Chapter 17
Chapter
Seventeen
ENZO
“You know I cannot stand that man. The thought of being in the same room as him makes my skin crawl. But for Vinny, because my sister adored her son, I will be there.”
“Thank you, Catherine. I’m sure it would mean a lot,” I tell her then hang up the phone.
I hadn’t particularly relished the thought of calling up Vinny’s long-lost aunt and inviting her to his funeral.
Partly because I’m not Carmine’s fucking PA, but mostly because he’s talked a lot about what an ice-cold bitch she is over the years, blaming her for ruining his relationship with his wife—her sister.
I found her pleasant enough to talk to though, and maybe she was right warning Lisa Falcone to stay away from Carmine.
I’m still mulling over what Ivan told me yesterday and the whole shitshow with the Bertellis.
If Carmine is planning on setting me up and turning the other families against me, it would be the perfect way to do it.
But why fuck me over now, after all these years of loyalty to him?
I have no fucking clue, but my guess is he’s going to wait until after the funeral before he makes any declarations about my involvement in the Bertellis’ murders.
I updated my brothers on the new development last night, and while they were shocked, I don’t think they were all that surprised.
Something has felt wrong about this whole situation from the outset.
What I still can’t figure out is how the video of Rayne fits into any of it.
The sound of glass smashing makes my head snap up. What the fuck is she doing? “Rayne?” I shout.
No answer.
For fuck’s sake. I stalk out of my study and head toward where the sound came from. “Rayne?”
Still no answer.
Silence is never good where she’s concerned. Not Rayne’s silence. Rayne makes noise when she’s angry. When she’s scared. When she’s breathing and fighting and still alive.
My heart slams against my ribs once, hard enough to hurt, and then takes off at a gallop.
“Rayne!”
For half a second, the entire world stops.
I run to the kitchen, every horrible possibility tearing through my head at once.
She’s hurt. She’s gone. Fear grips me, cold and vicious, punching straight through the centre of my chest. I see the broken glass scattered across the floor and her bare feet peeking out from behind the kitchen island.
I find her on the floor, rasping for breath, one hand clutching at her throat, eyes wide and glassy with panic. Fuck, fuck, fuck. The sound she’s making is barely a breath at all. More like her body is trying to drag air through a closing fist.
No.
The word detonates inside me.
Not her. Not like this. Not on my fucking floor while I stand here useless.
I drop to her side so hard pain shoots through my knees, but I barely feel it.
My hands go to her face, cradling her jaw, forcing her fading gaze back to mine.
Seeing her fight for one thin thread of air rips something open in me I thought was long scarred over.
I’ve seen her like this once before and it scared the hell out of me then too.
That memory slams into me with brutal clarity—Rayne at thirteen, too small and too pale in my mother’s garden, a hornet sting swelling angry and red on her arm while her breath came in those same awful, broken pulls.
I remember my mama shouting for the epi-pen while I stood there feeling more helpless than I had ever felt in my life.
“Rayne.” My voice is rough, too sharp around the edges. “Do you have your epi-pen with you?”
Her eyes roll back in her head.
Panic claws up my throat, but I shove it down because panic won’t save her. Anything but action is useless to her right now.
I tap her cheek, hard enough to drag her back but not enough to hurt. “Rayne, stay with me, baby. Stay with me. Do you have your epi-pen?”
Her lashes flutter. She blinks once, slow and terrifying, then gives the faintest nod.
“In your purse?”
Another nod. Barely there.
“Hold on I’ll be right back. Do you hear me? Hold on.”
She can’t answer, but the fear in her eyes is enough to have me moving faster than thought.
I tear down the hallway to her room, my blood roaring so loud I can barely hear my own footsteps.
Her purse is on the bed. I grab it and dump the entire contents across the sheets, hands clumsy for the first time in years.
Where the fuck is it?
Lip gloss. Wallet. Tampons. Keys. Receipts. My hands knock everything aside, too rough, too frantic. The seconds feel too long. Every one of them stolen from her. Every one of them another barrier between Rayne and breathing.
There it is.
I snatch the epi-pen and run back to the kitchen, praying to a God I haven’t spoken to in years that I’m fast enough. When I drop to her side again, her lips are turning blue.
“No, no, no.” The words come out of me without permission. My palm skims over her thigh, searching for the thick muscle of her quad. I position the pen, hand steady only because it has to be. “I’ve got you, baby. I’ve got you.”
I inject her and hold it there, counting each second like a prayer. One. Two. Three. Too slow. Too fucking slow.
Then I wait.
I’ve waited in dark alleys for men to bleed out, and sat for long hours in hot cars waiting for orders to come.
Even waited outside hospital rooms with my brothers’ blood drying on my hands.
