“Let me go!”
I’ve waited too long. Stunned by the gunfire and Sergei’s unexpected reaction to the attack, I follow him in a daze and don’t jolt back to reality until it’s too late. Until I realize what’s happening. Until I spot Xander with a weapon in his hand.
But Sergei is gripping me so tightly I’m afraid he’ll break my arm if I try to wrench it free.
“Keep moving,” he growls.
Blood is seeping from a bullet hole in his shoulder, black and thick as oil in the fading light. His blood must be on my face. Ivana shot him. She tried to stop him from getting me out of here, and she shot one of her own men.
I feel like I’m watching a movie scene, and I’m the person in the audience yelling at the main character to turn around and go back. “Not that way! That way is dangerous!” Days ago, I’d have given anything to escape from Leo’s house; I didn’t hesitate when Tamara took me to the woods lining the edge of his land.
But now… Everything has changed.
Leonid Ivanov asked me to marry him, and I said yes.
I’m wearing his grandmother’s ring on my finger and discussing rose petals with the gardener.
I could no more leave him now than I could stop breathing or loving dogs or wanting to make a difference in this cruel world.
“Sergei, let me go!” I dig in my heels and throw my weight backwards to knock him off-balance.
Where is Ivana when I need her? Where is Leo? Where is Tamara with her sly comments about wonderful-fucking-Elena like the woman was some kind of goddess?
But Sergei is still dragging me along, and instinct keeps me moving so that I don’t fall flat on my face. I claw at his fist with my free hand. My chest is heaving with the exertion of keeping up with him and fear that I’ll never see Leo again.
“I’m not going. You can’t make me leave. You’re hurting me!”
Tears sting my eyes as he drags me further and further away from Leo. From the man I fell in love with, probably the first moment I set eyes on him in his immaculate dining room.
I can see the armed men surrounding the property. How did they get in? Did Sergei open the door wide and stand back to let them pass through? Or was it Tamara?
Panic hurtles through my veins and bounces around inside my chest.
If I go with Xander, I’m never coming back. It’s all I can think about. Never sharing his bed again, never feeling his lips pressed against mine, never playing with Lucky and Marvel in the garden.
Bullets are still flying around us, but I know that I would rather take one right here while trying to stay with Leo than run away from him to save my own life. So, I choose the only option I have left: I allow my body to become a dead weight. I land on my knees, dirt and gravel scraping my skin through my pants, but I ignore the pain. Sergei stumbles over me as I drop to the ground, but the man’s fist is still like a metal vice around my wrist.
I roll over as he crashes on top of me, ball my right hand into a fist and aim a blow at his diaphragm. He doesn’t even groan out loud as he lands heavily on his knees. He’s back on his feet in an instant, and I wish I had a gun to finish what Ivana started.
Armed men close in on us, covering us with the barrage of bullets flying from their guns. I’m sobbing now. They’re tears of frustration. No one came to rescue me when I was abducted, and now that I’ve fallen in love with my captor, Xander is going to take me away again like he’s some kind of superhero.
When I’m close enough to see the smug expression on Xander’s face, Sergei shoves me towards him like he’s done with being the fall guy for the Sicilian boss.
Xander doesn’t move. He’s so arrogant that he thinks I’ll fall into his arms and shower him with my undying gratitude. But the way I feel right now, I want to punch him in the face and scream at him to stay the fuck out of my life.
So, that’s what I do.
My knuckles feel like they’re on fire when my fist connects with his cheekbone, but it’s worth the pain for the look on his face. His eyes widen in shock and then darken when the tender skin beneath his eye splits.
He makes no move to touch me himself.
Maybe Mel warned him not to lay a finger on me, or maybe he’s just a yellow-bellied coward who, afraid of what Leo will do to him if he touches me, is hiding behind his reputation and his men.
I’m still hollering and screaming at him, “Leave me the fuck alone,” when two of his men grab me from behind and lift my feet off the ground. “Xander! Tell your fucking men to put me down!”
I lash out with both feet, catching my captors’ thighs with my heels. But they’re far stronger than me, and no matter how I struggle and buck and scream, they carry me off Leo’s property and out of his life without even raising a sweat.
I’m still struggling and yelling hoarsely between sobs of frustration when they bundle me into the back of a truck with blacked-out windows. I land on my hip and roll sideways, but the door slams shut behind me, locking me in with the murky gloom. Someone else must be waiting for me inside the truck.
They don’t speak. But something cold and wet is held over my face, smothering my nose and mouth and filling my brain with a sinister chemical smell, and the world goes black.
I open my eyes, bringing the room slowly into focus.
