37. Roman
ROMAN
D eath is a kindness.
So they say.
The raw agony pouring from my shoulder pulses with every sluggish beat of my heart. I’m tired. My head hurts. Revenge is far from my mind and only one thought occupies me.
Jasmine.
I hope I did enough to help her. I hope she’s safe. I hope she’s so angry that she never lets anyone near her ever again.
My head hangs low and remains there until the two men carrying me drop me to the ground. I crumple immediately onto a cold, damp stone floor and lie there panting. Heavy footsteps approach me from behind and stop near my right side.
God just kill me now .
“Santino.” A distant voice across the room greets us. “What have you brought?”
“For years you demanded I bring this dog back to you,” Santino says. “I refused because I thought he was my son. And he has his uses. Both of those have come to an end.”
“So,” continues the second voice. “You brought him here?”
“Yes. You can do whatever the fuck you want with him now, I no longer care. My only request is that you don’t kill him immediately.”
“Telling me I can do whatever I want with him, then demanding I do not kill him is quite the request.”
Cracking open one eye, I place my hands on the ground and struggle to push myself up.
Hot agony throbs through my wounded shoulder, but I push past it until I’m on my knees, resting back on my ankles.
That’s as far as I go. I’m too tired for anything else, and it takes all my strength to keep my head raised.
The Yakuza stand before us with several guards surrounding one man in a tan suit with a red jacket hanging loose from his shoulders.
Shit. I’m back here.
Funny how things come full circle. They thought it was a secret, but I’m well aware that my shift in alliance to Santino was taken as a betrayal all those years ago. I’d hoped the decades and my work had freed me from that debt, but it seems not.
So this is my fate. To die at the hands of the Yakuza while my father watches on in glee. I wish it could be different. If I’d acted sooner, if I hadn’t grown so greedy in wanting Santino to suffer. I should have killed him when I had the chance.
I’m sorry, Mom .
“Yes,” Santino says with a touch of annoyance in his tone.
“I need some hint that he’s alive so I can draw out his bitch of a girlfriend.
She’s been a thorn in my side for far too long, and he’s the only thing I can use to get to her.
So if you would be so kind and not kill him right away, that would also be pleasing. ”
The man in the tan suit stares at me for a long moment, then he nods and motions for two of his men to step forward. Those who don’t move unholster their weapons and aim them at me.
What do they think I’m going to do in this state? The most I can do is breathe aggressively in their direction. The Yakuza approach and grab me by the arms, but just as they lift me, a wail of pain escapes me.
“Stop!” barks a voice from the shadows, one that sends a lance of pain through my chest.
I must be dreaming because that voice, that sweet voice sounds almost exactly like…
“Jasmine?!” Santino nearly chokes on the word and he stumbles backward, but as he does, the Yakuza shift focus from me to the men he brought with him and open fire.
Santino’s men have no time to react and they drop like flies, hitting the ground in a symphony of yells, cries, and wet thuds.
It’s over almost as quickly as it began, leaving only Santino’s audible panting to fill the room.
“What the fuck is going on?” he yells.
And then she’s here.
Somehow.
Jasmine walks out from behind the Yakuza Chairman and stops just in front of him with her arms crossed over her body and her gaze as sharp as her eyeliner. She doesn’t look at me, but I don’t need her to. Seeing her one last time before I die is more than I deserve.
“Santino, in case it still escapes your notice, your Yakuza are actually my Yakuza now. I’m surprised you didn’t catch wind of the change in ownership, but then you were always so self-absorbed that maybe I’ve been giving you too much credit.”
“You!” Santino surges forward a step, but the raised guns keep him at bay. Then he turns to me and I see the hope in his eyes, the desire to use me in some way to protect himself, but the two Yakuza guards remain next to me like silent statues.
He has nothing.
This is also something I don’t deserve to see, but witnessing the panic growing in his eyes and the uncertain steps he takes back and forth is better than any painkiller.
“How?” Santino demands. “How the fuck has this happened? Years of loyalty down the drain for some bitch?”
Jasmine laughs sweetly. “You can’t blame them. I saw an issue in Yakuza leadership, so I had it taken care of.”
