Chapter 19 #2
Those two words would have filled her with fear in the past. Those two words held power now.
She wasn’t afraid anymore. She was angry.
It was a rage that she had only ever felt briefly once before.
A rage so pure, so driven by instinct and justice that she actually had to hold herself back.
The kind of rage only a woman could feel.
One was powerful enough to summon storms, powerful enough to defy all odds and burn everything down in its way.
She felt the rage of her mother, the rage of a woman who’d abandoned her life to raise a child on the run, and never once did her mother stop fighting to stay alive.
She may have had her father’s eyes…but she had her mother’s spirit.
“You’re forgetting one thing, Cormac,” she said. Her tone was dangerously soft. Cormac turned to face her.
“What’s that?”
“You forget. I’m not just my father’s daughter…
” she smiled coldly. “I’m also my mother’s.
” In the single heartbeat that it took Cormac to register her words, she unclipped her seatbelt and lunged at him.
They collided against the wall by the flight attendant jumpseat at the front of the plane.
She swung a hard punch. Her fist connected with Cormac’s jaw and despite the pain that radiated up her right arm, she struck again and again, unleashing her rage.
That was her for mother, the woman who’d given up everything.
She swung again, landing another blow. That was for Angelo.
She screamed, the primordial rage tearing through her eardrums as she fought.
“Bitch!” Cormac snarled as he flung out an elbow, hitting her in the eye.
Jim O’Leary came into her line of vision, dodging her as she retreated back, trying to clutch her face.
“Grab her!” Cormac snarled at Jim.
The other man grappled with her near the front of the plane, and she got in a good punch, making Jim grunt and wheeze as he doubled over but his movement sent her wheeling.
She tried to keep her grip on him, but Jim threw her off, right through the opening to the stairs leading down from the plane. Kara toppled down the steps. Landing with a pained groan, she tried to get up, but her ribs felt like they were broken.
Have to get up…
She half rose on her hands and knees in time to see Cormac at the top of the stairs. He was rolling up his sleeves, his mouth curled into a harsh line. He was going to beat her to death, she saw it in his eyes.
“I’ll teach ye how it’s going to be…” he said. “As my woman, ye’ll—”
“Sir?” The pilot suddenly stood behind Cormac.
“Sir, I really must insist that you sit down before going to take off. If you aren’t buckled in, we can’t fly.
” The pilot’s eyes flashed to Kara who was well and truly off the plane now.
The man’s eyes widened in surprise and he glanced between her and Cormac.
“Just get the engine started!” Cormac spat then he faced Kara again.
“Sir—” the captain tapped Cormac’s shoulder anxiously.
“What?” Cormac bellowed as he spun to face the pilot.
The look of confusion and concern vanished from the pilot’s face at the same instant he swung a fist right at Cormac’s face.
Cormac’s expression went blank as the blow landed, and he crumpled, his body rolling in thuds down the stairs to light inches from Kara.
Kara scrambled back, afraid Cormac would wake up and grab her.
When he didn’t move, her gaze shot back to the pilot who stood in the doorway grinning.
“I told you if you didn’t buckle up, we wouldn’t fly, dickhead.”
Kara’s mouth dropped open. She had no idea what was going on. That confusion only deepened when the pilot suddenly pulled a gun out, but he didn’t aim it at her. He aimed it inside the plane at the only other person in the cab: Jim, Cormac’s man.
Lights flashed across the night as half a dozen SUVs came roaring across the tarmac. They all screeched to a halt surrounding the plane in a semi-circle. She turned just in time to see a door fly open from the nearest vehicle.
“Kara!” The shout was hoarse… but it was the most wonderful thing she’d ever heard in her life. Because it was Angelo.
He wasn’t dead.
That realization changed the tragic trajectory of her life for a second time. Angelo had had defeated death twice… for her.
He knelt down on the concrete beside her and pulled her into his arms, his soaking wet clothes dampening hers all over again and she didn’t care. It was the most wonderful thing in the world even though her head was pounding and her ribs hurt.
“Tesoro mio…” he whispered over and over as he pressed kisses to her lips, to her closed eyelids, her cheeks, the top of her nose.
Kara let him, her fingers clenched tight in his soaked sweater, feeling everything all at once. Letting it overwhelm her because that was life, wasn’t it? Letting love and joy be a tidal wave as powerful as grief. She let herself be swept away by that love and didn’t fight it.
“I love you,” she found herself whispering as he held her in a tight hug. “I love you, Angelo.”
“I know,” he chuckled.