I don’t know where I am. My limbs feel heavy, and a small smile tugs my lips upwards when I think about Leo, spreading my legs wide and burying his face in my sex. I feel the same kind of lethargy that follows a night of passion in Leo’s bed. Only, I can’t remember him coming back from the casino or what we did when we went to his room.
I study the neutral walls, the abstract artwork in the minimalist frame, the polished dark-wood floor.
This isn’t Leo’s room.
I sit up, leaning heavily against the padded headboard as the room slides out from under me. I squeeze my eyes shut and breathe deeply until my pulse starts to regulate. I feel nauseous. Bile rises in my throat, and I lean over the side of the bed retching, grateful when nothing comes out. My head feels hangover-woozy, my brain cells spinning.
Jeez, what the fuck happened last night?
Then it all comes bulldozing back to me like a spooked horse.
The phone call to Mel; Sergei; Ivana with her gun aimed straight at us. Xander-fucking-Amory.
Leo will be worried about me. I need to get back to him, let him know that I’m alright, that I didn’t want to leave, that Sergei tricked me into calling my sister. It must’ve been a trap. Xander must’ve been tracing the call.
The thought that Mel was part of this fills me with a sick sense of uneasiness. I know she must’ve been worried about me, but when she learns how I feel about Leo, she’ll be gutted that she helped her husband drag me away from him.
Will she help me get back to Leo though, that’s the question. And if it means going against her husband’s orders, I already know the answer.
No.
I have to get out of here.
Swinging my legs over the side of the bed, I grip the comforter with both hands until my head stops swimming.
The key turning in the lock grabs my attention. I cast my eyes around the room, searching for a weapon, but just like the guest room in Leo’s house, there’s nothing close to hand that I can use. My gaze instinctively flits to the camera set high in the ceiling cornice.
I’ve swapped one prison for another, only no matter how hard I look, I’m not going to find my future in this one.
Grabbing the lamp from the nightstand, I stumble across the room and press my back against the wall so that I’ll be behind the door when it opens.
The doorknob clicks. The door opens a fraction, and I raise the lamp over my shoulder with the heavy base facing the door. I’m ready to swing when a familiar voice says, “Gi? Gi, where are you?” and Mel walks into the room.
“Mel?” I drop the lamp and fling myself into my sister’s arms, my tears finally spilling.
She hugs me tightly, holds me at arm’s length, and then hugs me some more. When we finally pull away and sit on the edge of the bed together, both our faces are streaked with tears.
“Are you hurt, Gi?” Her eyes search my face for signs that I’ve been abused by my captor as she instinctively tugs my hair forward over my shoulders. “I’ve been so worried about you. When you didn’t get off that flight, I didn’t know what to think. I thought… Well… I’m just glad you’re alright. You’re safe here now.”
“Is that why Xander locked me in this room? To keep me safe?”
I feel a stab of guilt at the look of hurt that flashes across her eyes, but my sister needs to understand that I’m not a pawn in her husband’s war against the Russians.
“He was worried about you. We both were.”
“Not so worried that it stopped him from using chloroform on me.” My head spins and my stomach lurches to remind me that I’m still suffering the aftereffects of Xander’s brotherly concern.
“You were fighting him, Gi.” The expression on her face is unreadable as she narrows her eyes. “Do you remember punching him in the face?”
“Yep, and I’ll do it again if he walks in here right now.”
Mel covers her mouth with one hand like I just suggested walking naked through the house to fetch some coffee. “What did they do to you, Gianna?” she whispers between her fingers before lowering her hand and reaching out to touch me.
I pull away from her. She doesn’t get it yet, and until I can make her understand that being away from Leo feels as if my right arm has been wrenched from its socket, I can’t bear for anyone to touch me. Not even my sister.
“They didn’t do anything to me. At least not what you’re thinking.”
She breathes deeply. “Let me get you some food and coffee. Are you hungry? Did they feed you?”
“Mel, I’m fine. They looked after me.” I don’t mention the incident in the cold room shortly after I arrived—I’ve practically erased it from my mind with everything that followed. “I-I didn’t want to leave.”
“What?” She furrows her brow. “Why not? What did they say to you about Xander?” She stands up and paces the room. “Oh, my fucking God, they’ve been brainwashing you. They’ve turned you against your own family. No wonder you look so different.”
I shake my head. “You’ve got it all wrong, Mel. Leo isn’t a bad person. He looked after me. He would’ve protected me with his life.”
“Leo? What the actual fuck, Gianna. The guy fucking kidnapped you, and you’re calling him Leo.” She turns away like she can’t bear to look at me. “Wait till Dad finds out. He’ll go fucking apeshit. Xander is going to fucking rip the man apart limb from limb, as if this war wasn’t crazy enough.”
