing with the incense-scented cool of the cathedral.

I make one last desperate attempt to break free, throwing all my weight to the side and screaming loud enough that my throat burns with it.

Leo’s arm tightens around my waist, hard enough that I can’t breathe properly, and he leans down so his mouth is right next to my ear. His voice is low and cold.

“Stop fighting or I’ll have my men shoot your father. Your choice.”

I go still because I know he means it.

I can hear the truth in his voice, can feel it in the way he’s holding me.

Leo Santoro will kill my father if I don’t cooperate, and he won’t hesitate.

Hell, he wouldn’t feel guilty about it.

He’s already lost his brother to Connor Brennan.

What’s one more body to him?

“Good girl,” he says, and something about the condescension in those two words makes me want to spit in his face.

But I don’t. Because I’m not stupid, and I’m not going to get my father killed just to prove a point about my dignity.

Leo hauls me through the doors and sunlight hits my face, bright and warm and absolutely incongruous with what’s happening.

It’s a beautiful June afternoon, perfect for a wedding, and there are people on the street stopping to stare at the scene unfolding on the cathedral steps.

A bride being dragged down the stairs by a man in black, armed men following behind, screaming and gunfire echoing from inside the church.

Someone’s probably calling 911 right now.

Good.

Maybe the police will stop this before—

A car door opens and I’m shoved inside so hard I fall across the leather seat, my wedding dress tangling around my legs.

Leo slides in beside me before I can scramble back out, his hand still locked around my wrist, and the door slams shut.

The driver, another man in black whose face I can’t see, hits the gas and we lurch forward with enough force to throw me back against the seat.

I scramble to sit up, to turn back and look through the rear windshield.

My father bursts through the cathedral doors, his gray hair glinting in the sunlight.

His face is twisted with rage and horror, his gun raised but useless now that we’re moving.

He’s shouting something I can’t hear through the glass.

The car speeds around a corner and St. Patrick’s Cathedral disappears from view, taking my father and Tony and my mother and my entire life with it.

I turn to face Leo Santoro, who’s sitting beside me looking serene despite the visible handprint on his cheek and having just committed what amounts to an act of war against the Brennan family.

He’s watching me with those dark, intense eyes, waiting to see what I’ll do next.

Terror makes my hands shake and my heart race, and my breath coming in short, sharp gasps.

I’ve been kidnapped on my wedding day by a man who clearly wants revenge against my father.

And yet, beneath it all, something like courage stirs.

Emma Brennan doesn’t give up.

Emma Brennan doesn’t break.

And Leo Santoro is about to learn that the hard way.

“You just made the biggest mistake of your life,” I tell him, my voice shaking but still defiant. “My father is going to kill you for this. He’s going to hunt you down and make you suffer before he puts a bullet in your head.”

Leo’s expression doesn’t change.

If anything, he looks almost amused by my threat.

“He’s welcome to try,” he says calmly. Then he releases my wrist and settles back against the seat like we’re on a pleasant drive through the city instead of fleeing a kidnapping scene. “But in the meantime, my dear, you’re mine.”

The words echo in my mind. You’re mine.

I’m not his.

I’m not anyone’s.

I’m Emma Brennan, and I’m going to find a way out of this nightmare even if I have to tear this car apart with my bare hands to do it.

I just need to figure out how.