But I have never hated waiting more than I hate it now, kneeling beside her, listening for the next breath like it’s the only sound worth hearing in the world.
Come on, baby.
Finally, her chest lifts a little deeper. The next breath is shaky, ragged, but it comes. Then another. Her lips slowly lose that terrible blue tinge, returning to the rose-pink color I remember far too well. The flush of her cheeks starts to creep back in, faint but there.
Air rushes out of my lungs. “Fuck, Rayne.”
I fall back onto my ass because my legs suddenly don’t feel like they belong to me.
She lies beside me on the cool floor, curled into herself, still panting, her body trembling with the aftershocks.
A single tear leaks from the corner of her eye and slides into her hairline.
That one tear guts me more efficiently than any knife ever could.
And I forget every harsh word we’ve ever said to each other.
Every lie. Every betrayal. None of it matters.
Instinct takes over.
I pull her up and into my arms, settle her between my thighs and hold her there, one arm locked around her waist, the other smoothing damp dark hair back from her face. She doesn’t fight me. Maybe she can’t. Maybe, for once, neither of us has the strength.
“I’ve got you,” I murmur again, quieter this time. I hold her until her breathing evens out. Until the tremors fade.
She buries her face against my chest and sniffs.
I rest my lips on the top of her head. “What happened?”
She holds out her forearm, and I see the angry red spot for the first time. “A bee.”
I glance up at the open window and frown. The weather during Nevada spring is hotter than hell, which is why I have the best AC money can buy, so why is the window open? “Did you open the window?”
She nods. “To let the bee out. I don’t know how it got in here. Maybe through a vent or something, or it flew in when I was on the roof earlier?”
Jesus fucking Christ, give me strength! I have to close my eyes and take a breath to stop myself from berating her for being so goddamn reckless. “Why didn’t you just kill it? Or have me kill it for you?”
Her mouth drops open in horror, like I just suggested she drown a puppy. “We don’t kill bees, Enzo. They’re harmless.”
“One just almost fucking killed you, Rayne.”
She hums. “Yeah. That one was mean. But usually they’re sweet.”
This woman is going to send me to an early grave, one way or another. “Bees are sweet?”
“Yes.” She gives me the faintest, most incredible-sounding laugh and it soothes away the last drop of my anger. “With their little fuzzy black-and-yellow sweaters. Such a shame I’m so allergic.”
“Again, I’ll remind you, one just almost killed you.”
“Only almost,” she murmurs, still snuggled against me.
I suspect she’s too drained to move of her own accord, and I have no intention of going anywhere right now. Unless we need to. “Do I need to take you the emergency room?”
“And risk someone seeing us together? We can’t do that. Carmine could find out.”
“I’ll deal with that if and when it happens. Do you need to go to the hospital?”
She sighs, her breath warm against my skin. I’m only wearing shorts and now I’m hyperaware of our bare flesh touching, of the warmth of her skin against my chest and thighs. Of her ass nestled against my cock. My cock, who has no idea how to read a room and is getting harder by the second.
“No hospital. I’ll be okay. Thank you for saving my life.”
I’d fucking die for you, Rayne. I have no fucking idea where that thought came from because it’s not true.
Who the fuck am I kidding with that though?
I honestly have no clue why I’m trying to convince myself that she’s not the most precious thing in the world to me, even after everything she did. “You’re welcome.”
“Still hate you though,” she murmurs.
I suspect she’s lying to herself as much as I am. “Of course you do. You sure seem comfortable there though.” She’s curled up on my lap, cheek still pressed against my bare chest.
“Yeah, well a near-death experience will do strange things to a girl. Can we have a ten-minute truce? I’m not sure I can trust my legs to walk yet.” She lets out another soft laugh that makes her breath dance over my skin.
I could carry her back to her room so she wouldn’t have to walk. Then lay her down on her bed. Peel off her clothes. Kiss her better. Every-fucking-where. My dick jerks in my pants, very much favoring this plan. I tell my dick to shut the fuck up. “We can stay here as long as you need to.”
She mumbles something I don’t quite hear, but she doesn’t move, content to let me hold her for now. And it doesn’t hurt as much as I’d thought it would—caring for her. I’ll always protect her, even if she doesn’t know it, but that stuff comes naturally to me. This though, does not. Except with her.
I kiss the top of her head, let her scent fill my nose.
For the first time in six years, the hurt I felt at her betrayal matters so much less to me than having her here in my arms. How did it take me until now to recognize that the pain of seeing her and Tommy together is inconsequential to the agony of losing this incredible woman from my life?
What if there was a way to forgive her? To move past all the hurt we’ve caused each other and start again?
I’m not sure I’m strong enough to risk giving her that kind of power over me again.
But I do know I’m definitely not strong enough to let her go.