Chapter 29
Massimo
My hands are coated in gore. I need to clean up; Evelyn won’t like the sight of blood on me. It upsets her so much, and this time, the blood isn’t my own. I suspect she’ll like that even less.
My delicate little butterfly has a kind heart and a sweet nature.
I won’t disturb her by showing her the darkest parts of my life.
She knows that I’ve killed men to protect her, and she hasn’t turned from me in revulsion.
As long as I don’t show her the bloody evidence, she won’t be upset by what I did tonight.
Adrián, Mateo, and I saved the girl who was put up for auction. Every man complicit in selling her virginity is dead.
She chose to go with Adrián and start a new life in his employ.
I approve of her choice. There’s nothing for her here in this impoverished town. If she allies herself with Adrián, she’ll be safe and might even become powerful in her own right. She will never be a victim again.
I can at least tell that much to Evelyn.
She still seems to harbor na?ve notions about good and evil.
What she witnessed tonight might’ve given her a good dose of reality.
The drug lords that she thinks are so evil worked together to save an innocent young woman.
We killed the men who hurt her and empowered her to make her own choices.
That suits the code I live by. If Evelyn thinks that’s evil, I’m not sure if I’ll ever be able to sway her.
The thought makes me uneasy, so I push it away. She’ll become accustomed to my lifestyle once we make it home to Naples. She’ll settle into my life and become comfortable in my care. I will make her happy.
I enter the mansion quietly, not wanting to draw her attention just yet. I take a few soft steps down the long hallway, and something crunches beneath my shoe. I look down and see the diamonds glittering on the floor.
The house is dark and silent.
“Evelyn!” Her name booms through the cavernous space.
No reply.
“Evelyn!”
I could search the rooms, but I already know she’s gone. Her necklace is on the floor, discarded. Did someone tear it from her neck, or did she take it off?
But if someone else did it, surely, they would’ve taken it with them? The gemstones are valuable, and a thief wouldn’t leave them behind.
I manage to pull my phone out of my pocket with shaking hands and call Stefano.
“Where is she?” I demand as soon as he answers. My voice is barely human.
“Evelyn? I dropped her off safely and then returned to the club to help you and Adrián. But you’d already finished with your fun by the time I got there. She should be at the mansion.”
I stare at the fallen diamonds. They wink up at me, mocking me.
My chest hollows out. Evelyn ran away from me. I left her alone, and at the first opportunity, she fled.
She said she wanted to return to America, but I never thought she’d try to escape from me as though I’m her cruel captor.
“She’s gone.” I choke on the words. “Fuck!”
I barely stop myself from smashing the phone against the wall. I need to stay calm so that I can find her.
And punish her for thinking she could ever leave me.
If she wants me to be her captor, I can be that villain.
She looks at me like I’m her savior, like I’m a good man. And I’ve become addicted to it.
But the truth is that I’m camorrista. I’m a ruthless criminal, just like Stefano and Adrián. She fears them, but she’s never feared me.
At least, I thought she didn’t.
I gnash my teeth like a cornered animal. Whether she fears me or not, Evelyn is mine. She won’t escape me so easily.
“I’ll call Adrián,” Stefano says, calm and lethal. “We’ll find her. She can’t get very far.”
I grunt my thanks and end the call. Pain knifes through my chest with every thundering heartbeat. I breathe through the agony of losing her. One way or another, I will get her back.
And she will learn never to run from me again.
I race out into the street, hunting my prey.
Stefano is right: she can’t have gotten far. The town is small, and surely, she’s too smart to venture into the jungle at night. Evelyn might be headstrong, but she isn’t stupid.
I take a few seconds to decide on my next course of action. I can pursue her on foot. That will be slow, but I can check my surroundings more thoroughly than if I were in a vehicle.
I trust that Stefano will follow through with his promise to call for Adrián’s help. They’ll be out looking for her, too, so being thorough is more important than covering lots of ground quickly.
I take off at a run, making my way past the boundary of the wealthy neighborhood and into the impoverished area of town.
I remember that we passed a military outpost during the drive to the mansion.
The officials are on Adrián’s payroll. If I ask for their assistance, they’ll help me scour the streets for Evelyn.
