Filthy Sins (The Sabatelli Empire #2)

Chapter 1

GIOVANNI

Before I can cover the short distance separating me from Meggie in the climber’s hut, a hand grips my arm like a vice.

“Wait!” Bruno keeps his voice low.

Enzo stands beside me, while Bruno’s men form a group behind us in the entrance. It feels as though a chasm has opened up between us and Meggie, and I can’t even begin to imagine how she feels, staring at us from across a room that no one dares cross.

Her eyes blend in with the shadows as Bruno’s flashlight zones in on the explosives strapped to her chest. He’s studying them. Figuring out our next move.

Meggie has stopped wriggling, stopped fighting it, but I sense her eyes on me from the bottomless pit of darkness in which her torso has become a warning beacon in the spotlight.

“Try to stay calm, Meggie.” It’s a copout, like telling her not to breathe when she’s underwater or to stay away from the edge of the roof when there’s a fifty-story drop beneath her. “We’ll get you out of here.”

Bruno sweeps the hut with the flashlight, picking out the sink, the cot, and the closet that serves as a restroom. As it travels back to Meggie, I spot the bloody mess where her foot should be, and my heart forgets how to beat momentarily.

“Her foot,” I growl.

If I didn’t have enough reasons to liquidate the bastardo’s balls before, this has sealed his fate.

Only now, with this image in my mind, I will add to the list of people I will destroy, anyone else who hurts him before I get the chance.

The fucker is mine. He will learn in the most painful way imaginable that no one touches what’s mine and gets away with it.

Despite my best efforts to contain the rage emanating from my pores, Meggie must have heard me. She tries to slide her foot underneath the seat and out of view, a groan escaping her lips as pain shoots through her body.

I clench my fists. It takes every atom of willpower in my body not to run to her, but somehow, through the bubbling lava of rage threatening to consume me, the rational part of my psyche wins. I’m here to save her, not blow her to smithereens by acting on impulse.

The thought of what this could do to her… Bile surfaces, burning the back of my throat.

“One thing at a time,” Bruno says, taking control. “Nico?”

A man steps forward, the small group of men parting to let him through as Bruno trains the light on the explosives strapped to Meggie’s chest once more.

“What do you need?”

Nico is silent, pensive, mentally running through his options. He drops onto one knee and shrugs a backpack over his shoulders. “There’s running water. If we defuse one component of the explosive, it renders it useless. It’s a two-person job.”

Bruno turns around to address the rest of the group. “I’ll stay. Everyone else, outside.”

“I’m not going anywhere.”

I’m not being the person who takes shelter while others save the woman I love. They’ll need a bulldozer to get me out of here, and even then, I’ll go kicking and screaming so loudly, they’ll wish they’d sedated me first.

“Gio…” Enzo’s eyes meet mine in the gloom outside of the flashlight’s glow, and my brother quickly decides against warning me to follow orders.

Nico pulls a selection of tools from his backpack and works with his head bent; he only looks up once everyone else has left. His eyes slide between me and Meggie, the movement so fluid, I can’t even be certain that he reached her.

Finally, he says, “I need her to stay still.”

I don’t ask him to fill me in on all the details. Bruno trusts him, I trust him. He’s risking his life to save my woman, which gives him a vested interest in getting this right.

I cross the primitive room in three strides, Meggie’s panic-filled eyes on me all the way as I kneel in front of her.

I keep my eyes fixed on hers in the gloom.

She must be able to feel the device like a tumor on her chest, counting down the seconds until something triggers the end of her life; she needs hope, not fear.

“Meggie.” If not hope, I at least force some lightness into my voice, a glimmer of something positive for her to hold on to as I reach out and smooth her damp hair from her forehead. “You trust me, don’t you?”

She tries to swallow, the dirty rag in her mouth causing her throat to constrict.

“Don’t move,” I hiss.

I stand up. Slow unhurried movements, trying to project a calmness I don’t feel onto her while I loosen the knot at the back of her head, my stomach clenching when I spot the blood in her hair.

When the gag finally unravels, I hold one end and move back around to stand in front of her, blocking her view of Nico and his bag of equipment while I ease it gently from her mouth.

Her lips are drawn away from her gums, exposing them, like a feral animal snarling at a predator.

Her cheeks are raw. The corners of her mouth are sore and bloody.

I’m stockpiling these injuries in my head like a nomad preparing for winter.

Each one will represent another strike inflicted upon The Fish when I finally catch up with him.

“Gio…” she rasps, her voice little more than a ragged breath.

“Don’t try to speak, fiore.”

“Amber.” I have to lean closer to hear her. “Where … is … Amber?”

Deep breath. I have to tell her that I don’t know where the bastardo has taken her little sister, the child I promised to keep safe.

I fucking promised her. I made that vow like it was the easiest promise in the world to make because I’m Giovanni Sabatelli, and I lead a charmed life.

And then I let her down.

I don’t even need to answer. My hesitation has spoken for itself, but still, she watches me with those beautiful green eyes, silently pleading with me to leave her here and go save her sister.

“I’ll find her, fiore.” Kneeling in the blood oozing from her ravaged foot, I brush her cheek with my lips. “I will find her, I will bring her back, and you will never have to worry about anything again for the rest of your life.”

A flicker of sound behind me snags my attention.

Nico is holding what appears to be a cheap throwaway lighter in his hand. While Bruno holds the flashlight steady, Nico takes the lighter apart, setting the components down on a small square of cloth on the floor. He is focused.

“Gio?” Meggie whispers. “Please go.”

