The Bond (The Beautiful Monster #3)

Chapter 1

Enzo

The vortex of fire surged closer to me. Flames leapt forward, wrapping themselves around me, enveloping me in a fiery embrace of death. Whoever had set the blaze was gone. He’d set the fire and used the distraction to jump out the window.

Now the woodshed was cloaked in smoke so thick I couldn’t see my way out.

I brought my arm over my face—useless protection against a fire that was quickly getting worse.

Heat began to touch my skin. Pain spread.

The avalanche of fire was so hot, I felt the hair on my arms burn away.

Pretty soon it would burn the fabric that was barely protecting me and the pain would become too unbearable to withstand.

I gritted my teeth against the pain, suppressing the shout of agony that was battling to escape. I had to get out, but I couldn’t fucking see. Could barely remember the world before the flames. Then I remembered her. Valentina Romano. My bride-to-be. The fiancée I’d hated and grown to care for.

If this fire got out of control, Valentina was in danger. She was probably in the main house unaware of the fire. If the flames reached her before I did...

Suddenly, my lungs cried out for air. They screamed in pain. Whatever fears I had about my skin burning, none of that mattered if I could no longer breathe. My eyes watered, the smoke stinging them.

More memories flooded my mind. This wasn’t the first time I had been trapped by flames.

There had been the warehouse fire a year ago.

At the height of the war between my family and Valentina’s family.

The Romanos had set one of our warehouses on fire.

They’d been trying to send a warning to my family by burning what they thought was an empty building.

But that building hadn’t been empty. I had been in that warehouse.

That earlier fire had almost killed me. This fire might actually finish the job.

Searing pain forced me into fight or flight mode, my free arm braced as I staggered blindly toward what I hoped like hell was the wooden wall of the shed.

There was no fighting an inferno. Fire was not an enemy that cared.

It couldn’t be reasoned with. Fighting it without water or an extinguisher was certain death.

I had to stay alive long enough to save Valentina. Nothing else mattered after that.

I braced my body and rushed until I hit solid wood.

Pivoting to use my shoulder, I bashed my body shoulder first against the wood until I heard it splinter.

I crashed through wood, hitting the hard ground below.

The pain of the collision broke through me, adding to the burning in my lungs and the roaring pain of the fire as it burned its way up my arm.

Despite inhaling air, my lungs still screamed in pain. If I had inhaled too much smoke, I wouldn’t be able to get enough oxygen into them.

I heard screams. Then I felt the weight of a body flung over mine. Not much weight but enough. Enough to let me know that I wasn’t alone. While I’d been fighting to save her, Valentina had rushed to my aid and was now trying to shield me from the fire with her fragile body.

Somehow, that small, delicate woman dragged my bulk and brought me into a sitting position.

I couldn’t see. The smoke must have stung my eyes shut. I grabbed onto her as we staggered uneasily to our feet.

“Can you walk?” she asked me.

“I can walk,” I responded. If I could stand, I could walk. She wouldn’t have to haul me away on her own, which would be impossible for her if I had lost consciousness.

What I didn’t understand was why she was risking her life to save me.

Valentina was well within her rights to let me burn to death.

I had betrayed her and her family. My family had been working this entire time to use her for our own ends.

In discovering our treachery, Valentina had confronted me and told me she was through with the wedding.

Yet for some reason, this woman who hated me was doing everything in her power to save my life.

It made no sense to me and I couldn’t wrap my head around it. Why wasn’t she abandoning me?

But there was no time for questions. I had to tell her what I knew.

If her father had sent this hit after me, she deserved to know that she couldn’t trust him either.

The father she’d been loyal to had set up an engagement without her knowledge, and now that she was being obedient enough to go through with it, her father was pulling the rug out from under her in his bid to get to me.

Don Romano would never kill his daughter—but it was clear that he was more than willing to send messages and teach lessons that the entire mafia underworld could see.

Attempting to kill me without Valentina’s input was Don Romano sending a message that he was all powerful and she would have to obey no matter what her thoughts and feelings were.

