Chapter 38 – Rae
Mondays were sacred to me. During the week, I always said I was going to lie around and veg, only to wake up ready with a plan for fun.
This morning, I’d slept in until eight-thirty, waking up feeling perfectly rested and deliciously sore thanks to the midnight visit from the prince of darkness himself.
But I hadn’t sat around. After a quick oil change on my baby girl, I was out and driving Cherry Pie around Downtown Boston.
I found a cute bistro, where I had an early lunch, and then I walked up and down the historic roads, gazing at the buildings in a mixture of excitement and awe.
The plan for today was simple: soak up as much history of this place as I could.
Near the Boston Commons, by the Hermes store, a guy with wild eyes caught me staring in the subway. I was fascinated with the underground train system. This was just like in the movies, and I was about to venture down to peek when he started shouting at me for no apparent reason.
“Go across the street!”
He looked downright mean.
I smiled at him, thinking in my head that he wouldn’t dare try that in a small town.
We took care of our own. Not having any way to protect myself, I did move away from the subway entrance, hating that I felt the necessity to retreat instead of stand my ground.
But I wasn’t about to be assaulted by some random guy who didn’t want me on his street corner.
The Commons were…boring.
The grass was covered in fallen leaves, and groups of people sat around soaking up what sunlight filtered through the clouds.
It was sad to think that these patches of goose poop lawn were the only outdoors these city slickers had access to on a regular basis.
Georgia might not have the status and power that an old city like Boston held, but we had fields.
Pastures. Trees, and a whole lot of clean grass to sit in.
I’d run from the cops at two in the morning through peach orchards and spent many afternoons picking pecans for cash.
Suddenly, I was homesick.
I took the next exit out of the park and wandered down a street full of shops that didn’t have anything interesting to buy with the money I didn’t have. Even the historic churches with their gorgeous architecture couldn’t enthrall me.
I pulled into the shadow of a building to check my phone. I wanted to hear a southern drawl more than I wanted to take my next breath. I debated the risk to call someone, because an innocent chat might draw unwanted attention.
Something in the air shifted. It wasn’t a sound that caught my attention, but a feeling. I turned just in time to avoid the meaty hands reaching out to grab me.
On the sidewalk, people walked past, completely consumed with their own lives, hunched down in their coats and staring straight ahead.
I felt like if I could only take a few steps and join the throng, they would engulf me.
But safety in numbers didn’t feel like the true safety of my small southern town.
I tried.
I made it three steps.
A second pair of hands joined the first, and I was tugged back into the alley. One old man with a knee brace flicked a glance in my direction. He simply shook his head and kept walking.
They weren’t going to help me. I was being kidnapped, and they would just let it happen.
Well, fuck them.
I fought for everything I was worth. I kicked and screamed. I threw a punch. The delicious sound of cartilage crunching joined a sticky spray of blood. But there was a third man now. They managed to pull me behind the cement partition of a loading dock.
I saw red.
Dropping down, I let my weight work for me. The moment they struggled to hold me, I twisted free and picked up the first thing my hands met. A broken piece of wood from a pallet.
I swung.
The verbal hiss was a sweet reward.
“Just snap her neck so we can collect the bounty,” one of them bellowed as he ripped the board from my hand.
Liquid fear drenched my veins. This wasn’t a random mugging or a gang rape. These men were here—for me.
Three men. The same ones who’d broken into the butler’s cottage.
Knowing that gave me a fresh burst of adrenaline. I punched the soft flesh of someone’s abdomen, bruising the kidney. As my hand was yanked back, I felt something metal.
Something familiar.
I bucked hard, reaching blindly with my other hand.
Pudgy fingers wrapped around my throat. One twist, and it would all be over.
I wrapped my fingers around the weapon and pulled the trigger, not bothering to draw it from the guy’s holster.
His scream was followed instantly by the release of the hold on my throat. I yanked the pistol out, and my vision narrowed to a short field. The gun fired three times. I didn’t miss. Didn’t hold back. The silence that followed was deafening.
Hobbling to the wall, I leaned against it, gulping down air.
One of the guys twitched.
That was all it took for me to lose my lunch. Vomit spewed up my throat. In between bouts of retching, I watched the dead—and dying—men. They didn’t move. No one got up to come after me.
At least my daddy taught me how to use a firearm before he passed.
I sagged to the ground, suddenly unable to hold myself upright. It was terribly hot. The stale summer wind used the alley as a tunnel, whipping through with the speed and ferocity of a freight train.
What…now?
Calling the police was the first thought that popped into my head. I was the victim here. But it would only take a little digging for them to unravel the whole mess with my ex, the missing drugs, and the hit on my life.
I coughed. “No, I can’t do that.”
There was someone I could call.
I tried to stand, but I was shaking too badly. I immediately toppled over.
People were still walking on the sidewalk. No one had stopped to look. The gunshots hadn’t summoned anyone. Since it was a measly caliber pistol, they might not have heard it or maybe assumed it was a mechanical malfunction.
I cursed them.
Crawling on my hands and knees, I made it to where I’d dropped my phone near the mouth of the alley. My fingers shook as I tried to open the screen. Thumb hovering over my uncle’s name, I paused. What could he logically do? Come and clean up three bodies?
He didn’t have those kind of resources, of that I was fairly certain.
There was one more person.
I bit my lip and closed my eyes. The sour taste on my tongue made me gag.
Nico wasn’t going to want to clean this up.
It was messy. There was danger of the law coming at any minute, even if no one seemed to notice the girl sitting in the alley caught in the throes of a nightmare.
What we had was fun but calling him now made our relationship serious.
Give him a chance.
What choice did I have? He could always tell me no. If he didn’t want to come to my rescue, he wasn’t obligated to help.
I pressed his name.
