Chapter 30
brONX
Blood.
So much fucking blood.
It’s on my hands, soaking through my shirt, spreading across the floor of this shithole apartment while Tierney collapses against me.
The bastard who stabbed her is already dead. Reign put two bullets in his skull before his body hit the ground.
Cold dread surges from my stomach to my throat as I stare down at her.
Because the damage is done.
She saved my life.
After finding out I was supposed to seduce her. After hearing her entire marriage was built on lies. After telling me she doesn’t give a shit about me and our whole relationship was fake.
She still threw herself between me and that blade.
“Get a fucking ambulance,” I roar, pressing my hands against the wound in her side. The knife went deep. Blood pulses between my fingers as I try to slow the flow.
“Already called,” Kingston says. “ETA is three minutes.”
Tierney’s eyes flutter, trying to focus on my face. Her skin sickly pale, lips losing more color with every passing second.
“Stay with me, princess,” I mutter, applying more pressure to the wound. “Don’t you dare fucking leave me.”
She moves her lips like she’s trying to say something, but her voice is too weak, and I can’t hear her.
“Save your strength,” I say, cupping her face with my free hand.
Her shaking hand finds mine, and for a blink, I think she’s trying to hold on to me. Then she pushes my hand away from her face.
Even bleeding out, she doesn’t want me touching her.
Sirens blare out, the ambulance approaching. The paramedics flood in, and they make me step back while they work on her.
“Sir, are you injured?” one of them asks me.
I shake my head. “It’s not my blood.”
Watching them lift her onto a gurney, seeing how small she looks, fuck, it feels like I just took a blade to the chest myself.
“You need to move away,” another EMT says.
But I follow them downstairs to the ambulance anyway. “I’m her husband.”
The paramedic glances at Tierney, who’s barely conscious. “She’s lost a lot of blood. We need to get her to the hospital now.”
I climb into the ambulance before anyone can stop me.
During the ride, while they’re working to stabilize her, Tierney’s eyes float open. She looks right at me, and my heart sputters. There’s no love there. No trust. No forgiveness.
Just emptiness.
Like I’m a stranger.
“Don’t...” she says in a ragged whisper.
“Don’t what?”
“Don’t... pretend... to care.”
Then she drifts off again, and I’m left staring at the woman I love while machines monitor her failing vital signs.
The woman who just sacrificed herself for a man she thinks has been using her from day one.
FOUR HOURS LATER
I’ve paced this hallway so much over the past few hours that I think my shoes have worn a groove in the linoleum floor. Tierney’s surgeon approaches from the left and my heart leaps up to punch a hole in my throat.
“Mr. Viacava,” he says. “The blade missed your wife’s major organs. She’s extremely lucky. If that blade had entered a few inches to the right, the outcome would have been very different for her.”
The weight of his words crashes down on my chest, suffocating me.
“When can I see her?” I choke out.
“She’s in recovery now. But...” He hesitates and looks around. “She’s been asking that we don’t allow visitors in to see her.”
“But I’m her husband.”
“I understand that. But she’s been very clear about her wishes. We need to honor them.”
The hairs on the back of my neck prickle. “Let me talk to her.”
“Mr. Viacava, please understand. She’s been through significant trauma. Both physical and, from what I understand, emotional. She needs time to process everything.”
Time. Like time is going to fix the fact that she discovered I was supposed to manipulate her into betraying her family. Like time is going to erase the hurt in her eyes. I drag a hand down my face, fucking furious. “How long does she need to recover?”
“Physically? She could be discharged tomorrow if there are no complications. The wound will need care, but it’s not life-threatening.”
Tomorrow. She could leave New York tomorrow.
And knowing Tierney, she will.
“Can you at least tell her I’m here?”
“Sure, I can do that.”
Then he disappears down the hallway, and I’m left pacing like a caged animal. Kingston and Reign are handling cleanup at the apartment.
Connor’s been located and is on his way to the hospital. And I’m stuck out here in limbo while my wife recovers from a stab wound she took to save my worthless life.
It takes everything in me to sit in the waiting room and not punch the fuck out of the closest vending machine.
The fucker who stabbed her deserved more than a bullet to the skull.
Ten minutes later, the surgeon returns. He looks at me, his lips twisted and his forehead creased.
“She said to tell you the debt is paid. Whatever that means.”
The debt is paid.
She saved my life, and now she thinks we’re even. No more obligation. No more living in the same space. No more gym sessions together or rolling over in bed every morning to watch her sleeping beside me.
Fuck.
“Doctor,” I say, clearing my throat. “When she’s discharged, will she be able to travel?”
“Locally, yes. I wouldn’t recommend long flights for at least a week.”
But I know Tierney. A stab wound isn’t going to stop her from getting as far away from me as possible.
“Thanks.”
The surgeon gives me a swift nod and walks in the opposite direction. With a deep sigh, I collapse against the wall, pressing my hands to my temples.
The double doors leading from the waiting room open and Connor runs through, his eyes wide with panic.
“Where is she? Is she okay?” he says, skidding to a stop once he sees me.
“She’s alive. Stable.”
“What happened? Your man on the phone just said she’d been hurt.”
I look at Connor. The kid whose lies helped destroy my marriage, whose father’s debts put Tierney in danger, whose manipulation made her feel like everyone she loved was betraying her.
“She took a knife that was meant for me.”
“Jesus. Tier…” Connor’s face crumples. “Can I see her?”