That left her vulnerable. Without a fiancé to protect her or guard her interests, she would be facing her all-powerful father all by herself.

The thought of her facing her father without any backup didn’t sit right with me.

She had spent all her life being loyal to her father without complaint.

It was time for someone to be loyal to her for once.

The flames were still roaring but I had to get the truth to her. Had to let her know based on the very real chance that I didn’t make it. Tensing against the pain storming my lungs and squeezing my chest, I managed to gulp down enough air to shout, “Your father. Your father did this.”

“No, Enzo, this was an accident,” she said, her voice growing distant.

I shook my head, then choked out the words as my chest burned. “I saw a shadow. Somebody was here. Your father sent him to kill me.”

It was now obvious that setting fires was her father’s signature.

First, he’d set the warehouse fire that nearly killed me last year.

Then there had been this week’s fires at my family’s car dealership.

I hadn’t believed that the Romanos were responsible for the car dealership fires, but now, there was no other explanation.

Fires signified a pattern and now I was getting the message loud and clear.

Don Romano wanted to get rid of me and my family.

He had likely been trying to warn us off the wedding to his daughter.

Or maybe this fire hadn’t been a warning at all, but an attempt on my life.

Instead of sending a message to get us to back out of the wedding, Don Romano could cut out the inconvenience and just kill me outright.

Making certain that there would be no groom for his daughter.

“We have to get out of here,” Valentina said frantically, breaking through my disordered thoughts. “We need to get you to an emergency room. There’s a medical center a few miles back so we’ll go there.”

Based on the frenzied way she was speaking, it sounded like she was more talking to herself than she was to me. I could hear the terror in her voice even though I couldn’t see her. She was scared. I sensed every bit of her fear.

But her fear didn’t keep her down. She didn’t give in to it.

Because she never did. Valentina had always overcome extreme emotions to do what needed to be done.

My bride was focused and ruthless, always refusing to give in to fear.

She always faced her fear head-on—thinking up ways to retaliate against her enemies, or setting up plans to outfox and outmaneuver them.

Valentina didn’t rely on bravado to get the job done.

She felt her emotions and still did whatever needed to be done.

Instead of wasting time suppressing her feelings, she leaned into them, letting her fear, fury, or whatever else she was feeling act as fuel.

Her emotions pushed her into battle, ensuring that she never backed down.

She was an extraordinary woman. Formidable, cunning, highly intelligent, and passionate all at once.

While she was subordinate to her father Don Romano, Valentina had all the makings of a mafia leader despite all the skepticism that came with her being a woman in a man’s world. Men dismissed her at their peril.

I had made that mistake. I’d thought that I could trick her into giving my family what we wanted. That had backfired and if I survived this, we would all be paying the price for our deceit very soon.

Together, we staggered away from the burning woodshed toward the pickup truck.

Valentina managed to prop me up against the side of the truck before she got the passenger door open.

I managed to climb into the passenger seat with her help and the next thing I knew, I passed out.

Not only was the world already dark, all the sounds faded into complete silence.

Time stopped moving. I was trapped in a slumber that I couldn’t wake from.

~~*~~

WHEN I CAME TO, I WAS blinded by a brightness that burned my eyes.

I had to snap my eyes shut and then blink them slowly open as I took in my surroundings.

A bright hospital room. Everything was white, from the walls to the blankets to the doctor’s coats.

Doctors and nurses were hovering around me, speaking in hushed tones.

I hated how they were talking. Like I wasn’t fucking there.

Angry, I started to struggle to get out of the bed, only to find that I’d been restrained. My arms were strapped down. The more I struggled, the more futile it became. Without my arms, I had no way to defending myself. Anger exploded as I opened my mouth to vent my white-hot rage.

But no words came out. I choked, pain tearing through my chest. The agony ripping through me got me to stop thrashing.

I went still then, finally understanding that I couldn’t speak because there was a fucking tube down my throat.

That tube cut like a knife through me, but it was the one thing keeping me alive.