“That’s why you have to help me stop him, Mel.” My chest feels like it’s been ripped open, and my heart is being pulled in two different directions. “This war has to end. I need you to help me get back to Leo.”
It’s Mel’s turn to shake her head as she backs towards the door, and I’m worried that she’s going to call Xander to come and knock me out again. “You don’t know what you’re saying. Did the Russian put you up to this? Did he turn you against Xander?”
I take a deep breath and set my shoulders back.
“I’m a grown woman, Mel. I can make up my own mind about your husband and he was never my favorite person. To begin with,” I quickly add when I see the way her expression crumples. “And the Russian has a name. It’s Leonid Ivanov, and I’m in love with him.”
She swallows hard, steps closer and reaches for my hand. This time, I let her take it. “You don’t know what you’re saying. You’re suffering from a classic case of Stockholm Syndrome, Gianna. We’ll get you the help you need. We’ll…”
Her voice trails off when she feels the huge stone on my finger. Turning my hand over, she traces the diamond and sapphires with her fingertip and then raises her eyes to meet mine.
“Gi, what the fuck is going on?”
“I told you I’m in love with Leo.” I keep my voice steady. If my own sister won’t believe me, I don’t stand a chance of convincing Xander to end this war and take me back to him. Mel is my only hope. “This is his grandmother’s ring. I’m going to marry him next week.”
“No.” She closes her eyes briefly. “Xander will never allow it. He’ll—”
“Listen to me, Mel. Xander isn’t my father, and he can’t stop me from marrying the man I love.” She’s about to interject, but I shut her down. “Do you remember how you felt when you first met Xander? You knew he was the enemy, but he kissed you once, and there was no turning back. You were smitten.”
“That was different. Xander didn’t kidnap me on a fucking flight back from Montenegro.”
“No, but he kidnapped me tonight.”
Deep breath. I need her to listen, but all she knows about Leo is what she has heard from her husband, and he isn’t exactly nominating Leo for the mafia boss of the year award.
“Mel, I know Leo kidnapped me because of this stupid war, but there are two sides to every battle. I’m not condoning what he did. But he isn’t the ruthless monster you think he is. I got a fever, and he nursed me better. He got me a rescue puppy—her name is Lucky, and I can’t wait for you to meet her. He’s going to open a women’s refuge in Chicago, and he wants me to run it. And when I’m in his arms…”
“You know that there’s nowhere else you’d rather be.” Mel finishes the sentence for me. “You know that if you can’t be in his arms, the sun might as well never shine again.”
I’m smiling despite the groggy pounding inside my head. “Looking at Leo makes me feel alive and like I want to throw up all at the same time.”
Mel tips her head back and stares at the ceiling. When she looks at me again, her eyes are large with unshed tears. “I knew you were different the moment I walked into the room. You’ve got it bad.”
“Uh-huh.”
She throws her arms around me again, but the hug is fleeting as the implications jolt her back to reality. “Did you…?” She gives me the side-eye. Before I can respond, her shoulders slump. “You did, didn’t you? You fucked him already.”
I can’t lie to my sister. I didn’t tell her about the arranged marriage to Seamus, but that was withholding information, it wasn’t a barefaced lie.
“I wanted to call you and tell you everything, but Leo—”
“Kept your phone so that we wouldn’t trace you.” She nods.
She is no longer judging my poor taste in falling for the enemy—I’m only following in her footsteps—she’s simply telling it like it is. This is the life we were born into. We both know how it works.
“They’re enemies,” she’s talking out loud. “Xander will want to kill him when he finds out. He already wants to kill him.”
“Daniel wanted to kill Xander when he found out about the two of you.” I shrug. “Mel, just because this is the way it’s always been, it doesn’t mean that things can’t change. We can make a difference. A new generation that doesn’t want to rip each other’s throats out.”
“If only it was that simple.”
“It is, Mel. But I can’t do it alone.”
“My beautiful little sister.” Her fingers are still subconsciously rubbing the diamond ring. “You always were the one who wanted to change the world.”
“Leo will come for me, Mel. You know he will.”
Mel nods. “Xander would do the same for me.”
“I don’t want to be the cause of more bloodshed. I need Xander to let me go to Leo. I can stop him, I know I can. But I can’t do it without your help.”
“Xander will never agree to it.”
“Please, Mel.”
My sister is almost there. She believes that I’m in love with Leo, but there’s a part of her, the part that still sees the images of our mother lying in a pool of her own blood when she closes her eyes at night, that’s afraid to interfere in the way Xander runs Amory Corp. I need to give her one final push.
“If Xander kills Leo, I’ll never forgive him. I promise you that I’ll disappear, and you’ll never see me again.”
“Gi, please, don’t make me choose between my sister and my husband.”