His sultry voice came through the phone line. “I was just thinking about you.”
I swallowed a sob.
Probably not quietly enough.
“Rae, baby, what is it?” he demanded, voice suddenly serious.
“I’m in trouble,” I whispered.
“Stay where you are, I’m coming.”
With that, the call ended.
I crept back into the alley, and the last thing I remembered before the shock took over was wondering how he would ever find me.
***
There was warmth. Unbelievably wonderful warmth. I shivered and sank deeper into the feeling.
“Hush, it’s alright,” a strong timbre rumbled somewhere outside my body.
The last hour came back in a rush.
The street. The alley. The fight and the gun. Being sick, calling Nico.
The crew of Made Men showing up in two dark SUVs.
And now I was inside, naked, in a bathtub of warm water.
I shuddered.
Two strong arms and two thick legs wrapped around me from behind. I was pulled back against a hard, solid mass.
“You’re in shock, cherry-bomb,” Nico murmured. “But I’ve got you. I’ll make it better.”
“I do feel better,” I said.
Or tried to. The words came out in a breathy rasp.
Clearing my throat, I tried again. “Are you…mad?”
Nico tightened his hold on me. “Very.”
Shit, I knew it.
I pushed away, but he held me tight.
“I’m mad that someone is coming after you,” he rumbled. “I’m mad that you haven’t told me what is going on—something you’ll fix as soon as you’re feeling more yourself. But Magnolia Rae, you listen and you listen well. I am not mad at you.”
“How can you not be?” I whispered. “I shot three people. I put a target on your mob.”
He understood what I was saying despite the stumbling, stuttering words trying to choke me. “You come to me.” He leaned us forward, reached out, and turned the rushing tap off. “I am the one you call whenever things are bad. Do you understand?”
With a sigh, I leaned back into him. The context of what he said was sweet. I wanted to believe that he was there for me. I wanted it so badly.
Right now didn’t seem like the time to argue with him that this was just sex. I let myself float on the daydream. But images of today’s trauma kept popping into my head.
“It helps to talk about it,” he murmured into my hair.
“How did you know?” I laughed bitterly.
He cupped his hand and drew the water toward me, letting it wash over my shoulders. “You keep starting and jerking every time you relax. I’ve been in your shoes, Rae. The first time I shot a man dead, I couldn’t stop replaying it over and over.”
My gut twisted. The words tumbled out without my permission. “That wasn’t my first time.”
Nico went very still behind me. He didn’t breathe. Even his heart seemed to stop beating.
“There was…once before.” I lifted his hand and pulled it over my wrist. “They didn’t find the body, though.”
“Magnolia.” My name was a prayer of pain.
The story came out, pulled from the recesses of my mind where I kept it hidden away.
“My dad died when I was seven. It broke my mom. She wasn’t mentally stable to begin with, and the prescriptions turned into narcotics.
Guys came and went for the next few years.
A lot of them were ones she partied with, but occasionally they were stand-up pillars of the community or from towns not too far to drive to.
One of them, he was with her, but he was always looking at me—until I made sure he never looked at anyone ever again. ”
Nico jerked and cursed in Italian.
I shrugged.
Water dripped from the faucet. One bead chased another. There was a pause in between, but the next always came sneaking out.
“And the phone call? The other night, when you helped me?” Nico’s voice was deadly low. He was holding back, but from what, I couldn’t tell.
“Oh, no.” I laughed roughly. “That’s a whole different mess. But, since you helped me clean it up, I guess I owe you an explanation.”
Nico shifted. “I need to know so I can help you.”
A funny pressure squeezed my chest tight.
He wants to help me.
At this point, telling him everything made more sense. “Today’s episode was brought to you courtesy of my no good ex-boyfriend, who while in jail, told his dealer that it was me who stole thousands of dollars’ worth of drugs.”
“And now they’re coming after you,” Nico surmised. “I’m going to need some names, Rae.”
“Why?” I turned to look up at him. Death never looked so beautiful.
“No one comes into my city, threatens my people, and gets away with it,” he said simply.
That was what it felt like to belong. An overwhelming rush of emotion shot through me. It was bright, lighting up the dark places inside me like a fucking Christmas tree.
“I shot them, though, so it’s over.” I reached up and cupped his face. “I can’t believe you found me. That you came so fast. I didn’t know you were in the city.”
“Actually, I’m here to meet someone.” Nico grabbed my fingers and pulled him to my lips. “I was going to find you, because I knew you were here too. I was going to surprise you on the street.”
I frowned. “You were stalking me?”
His voice was a growl, rough and lethal. “Shocked?”
I snorted. “No. But I’m sorry I interrupted your meeting.”
“She’s not here yet, so it’s fine.”
An instant, insane rush of green fired in my gut. I moved, pushing away from him, but Nico dragged me back.
“Rae,” he warned.
“No, you don’t have to explain. I’m good now—”
“Rae,” he snapped. “There’s only you, Rae.”
I huffed.
“I mean it.” He pulled me around to face him and held my head inches from his own. “I wanted you to meet the other person—two of them actually.”
I was being stupid. I knew that. But I blamed it on the swell and crash of emotions.
The way this monster looked at me gave me strength to wade through the muck.
“Oh,” I breathed.
“Yeah, oh.” He pressed a fast kiss on my lips. “You are mine. Only you. Always you. Why can’t you see that?”
I lifted a shoulder. “You have this whole glamorous life, and I don’t fit in it.”
“Then I’ll burn that one to ash and rebuild one where you do belong.”
I smiled sadly. “Such pretty words.”
“I’ll prove it to you. Now, come, get dressed.”
He rose, pulling me with him. Water sluiced off that god-like body, and my insides turned to greed. This was mine. All mine. And I was done fighting the reasons not to claim it.