LEROI
Seraphine is as docile as a kitten as I lower her to the motel’s sunken tub and work shampoo through her hair. The coffee dye is fading fast, turning her back into the blonde angel I rescued from the Capello mansion.
Warmth fills my chest as I lose myself in her delicate features. She’s no longer the innocent girl I thought she was, but a woman whose darkness surpasses mine.
After getting her clean, I lay her face-down on the bed. Both her perfect little ass cheeks have darkened from the spanking and I apply a thick covering of cooling gel to her heated flesh. When I’m done, she rolls over and wraps her arms around my neck, her eyes shining with light.
It’s a combination of gratitude, admiration, and affection that’s more than a man like me deserves. If it hadn’t been for Capello’s twisted attempt to turn her into a killing machine, a mafia princess like Seraphine would never have crossed my path.
She would have graduated from an ivy league college or married into an influential family, living out her life in luxury and comfort. But here she is, in a motel with me.
I place a kiss on her lips, feeling something inside me shift. Seraphine has become my purpose, and I’d do anything to keep her safe.
“What did you want to do with your life?” I ask.
She shifts on my lap, her hand trailing down my chest. “I used to dream of killing the twins in front of Dad before stabbing him with hot pokers. Why?”
“Before that,” I ask.
Her head tilts to the side, and her eyes glaze with a faraway expression, as though she’s lost in a memory. “I wanted to study at the Cordon Bleu cooking academy.”
“Is that why you learned your knife skills?” I ask.
She rests her head on my shoulder. “I used to help Bianca in the kitchen.”
“Your cook?”
“She was married to our driver, Felix. He used to give me driving lessons and was the one who took me to my grandma’s house that night…”
She bows her head, too overcome with her memories. I stroke her hair, wishing there was something more I could do to ease her pain. Keeping her safe isn’t enough when she’s still plagued by the monsters from her past.
Wrapping her legs around my waist, I rise off the bed, pull back the covers, and ease her onto the mattress.
“Stay with me?” She tugs at my arm.
“That was the plan.” I slide into bed and gather her in my arms. “Tell me about Bianca.”
Seraphine launches into a description of a middle-aged Italian woman who lived in the mansion’s servants’ wing with her husband. The more she talks, the more obvious it becomes that Bianca was the one who did most of the child rearing.
Her mother, Evangeline, appeared more interested in socializing, shopping sprees than in parenting her two children. And, of course, cheating on Capello with her bodyguard.
“Bianca was so great,” she says with a yawn. “She set up a table in the kitchen and let me watch her cook while I did my homework, and she even let me help prep.”
I rub circles on her back until her eyelids flutter shut. “Would you like to find her when things go quiet?”
Her entire body stiffens. “I can’t.”
“What do you mean?”
“If Dad killed Felix for driving me away that night.” She raises her head, her pretty features stricken. “If he hurt Bianca—”
“It’s alright,” I say. “We don’t have to look them up.”
She relaxes against me, her body still rigid. I continue rubbing slow circles on her back until the tension melts away.
It was naïve of me to think I could hand her over to a therapist to help fix her mind. Seraphine’s story is a complicated tangle of secrets, betrayals, and violence. It needs to be unraveled at her pace.
“You’re safe with me,” I murmur into her hair. “No matter what, I will always protect you and put you first.”
She relaxes fully, and her breathing deepens as she drifts off to sleep. I stare down into her streaky blonde hair and swear to myself that no matter what, I will make her future brighter.
Half a day later, we’ve checked out of the motel and are sitting around the corner from the home of Mike Ferrante. It’s the basement condo of a five-story brownstone building in a quiet suburb of Beaumont. According to Miko’s intel, his wife is a nurse working two jobs to fund their two children’s college education.
Street lights illuminate a quiet block lined with parked cars. I glance across at Seraphine, who sits alert, her knee bouncing. We’ve already gone through the plan a dozen times, and now she has to wait.
“She’s not leaving,” she says.
“Miko checked the hospital’s schedule,” I mutter. “She’s probably running late.”
Moments later, a blonde woman in scrubs emerges from the steps, carrying a small backpack. She hurries to a silver sedan parked outside and speeds off.
“Let’s go,” I say.
Seraphine bursts out from the car and hurries down the street. I pick up my bag and follow after her with long strides. She’s still impatient, but this is a vast improvement from the last time when she jumped out of a moving car to chase after Pietro Fiori.
By the time I catch up with her, she’s already at the bottom of the basement steps with her finger pressed over the bell.
The door flies open, revealing a balding man with a bulbous nose covered with a red rash spreading down its bridge to his cheekbones. He’s too busy glaring down at Seraphine to notice me descending his steps, and yells, “What the fuck—”
With well-practiced precision, she stabs Ferrante through the ribs with a syringe, making him stagger backward and drop his gun.
I wince, hoping she didn’t reach his heart. Seraphine needs closure, not just quick kills.
Mike clutches at his chest with one hand and gasps for air. He kicks out at Seraphine, but she side-steps.
“Bitch,” he snarls.
“Don’t worry,” she says. “It’s just a sedative. You’ll be awake in a few minutes and then we’ll talk.”
I step into the condo, close the door behind me, twist the deadlock, and attach the chain. Mrs. Ferrante will be gone for at least eight hours, and we can’t leave anything to chance.
“Find the bathroom,” I tell her.
She rushes ahead, opening and closing doors until she finds the right one. “Here.”
I drag Ferrante across the wooden floorboards into a room of white tiles and an equally pristine suite. Tasteful. I sit him on the toilet seat and handcuff him to the towel rack.
While I’m taping plastic wrap to the floor, Seraphine returns with a nail gun.
I raise a brow.
“You should see all his tools,” she says, her cheeks flushed. “He has so many.”
“Can you do something for me?” I ask.
“What?”
“Don’t touch his cock.”
Her brows pinch. “Why not?”
“If you touch him like you did that other guy, I’ll put a bullet through his head.”