“It isn’t a choice, Mel. You can have both. All you have to do is convince Xander to let me go before one of us loses someone we love.”
She stares at the window, my hand still in hers, pensive.
Have I done enough to convince her? If I haven’t, my only option is to try to escape before Leo arrives. I know Xander won’t shoot me, even if I did punch him in the face earlier, but he won’t sit back and watch me walk out of his heavily guarded property either, not when he went to such efforts to get me here.
“Okay,” she says finally. “Let’s go.”
“Go where?”
“To speak to Xander.” She gives me a small smile. “I know my little sister, and when you say you’ll disappear, and we’ll never see you again if anything happens to Leo… I believe you.”
I throw my arms around her neck and squeeze her until she complains that she can’t breathe. “Thanks, Mel. You’re the best sister a girl could ask for.”
“Don’t thank me yet. Xander isn’t going to know what’s hit him.”
I flex my fingers on my right hand. “I think he already does.”
Xander is in his study when we go downstairs. Mel knocks three times on the door like it’s their secret code, and he calls out, “Come in,” sounding as if he’s a thousand miles away, not just on the other side of the door.
Mel glances at me, eyebrows raised, and I nod.
I can sense the tension emanating from the crack around the door, but we have no choice. Without Xander’s approval, I’m a prisoner in his house until this is all over, and this won’t be over until at least one of the two enemies is dead.
Quelling the thought of Leo dying at my brother-in-law’s hands, I follow Mel inside.
The study is larger than our father’s. Xander is sitting behind a solid mahogany desk in a wide leather seat that seems to embrace him like those neck cushions people use on long-haul flights. A bookcase filled with leather-bound books consumes the wall behind Xander giving him the air of a bestselling author who uses it as a backdrop for his social media posts.
Three men dressed in standard mafia black nod to Mel when we enter and leave the room, closing the door behind them with an unobtrusive click.
I look at Xander. There’s a shadowy bruise on his left cheek from where I punched him, and his eye is puffy and bloodshot, but that aside, he has aged since I went to Montenegro two years ago. The grooves across his forehead have deepened while I’ve been away, and the stubble on his chin has a hint of silver in it now that I never noticed before. He’s still good looking, just a little more worn than he was when he first met Mel.
His eyes roam over me from top to toe checking, as Mel did, for signs of physical abuse at the hands of my captor. I stand tall and raise my chin, defiant under his gaze, reminding him that I can look after myself.
“You’re welcome,” he says without a trace of humor.
I instantly bristle. “I never asked you to rescue me. I was doing just fine where—”
“Okay.” Mel shuts me down with a warning look. “What’s going on, Xander?” She obviously sensed the tension in the atmosphere too, and she knows her husband better than anyone.
“Nothing you need to worry about. I’ll handle it.”
He looks as if he’s in fight-or-flight mode, sitting forward in his seat, ready to either dismiss us and run, or pull a gun from his top drawer and tell us that he’s off to kill himself a Russian mobster.
“That’s what worries me,” Mel says.
She doesn’t sit down but stands beside me. Sisters united.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” His tone is cold, menacing, and I wonder if he sounds the same when he and Mel are alone or if he softens like chocolate left out in the sun the way Leo does.
“This war…”
“This war that just destroyed fifty percent of my assets?” His eyebrows arch jaggedly. “This war that cost me more men than I cared to sacrifice in order to rescue your sister?”
I open my mouth to protest a second time and change my mind. I need to be patient and let Mel handle it.
“What assets?” Mel asks in a voice that sounds wary.
“Warehouses. Vehicles. Dru-electrical goods.” Xander is speaking to Mel but watching me like this is somehow all my fault.
“I never wanted to get caught up in this stupid vendetta if that’s what you’re thinking,” I blurt out before I can stop myself.
“Stupid vendetta?” His eyes become small and dark. “You think you can do better, then go right ahead, and be my guest.” He stands, pushes his seat back, and gestures for me to take his place behind the desk.
“This isn’t her fault, Xander, and you know it,” Mel snaps. “They’re just buildings. It’s only stuff. Everything can be replaced.”
“At what cost?” He remains standing.
“We have enough money to buy more warehouses.” Mel squares up to him. “But there isn’t enough money in the world to replace my sister.”
Xander’s gaze flits between me and Mel. He’s breathing heavily like he just completed the four-hundred-meter sprint. “What the fuck are you talking about, Mel?”
“I’m talking about my sister, Gianna. She’s in love with Leonid Ivanov.”
His face has already darkened like the sun just passed overhead throwing us all into shadow.
“If you kill him, she’s walking out of here and she’s never coming back.” Mel’s tone is serious but surprisingly calm, so that there’s no ambiguity in what she’s about to say. “And if she goes, I go.”