The concrete block building is just visible at the end of the street, which is illuminated by a single light outside. Otherwise, moonlight guides my path, throwing the hardpacked earth road into sharp relief with the pastel buildings on either side.
A gunshot rings out from the building, accompanied by a distant scream.
My heart stops, but I manage to keep my feet from faltering at the punch of terror. Years of fighting for my life sends adrenaline pumping through my body, granting me lethal focus rather than debilitating me with fear for her.
Maybe it wasn’t her. Maybe…
My name tears the quiet night. The sound of her scream is mostly contained inside the concrete building, but I’m close enough now to recognize the cadence of her voice crying out for me.
I barrel down the street in a burst of nearly inhuman speed. The world falls away around me, my full focus centering on her. She’s seconds away from me. But if someone fires that gun again, I might lose her forever.
I burst into the building, revealing a nightmare. My brain takes in the horrific scene without my body slowing.
Evelyn thrashes on the floor, a man holding her down.
He’s laughing as though he’s having the time of his fucking life.
An older man looms over her, fisting his flaccid cock, preparing to violate her.
There’s a gun on the desk behind him, and the other man has an automatic rifle tossed carelessly beside him—both of them are too distracted by hurting her to think about their weapons.
The knife Adrián gifted to me is in my hand.
I lunge for the one who has her pinned. He’s too close to her, and once I attack, he might grab her and use her as a shield.
He will die first.
I slam into him with my full weight, shoving him off her.
His shocked shout lasts only an instant before morphing into an agonized scream.
My blade slashes his face, bisecting the lips that leered at her.
I catch a flash of teeth and bone before the blood pours from his ruined mouth.
His flailing hands scramble for his rifle, but another harsh slash of my knife nearly severs his wrist. His scream of abject horror ends when I grab his body and lift it in front of my own.
Just as I’d anticipated, bullets rip into his chest. I launch myself at the older man, who’s managed to grab his gun from the desk behind him. I keep the body between us. At this close range, my meat shield won’t hold out long before the bullets tear through and hit my own chest.
I use the body like a battering ram, slamming the dead weight into my enemy. He falls back, losing his balance. The gun clatters to the concrete floor, and the body pins him for a precious second.
I haul the dead man away, discarding the corpse like garbage. The older man is covered in blood, but none of it belongs to him.
I’ll fix that. But before I allow him to die, he will suffer.
He touched her. He intended to rape her.
“She’s mine,” I snarl and plunge my blade into his gut.
He thought he could hurt what’s mine. He thought he could take her from me.
“Did you like her fear?” I wrench the knife free and drive it deep into his belly again. “Did you enjoy her screams?”
I slow my actions, pushing the blade upward. I make him watch as I slice him open from navel to sternum, revealing his shredded guts.
“Who’s screaming now?”
He isn’t capable of releasing another scream. He chokes on blood, the wet sound echoing off the concrete walls. His entire body shudders as death nears. Just before the life leave his eyes, I drive my blade between his legs, severing his flaccid cock. He will never touch her.
His eyes go wide in his final expression of horror, and then his face is utterly still, perpetually frozen in agony.
Both of my enemies are dead.
I have to get Evelyn somewhere safe. There might be other soldiers nearby, and they won’t stop to ask me questions when they see the mess I’ve made of their friends.
I pick up the rifle and sling it over my shoulder, arming myself in case more men come pouring into the building, drawn by the gunshots and screams.
I turn to her, and my stomach drops.
Her dress is torn, and she clutches at the frayed silk in an attempt to cover herself. Blood splatters her pale cheek, and my fear grows black claws, digging into my chest so that each breath is agony.
“Evelyn.” Her name is a garbled exhale.
She might be bleeding. I don’t know what they did to her before I arrived, but I heard her cry out my name in desperate terror. There had been gunfire.
I drop to my knees beside her. A pained whimper like an injured animal slips between her parted lips, and she scrambles back.
Away from me.
Her lovely eyes are wide, her pupils dilated with fear.
I suddenly become aware of the gore that coats my hands and forearms. My face feels tight and sticky. I didn’t want her to see me like this, but that choice was taken from me the moment I heard her scream.
“Farfallina…” I rasp, reaching for her again.
She shakes her head and scoots back, struggling to hold her dress closed and put distance between us at the same time.