Chapter 9 Cassian
CASSIAN
“Jesus Christ.” I shift my gaze up to look at her face, her eyes. They’re huge and locked on that bloody rag. That filthy, bloody rag.
“Fuck,” comes Jet’s voice.
I push my hand into my hair. Something clinks onto the ground. I look down to watch a ring roll a small distance then come to rest.
“Shh now,” I say, letting her hand go, pulling my shirt out of my slacks and ripping as much of it as I can get.
It’s cleaner than that rag. “Shh, babygirl.” I close the makeshift bandage over her hand as gently as I can, but she still cries out when I do it and that tightening in my chest of earlier, it’s back and it’s closing up my throat.
I look at her face, her wet face, her searching eyes locked on me now.
Fuck.
Fuck.
Fuck!
“I’m here now, babygirl. I’m here. I’m going to take you home now. I’m going to take you home and I’m going to fix everything,” I promise although I’m unsure I can fix anything at all.
Wrapping one arm around her, I pick up the old rag she was cradling her hand in and register the new blood with the old. I shove it into my pocket, that twisting in my chest expanding into my gut and morphing into regret then fury. I pick up the ring and push it into my pocket.
“Shh, babygirl. I’m going to take you home now.” I slide my other arm under her knees. She just cradles her bloody hand, staring at it again, in shock or worse. Or maybe she’s reliving the hell she survived five years ago. The work her father began. The work Malek Lombardi continued.
I rise slowly, careful to be gentle with her. I ignore the screaming pain in my shoulder.
“Soldiers?” I ask, not looking away from her, but registering the quiet. The gunfire has stopped.
“Dead. There were half a dozen. You’re shot, Cassian,” Jet says.
“Flesh would.” I grit my teeth against the pain.
“Doesn’t look like a flesh wound.”
“Yeah, well she lost a finger, so that takes fucking priority, doesn’t it?” I snap, angry. Furious. Furious at myself. At Malek. At this fucking world.
Allegra begins her whimpering in my arms.
“Shh, Little Moth.” She looks up at me and I imagine she looked a lot like this five years ago. A child lost, now a woman lost. “I’m going to take you home now. No one is going to hurt you ever again.”
Her gaze moves to something beyond me. I follow it to a small table beyond. On that table is what looks to be an old, stained butcher’s block. Wedged in that block is the butcher’s knife.
I move so she can’t see them, the objects of her torture.
She’s trembling in my arms, but she tries to say something. To form words she is incapable of forming.
“Mmmm.” She licks her lips and tries again. “Mmm… My m…” those tears begin again, and I cup the back of her head and pull her to me, pressing her face into my chest, holding her even as my shoulder and arm throb with pain.
“Shh, babygirl. I have you. You’re safe now. I have you. Shh.”
I search the space. I’m looking for her finger. If I’m not too late, maybe we can save it. If I’m not too late. But it’s not here.
When footsteps sound on the stairs, she presses into me, squeezing her eyes shut.
Jet looks over his shoulder and quickly strips off his shirt to cover her.
I accept it.
When the first soldier comes into view, his flashlight shines on us. He pauses when he sees me holding her. Sees the state of her.
“Sir.” He shifts his gaze to me. “They’re all dead. All but one.”
I nod. “Keep him alive. I need him to talk. The cars?”
“Mostly destroyed. Couple are drivable. I’ve already called in for more.”
“Good.” I look at Jet. “I want those things.” I gesture to the block and knife.
He nods. “I’ll take care of it. Get her out of here.”
“Search the house. I want anything that’s his. Anything. And keep soldiers here, off the property, but here. There’s an opening at the back too where the coward ran—”
Jet puts a hand on my shoulder. “Go. Get her home. I got this.”
I look down at the top of Allegra’s head.
She’s got her face buried in my chest. I look at Jet.
He’s standing shirtless in the middle of this mess.