“You didn’t have the might to take them down all these years, why now?”
“I had some help. See, someone once taught me that an unexpected alliance can be the best way to change things. So I reached out to someone and they offered me their help. And this lovely new Chairman has been more than amicable to my requests because unlike you , Santino, I plan to work with them. A partnership of sorts. Alien to you, I’m sure. ”
“I’m going to kill you, you fucking bitch! I’m going to?—”
Santino’s words fade suddenly as my world becomes blanketed in cotton.
Every sound becomes muffled and seems far away, with the only clear spot being Jasmine.
But focusing on her beautiful face rapidly becomes difficult and with each sluggish blink, her edges soften until she’s nothing but a colorful haze.
But that’s okay.
I got to see her one last time.
My body throbs like a bruise for the last time and I close my eyes. As much as I ache to stay here even just to hear how much Jasmine hates me, keeping myself awake is becoming the most difficult thing I’ve ever done.
My head sags and darkness creeps up like an old friend.
Suddenly, warm, gentle hands cup my cheeks and my instinct to flinch away is met by a soothing sound in front of me. I wrestle with myself, forcing my eyes open and finding Jasmine’s gorgeous eyes floating in front of me like two stars.
“Hey,” she says, her words reaching me even as her lips move in slow motion. “You’re not getting away that easily.”
I try not to blink. My eyelids are so heavy, I know they won’t open again if I let them close. “How…how do you not hate me…?”
“Consider this payback for saving me,” she says, sounding even further away. “Now we’re even.”
My eyes close as darkness wraps me in its warm embrace, and the last sensation I register is the soft press of Jasmine’s lips against mine.
“Am I dead?”
“Not yet.” Jasmine’s voice trickles through the darkness. “But I can arrange it if you want me to.”
Huffing out a laugh, the pain across my ribs immediately drags me to complete consciousness.
I open my eyes, and Jasmine is perched on the end of my hospital bed with a book dangling from one of her hands.
Beside me, several machines beep in rhythm with my heart and betray the lurch when I look at Jasmine.
Warm light trickles in from slatted blinds giving Jasmine’s hair an almost honey-gold look, and the way her eyes catch the light convinces me I am dead.
“I think I’m dead.”
“No,” Jasmine says, her red lips stretching in a small, fond smile. “You’re just on a shit load of painkillers.”
“Good ones?”
“The best.”
“Why…” The words catch in my throat and a cough rises, taking all my energy in seconds.
Jasmine moves quickly. She sets her book down, slides from the bed, and is by my head in seconds with a cup of water and a small straw in her hand.
“Here,” she coaxes gently. “Drink.”
As much as I want to joke about it being poisoned, my throat is so dry it’s making my eyes water, so I accept the straw and suck down several glorious mouthfuls of cool water. I’d drain the cup, but Jasmine guides it away from me before I can.
“Doctor said you can’t have too much too soon,” she says. “Sorry.”
“Don’t,” I croak. “You don’t ever have to apologize to me. For anything.”
“That’s not a very healthy outlook.” Jasmine reseats herself on my bed but higher up this time. “Ren, I have some things to tell you.”
She uses my name. My real name. It feels like a punch to the heart. I don’t deserve her calling me anything. “You don’t have to tell me anything.”
“No, I do. Stop. Stop acting like you’re not owed anything, or that there’s nothing here.” She takes a deep breath and meets my gaze. “I know you lied. About everything. Those messages were from Alto, and they were always from Alto. Why did you do that?”
“Would…” I swallow hard when the words stick and try again. “Would you believe me if I said I was scared?”
“Scared?” Her head tilts causing her hair to cascade over one shoulder like a golden curtain.
“My fa—Santino gave me an ultimatum, and I was struggling. And that scared me. Because everything I’d been working toward for decades was suddenly in my grasp, but then there was you, and how much I loved you also scared me.
And I didn’t know how I could give one of those up.
So I came to see you, and when you told me about Alto and those messages to your mother, everything became painfully clear. ”
My voice trembles, and the machine betrays the irregular way emotion makes my heart skip, but it’s the honesty Jasmine deserves. I have nothing left to hide from her. Nothing at all.