“No.” I shake my head. Leaving her to face this alone isn’t an option. “We’re in this together, fiore.”

“Please?”

I think of the times she said please to me on the rooftop of my apartment.

Please, Gio, please lick me. If I never get that Meggie back again, I will have failed her even more miserably than I can imagine, because this please right here, is filled with pain and fear and panic.

It is filled with everything that I promised to protect her from.

“You need … to save Amber.”

I didn’t think it was possible to contain so much anger inside one person, but the way I feel right now, I am a monster. I could rip The Fish’s head clean off his neck with my bare hands and feed him to the sharks. The human kind.

Meggie deserves none of this. If ever there was a person who deserved to be treated like a princess, it is my Meggie. My flower. My love. She believes that she isn’t walking out of this situation alive. She is worried that if I die here with her, no one will rescue Amber from her father.

“I will save Amber, you have my word, fiore. We will be together again, the three of us, and we will go wherever you want to go in the world.”

I have my back to Nico and Bruno, but I hear the urgency in their movements. The clatter of tools, something being sliced with a knife, water running from the tap in the small sink.

“We can go to Sicily and grow olives and lemons and tomatoes sweeter than any you have ever tasted before. Or Scandinavia where the nights are long, and the lakes are serene.” I keep talking above the fizzing and hissing going on behind me.

“Or we can buy an island in the Caribbean, our own piece of paradise, or build a grass hut in the rainforest and have parakeets and monkeys for neighbors.”

She is listening, soaking up my words in silence, and even if all I’ve done is provide her with a distraction, I will have achieved something.

Her eyes widen, and Nico joins us on silent footsteps. Without making eye contact, he crouches beside Meggie and, on all fours, inspects underneath the seat.

“I need you to shield her.” His voice is firm but gentle. Soothing almost, like a pediatric nurse. “The explosives are connected to a detonator under the seat. We can’t risk moving her, but I need to use some force to defuse the device, you understand?”

He waits for me to nod before going back to join Bruno, who is holding what appears to be a strip of rubber, or plastic hose, connected to the tap in the sink.

“No.” Meggie tries to shake her head, and I cup her face with both hands. “No, Gio. I can’t—”

“Listen to me, Meggie.” Firmer. I’ve kept the panic at bay so far, I can’t let it win now. “I’m not going anywhere without you. It’s only water, okay? We’ll get a bit wet, and then it will all be over.”

I don’t wait for her to respond. I stand up, move to the opposite side of the seat to the device that Nico located, and wrap my arms around her upper body.

Her foot is mangled. I can’t imagine the pain she must be in right now, but her brain has probably blanked it out while it deals with the very real fear of being blown apart.

Then, I rest her head against my chest and shield her with my arms.

“Deep breath, Meggie. I’m here. I’ve got you.”

She’s trembling uncontrollably, her teeth chattering, her shoulders knock-knock-knocking against my chest, and I tighten my hold around her as Nico aims the hose at the seat and flicks the lighter in his hand.

I don’t know how he did it, but the trickle of water from the tap through the end of the rubber tube in Bruno’s hand becomes a jet.

There’s no time for me to preempt what will happen next. No fleeting moment in which my life flashes before my eyes like a drowning man. No time for me to pray that if this hut goes bang, Enzo will conclude my business with The Fish and make sure that Amber is safe and loved.

The jet hits the side of the seat with enough force to slam it into my legs. I cover Meggie’s head with mine, shielding her from as much of the spray as I can, murmuring the whole time, “It’s okay, Meggie. I’m here. I’ve got you. I’ve got you…”

Several moments pass by with the water bouncing off my head and my arms and drenching the floor, and Meggie shivering in my embrace, before I realize that the device hasn’t exploded. My pulse, which until now has kept up a steady pace to keep Meggie calm, now picks up speed.

We’re still here.

With Nico’s help, I’ve been able to keep at least part of my promise to Meggie because if the device was going to kill us, it would have done so by now.

“Good girl, fiore. We’re in this together, remember.”

I have no idea if she can hear me. Perhaps I’m motivating myself as well as Meggie, but I don’t stop. I keep right on talking while the water continues to batter the seat and the lower half of Meggie’s body. She’s still trembling violently, but otherwise, she has remained utterly still.

My Meggie.

My beautiful, strong, kind, sexy Meggie.

I stand behind the chair, shielding Meggie with my body until my arms are numb from the sting of cold water. Even when the jet stops battering us, I don’t move.

Nico approaches us with caution, his boots sloshing through the puddles on the floor and crouches beside the seat with another tool in his hand. Without warning, he snips through a wire and cricks his neck from side to side.

Was he convinced that he’d done enough to disarm the device? Or was he putting his trust in God to keep him alive? Either way, I am eternally grateful and will be forever in his debt.

I watch him dismantle the device, remove the explosives from the ropes binding them to Meggie’s chest, and stand back.

He nods once and heads outside, leaving me and Meggie in the hut with Bruno.

“We did it, fiore.” I’m scared to let her go. I will spend the rest of my life afraid to let her out of my sight. “We did it.”

I release her slowly but keep my hands on her arms for support; the adrenaline crash is going to be one almighty low, and when it happens, the pain is going to consume her.

As expected, she slumps against me, her shoulders shuddering with the force of all the emotions she’d kept bottled up inside for Amber’s sake.

I scoop her into my arms, and her body goes limp.

“We need to get her to a hospital.”

Bruno is already one step ahead of me. I heat the whirr of helicopter blades as I step outside with Meggie and breathe in the cool night air like a champion declaring my victory.

But the battle hasn’t even begun.