He’s always careful to keep a shirt on, so although I’ve seen the scars before, they still make me pause.
Make me remember what he told me once, a long time ago over a shared bottle of whiskey.
What we never again discussed. I shift my gaze back up to his.
“Go,” he says, jaw tight.
Allegra moves in my arms. “I’ll see you at the house. Bring that soldier.”
He nods and I carry her out of the room. One of the soldiers I pass sees my shoulder.
“Boss, want me to take her?”
“I got her. But I need you to drive.”
He nods, walks ahead of us to one of two SUVs with tires intact, still riddled with bullets, but not as bad as the others which are useless. I set her in the back seat and when I pull away, she panics, reaches for me, still shivering.
“Shh. I’m just getting you a blanket. You’re safe now. I have you, Allegra, and you’re safe now.”
She glances over my shoulder at the house then looks down at herself. Jet’s shirt is the button-down he was wearing to the event in Atlantic City what feels like a decade ago. She cradles her injured hand with the other.
I open the back of the SUV to take the folded blanket and hurry to Allegra. I climb in and wrap it over her shoulders.
“Better?” I ask her, hugging her trembling body close.
She doesn’t respond.
“I’m going to get you home. I’m going to take care of you now.”
When the driver starts the car, she panics, turns to the closed door. “No!”
“Allegra—"
“I need… I need…”
“What do you need?”
Her lip trembles and her eyes glisten with fresh tears. “The… ring.”
“The ring?”
She nods.
“I have it. It’s in my pocket.”
She’s visibly relieved. Nodding, she lays down on my lap, surprising me. I watch her close her eyes and squeeze her shoulder, unable to keep from looking at the bloody rag of my shirt.
She’s alive. That’s what I asked for. That’s what I got. She’s alive. What he did to her I’ll fix. It won’t matter. She’ll see. She’s alive and I have her and she’s safe. And I’ll fucking take Malek Lombardi apart limb by limb.
I tuck the blanket closer over her shoulder and keep telling her it’s going to be all right. That she’s safe. But she doesn’t react to any of it. She just lays there with her eyes closed and I hope she’s sleeping. I hope.
Night gives way to day and as we drive back to Devil’s Peak while I think.
Malek Lombardi was in his car on his way off the property as I pulled onto the grounds.
He was in a hurry, but my arrival was not a complete surprise.
Who would know I was coming? That I knew where he’d take her?
Richard Moore? No, I don’t think so. I believe that he didn’t know where Malek took her.
I can’t imagine why he’d know about the existence of the house at all.
He may have and probably did contact Malek to tell him about my visit, but that wouldn’t translate to my knowing about the house Allegra and her mother were taken to when she was kidnapped.
As far as the story of Sarah Moretti’s death, she died in a fire at the house of her piano tutor.
A tragedy. Nothing more to it. The fact that Allegra and her mother had been kidnapped wasn’t public knowledge because it wasn’t truly a kidnapping.
It was her father punishing his wife. Hurting her any way he could.
Who would know that I was coming here? Or did Malek just get lucky? But then why not take Allegra with him? Perhaps that is the more important question. Why did he leave her behind for me to find?
I dig my phone out of my pocket to find a text from Enzo.
Enzo: Cousin, I’m on my way to the house. Where do you need me?
Me: Why aren’t you at the hospital?
Enzo: I’m fine. Where do you need me?
He’s eager to prove himself. He knows I have my doubts about everyone. I’m analyzing everyone’s motivation, everyone’s actions.
Me: Devil’s Peak. Call a doctor in. Female.
Enzo: Done
I add that last part thinking Allegra will feel safer with a woman doctor. I want her examined thoroughly. I want to know where that bastard laid his hands before I cut them off. Because I will cut them off. And that will be the beginning of what I do to him.
But all that can wait. I glance down at Allegra sleeping, her head in my lap, the bruises on her face.
I have her. She’s here with me. Everything else I will fix. I have her now and she’s safe.