Chapter 29 Constantine #2
The table behind him had a group of men and women, and two of the guys lunged for it, trying to tackle Darius from behind.
Gunfire erupted, and every guest at the table was sprayed with bullets. The room screamed, and everyone ducked under their chairs for cover.
“No one is going anywhere,” Darius said calmly.
“So, what’s it going to be?” He pointed at my mother.
“Your mother.” Then he pointed at Aurelia.
“Or your wife. Who should go first, Constantine?” He turned back to me, arms crossed over his chest. “And yes, I’ll stomp on their arms and legs and spine, and we’ll all listen to them scream as every single one of their bones snaps in half before I shove them into an oil drum, just like your asshole brother. ”
My mother couldn’t control her pained gasp, learning the truth in the most graphic way possible. She had to grab on to Aurelia’s hand for balance, like she might fall over.
There was a malicious glint in his eyes like he was enjoying this, like he’d been plotting this since I’d shot him in the head, like he’d purposely lain low and waited until this moment because it would be far more worthwhile. “And I’ll cut out your baby and throw it into the sea—”
“I swear to fucking God—”
“Your wife or your mother. Choose.”
My muscles were flexed with rage-soaked blood, and it would take at least twenty bullets to slow me down. I thought I was angry when my brother died, but this was borderline derangement.
My mother and Aurelia shrank back against the table, and Darius and I continued our standoff.
Then Darius moved toward them. “Then it looks like I’ll choose for you.”
I launched into a sprint, knowing the spray of bullets would kill me, but if I could kill him first, then my mother and Aurelia had a chance to get out of there alive.
A nearby gunman moved in my way, pointing his rifle right into my chest and forcing me back. Then he put the gun to my temple and kicked the backs of my knees until I was forced to the floor, on my knees, the barrel loaded with a magazine pressed right into me.
I felt sweat pour down my face, felt my veins pop until they nearly burst from my flesh. Restrained and helpless, I watched Darius grab my mother by the arm and force her toward the center of the floor.
Medusa continued to growl and then started to bark, mad as hell but still obeying the command I’d issued.
“Darius, name your price. I’ll give you whatever you want. Break my spine and make me your new nightstand—”
He continued to grip my mother by the arm, and he sneered at me. “Not enough money in the world, Constantine—”
It happened so fast, I almost missed it.
My mother pulled out a steak knife that she must have grabbed from the table she’d been backed into and stabbed it right into his neck. Stabbed it so deep that the hilt of the knife almost got lost in his flesh. And then she stabbed him again . . . and again.
Darius stumbled for a moment, unable to process the shock of what had happened.
The gunman turned his rifle toward them, but there was no way to shoot my mother without also shooting Darius because they were so tangled together.
And my mom was still going for it, stabbing him over and over. Her eyes were maniacal, and she looked like a bloodthirsty wolf that finally caught its prey in a blizzard and ripped it to shreds. “You touch my son and think you’ll get away with it, you son of a bitch!”
Darius finally elbowed her hard in the face, and she hit the floor, the knife still lodged in his neck.
He reached for it, and in his insanity, he yanked it out, another squirt of blood spraying like a geyser into the sky.
He dropped to one knee, staring at me with a veil across his gaze, like he was already halfway gone.
That was when Rocco and Cosa Nostra leaped into action. Tommaso and the others fired at the gunmen with their handguns, and Rocco picked up a chair and slammed it down hard onto the gunman who had his rifle against me again.
Rocco knocked him out cold before he took the gun and did exactly as I’d asked and shielded Aurelia with his body before he shoved her under the table. Gunfire erupted throughout the terrace, and people ran for their lives. Cosa Nostra tried to tackle Darius’s men even though they were outnumbered.
I wasn’t taking any chances this time, so I ran to Darius to finish the job.
But right when I got there, Medusa jumped on him—and literally ripped out his throat.
He barely screamed before his windpipe was gone, and he was done. When she pulled away, her white teeth were covered in blood, her fur soaked in it. Even the bow tie that had been white was now bloodred. She growled at his body as if what she’d done wasn’t quite enough.
I went to my mother, who hadn’t moved since she’d hit the floor. “Ma.” Her eyes were closed when I found her, and I gathered her in my arms and sat her up against me.
The movement made her stir, and she sucked in a deep breath and released a gasp.
I felt the back of her head, and my hand came away with blood on it.
She let me support her as she stared at Darius before her, a massacred corpse now.
“Ma, are you okay?”
“Yeah . . . yeah . . . I’m fine.” She suddenly left my arms, crawled across the floor, picked up the knife Darius had yanked out, and started stabbing him in the chest with it—over and over—a mother unleashing a catharsis of grief.
I let her be. She deserved to do whatever the fuck she wanted to his body after what he’d done to Edric.
The gunfire receded, and it seemed as if Rocco and Cosa Nostra had either taken them all out or run them off.
I moved to the table where Rocco had shoved Aurelia and lifted the tablecloth to find her, clearly in shock, judging by how snow white her face was. She trembled from head to toe, and when her eyes found mine, she immediately started to sob.
“Sweetheart, it’s okay.” I pulled her into my arms under the table and clutched her tight. “He’s dead. Everything is okay . . . it’s okay.”
Her hand moved to her stomach like she needed to make sure our baby was all right, that a stray bullet or a knife hadn’t come close.
I felt her hyperventilating against me, afraid not for me or for herself, but for the person we both already loved with our full hearts.
“Everything is okay,” I repeated. “Everything is okay.”
“Your mom?” she asked through her tears.
“She’s fine.” I could hear her continue to stab Darius through the tablecloth.
Then Medusa ducked her snout underneath the white material and lifted it as she came to us, blood all over her face from getting her revenge against Darius for breaking her leg . . . and to protect my mother.
Aurelia didn’t care about the blood at all and brought her into her arms like Medusa was our child, a seventy-pound baby covered in fur. She got blood all over her dress as she snuggled Medusa, sobbing into her fur because she was relieved she was okay.
I’d fucked up again. I’d never gotten the irrefutable evidence that Darius was actually dead, and it had nearly cost me my entire family. “I’m so sorry.” Tears sprang to my eyes when I mourned what I’d almost lost. “I’m so fucking sorry.”