“She’s not seeing visitors. At least, that’s what the surgeon told me. I’m hanging around, hoping she’ll change her mind.”
“But I’m her brother—“
“You’re the reason she was in that apartment in the first place.” My voice is ice-cold. “You and your lying sack of shit father.”
“Bronx—”
“She found out, Connor. About the mission, about the marriage arrangement her father wanted from the beginning, about all of it. Everything you told me. She overheard me talking to my brothers about all of it. She knows I was supposed to manipulate her feelings to get the intel she stole from the Blood Vault.”
Connor goes white. “How the fuck—?”
“Doesn’t matter how. What matters is that she thinks her husband seduced her for his own gain. She knows her brother lied to her for months, and her father orchestrated the entire situation to save his own ass from the Murphys.”
Connor shakes his head wildly. “But I never wanted—”
“I don’t give a shit what you wanted, Connor. Your sister could have been killed today and she’s lying in a hospital bed right now, convinced everyone she loves has been using her.” I rake a hand through my hair. “And she’s not wrong. We all had a part to play in destroying her.”
Connor sinks into one of the plastic chairs lining the hallway. “What do we do?”
“We?” I let out a snort. “There is no we. You’re going back to Dublin, to your father and your lies. Tierney’s going to try and leave with you. And I’ll have to live with the fact I hurt the only woman I’ve ever loved because I was too much of a pussy to tell her the truth.”
“You’re in love with her?” Connor looks at me.
“Yeah, Connor, I fucking love her.”
My phone buzzes with a text from an unknown number.
Thank you for finding my daughter. We’re arranging transport back to Dublin. - D.B.
Fury claws at my insides, bubbling under my skin. Declan fucking Blake. Kingston must’ve let him know what happened. But like hell am I gonna allow him anywhere near my wife.
I click the button on the screen to call the slimy bastard.
“Tierney’s not going anywhere with you,” I growl the second he picks up.
“She’s my daughter—”
“That doesn't mean shit anymore. You sold her over to me. That makes her mine, not yours. And after what you put her through, if you come within a thousand miles of her, I’ll tear your fucking head off your body, shove it down your throat, and pull it out your asshole.”
“Bronx—”
“Shut the fuck up. You used her and lied about the Tribunal. You forced Connor to lie to her. You manipulated your own blood into marrying a man she’d never even met. So no, you don’t get to play the concerned father now. You’re full of shit, and now she knows it, too.”
“She’s still exposed. You saved her this time, but if they got to her once, they will do it again.” Declan’s voice rises. “The debt is still outstanding.”
That stops me cold. Because he’s right. Tierney has nowhere safe to go. There’s no one she trusts. No one who hasn’t betrayed her.
I’d like to think that killing a couple of Murphy soldiers is enough to keep them from trying to get close to her again, but I know this world. And I know the people in it.
Debts need to be paid. And right now, it’s Tierney or two million euros. My hand grips the phone like it’s Declan’s neck and I’m about to crush it.
“That’s not your concern anymore.”
“She’s still my blood,” he says.
“I’m not going to repeat myself again, Declan.
Tierney is a Viacava now. You only need her for insurance.
Truth is, you don’t give a damn about her or Connor.
And for the record, I didn’t marry you so figure out how to pay your own fucking debt.
My family will handle the Murphys inside our territory.
You deal with your shit in your own backyard. ”
I stab the end call button, staring down the hallway. Tierney’s in one of those rooms, probably feeling more alone than she ever has. Anger simmers in my veins because I have no way to reach her.
And I know the woman well enough to predict her next move. When she has enough strength, she’ll plan her escape. From her father’s manipulation, from Connor’s deceit, from my betrayal.
From me.
And the worst part is, I can’t blame her.
Because if I were her, I’d run too. I’d get as far away as possible.
Connor appears at my side. “She wants to see me.”
My jaw ticks. “But she told the doctor—”
He holds out his phone. “I just got a text. She must’ve given a nurse my number to text me.”
My stomach free falls into my shoes.
She’ll see Connor but not me.
“Connor.” I grab his arm as he’s about to pass. “Tell her…” I swallow hard. “Tell her I’m sorry. So fucking sorry.”
He nods and claps me on the back. “I will. And thank you, Bronx. For everything. You saved us both.”
I stand alone in the hallway, holding a wedding ring that belongs to a woman who saved my life and then told me she never wants to see me again.
The woman I love.
The woman I manipulated.
The woman who's mine, whether she wants to admit it or not.
Because Tierney Blake can lie to herself all she wants. She can tell me our whole marriage was fake, that she was just surviving, that she doesn't give a shit about me.
But you don't take a blade for someone you don't care about.
And you sure as hell don't look at a man the way she looked at me this morning if it's all just pretend.
She can run back to Dublin if she wants, crawl back to whatever pathetic ex she thinks will hurt me, and tell herself she was playing me the whole fucking time.
But I know better.
I've had her underneath me, screaming my name. I've seen her laugh like she forgot how to be angry. I've watched her trust me with pieces of herself she's never given anyone else.
That wasn't fake. Not for her, and damn sure not for me.
So she can run. She can hide behind her anger and her hurt and her fucking pride.
But when she's done licking her wounds, when she realizes that what we had was real despite all the lies around it, I'll be waiting.
Because Tierney fucking Viacava is my wife.
Mine.
And I don't give up what's mine without a fight.