“Tell me now…” she begged.
He drew back a few inches, their mouths her breath apart. His warm brown eyes held the answer to her future… to their future. He’d said those three words she wanted to hear in the car, but it was going to be different this time because his I love you was no longer a goodbye.
“I love you,” Angelo murmured in the crown of her hair as he pulled her close again.
The frantic I love you in the sinking car had spurred Kara to survive… but this I love you was an early spring that blossomed as the harsh winter of her soul melted against the kiss of spring.
“I love you, tesoro mio,” he said again, his smile widening and softening at the same time as a storm of butterflies rolling through her stomach.
A sudden groan made them both flinch. Cormac stirred, clutching his face as he tried to sit up.
“What the bloody fuck?” He spat blood out as he got to his feet. Angelo pulled Kara up and immediately put her body behind his.
“Don’t worry, I got this.” The pilot trotted down the steps, and without another word pistol whipped Cormac with his gun, knocking the man into the ground. He was out cold this time.
Kara stared at the pilot, her mouth agape.
Asher stepped forward, eyeing the pilot. “Thanks for the assist, Atlas. I didn’t think you’d make it here in time, after the car bomb situation.”
Atlas? Who was Atlas? Kara wondered. And car bomb? What had she missed?
“Oh, I made it,” Atlas said with a grin at Kara. “And I brought your father’s men along.” He nodded it to the SUVs. “The Cabrinis helped me get the Westies here in time. Thank God, that asshole,” he gestured to Cormac. “Didn’t recognize me.”
Several rough, scary looking men got out of the vehicles along with the Cabrinis. Kara wanted to run, but she held her ground. The Cabrini brothers were among the massive group of men who departed from the vehicles, and their guards stood at the ready behind the Westies.
“So this is Kara O’Brien?” One of the men stepped forward, speaking with a soft Irish accent as he eyed her with interest.
Kara lifted her chin and took one clear step forward, away from Angelo so she could stand on her own.
“I am. But I want to make one thing clear, I don’t want my father’s life or his businesses.
I want to be left alone to live my own life far away from all of this.
Do what you wish with his businesses. I give it all to you.
Just stay out of Chicago. This city is my home. ”
The Westies exchanged glances, and then the man who had stepped forward held out a hand to Kara. She took it hesitantly.
“In that case… ye need not worry, love. We don’t know anything about a Kara O’Brien, do we lads?”
The men shook their heads. “And it’s nice to meet you, Kara Gallagher.” She shook his hand and let go.
“For what it’s worth,” Angelo said. “She’s also going to be a Vertucci.” Kara’s face flamed but secretly she was melting inside for Angelo, and what it meant for him to say that.
“She’s under the protection of the Cabrinis.” Someone from behind Angelo and Kara added.
“Understood,” the Irish mobster smiled respectfully at Angelo, and then gave a tight nod to Leo Cabrini who came to stand beside Angelo and Kara. “Right, well,” the man said. “We’re off.” The Westies returned to the SUVs that had driven them here.
“What about Cormac?” Kara asked Angelo.
“That’s up to you,” Angelo said as Leo Cabrini and his brothers joined them by the fallen Irishman.
“Up to me?” Kara asked.
She didn’t know what to do. She knew Cormac would want her dead if he was left alive.
Leo Cabrini’s cool gaze met hers, and she knew what she had to do then.
“Mr. Cabrini, Cormac is a part of your world. Not mine. I want to leave it up to the Cabrini family to deal with him and Mr. O’Leary. I want to be certain he will never be a threat to me or anyone I love ever again.”
Leo nodded in deference and spoke to Angelo. “You’d better leave now. What comes next is not for her… for either of you.” He placed a hand on the gun holstered at his hip.
Angelo squeezed Kara’s hand. “Let’s go.”
“Wait…” she pulled free of Angelo and rushed back of the plane stepping over Jim O’Leary’s unconscious body.
She realized then that Atlas must’ve knocked him out at some point, but she honestly didn’t care.
She reached the back of the plane and knelt down, smoothing her hands over the carpet until she found what she was looking for.
Atlas had followed her and stood watch over her as she passed him to exit the plane again.
She ran back to Angelo who caught her in his arms.
“I couldn’t leave without this.” She slipped the engagement ring on her finger and when he realized what she had gone back for, he kissed her. Hard, desperate, raw, and then after a moment, his mouth softened to sweeter kisses.
A polite cough broke them apart and Asher tapped his watch and nodded toward the waiting Cabrinis.