“You are lucky my brother does this for you,” Nino said. “I’d have cut your throat.”
He said it in a clinical voice. For him this was about logic and pragmatism. For Remo, this was personal. For Remo, I was like a brother and I had gone against him. Nino moved across the room to his brothers.
Every last seat was occupied and even more spectators stood against the walls, eyes eager for the fight of a lifetime. Leona wrung her hands beside me, eyes sliding from me to Remo who was surrounded by his three brothers, even Adamo would be watching the fight for once. They knew it might be their last chance to say goodbye to him.
The excitement of the crowd slowly crept into my bones. The thrill of the fight took hold of me.
Remo looked at me. Tonight we’d both die. We knew it. Every other outcome would be a miracle. Leona was reluctant to let me go when Griffin called my name. Before I loosened her grip, I kissed her in front of everyone, because it didn’t matter anymore. I pulled back and climbed into the cage where Remo was already waiting for me.
Griffin was saying something to the crowd or to us, I wasn’t sure.
Remo approached and only stopped when his chest almost touched mine. “I loved you like a brother. Tonight is where it all ends.” He held out his hand.
I wasn’t sure if Remo could love. Before Leona I had been sure I wasn’t capable of it either. I gripped his forearm, my palm covering the tattoo on his wrist and he mirrored the gesture. Then we let go and took a few steps back.
Griffin climbed out of the cage and locked the door before he shouted. “To the death!”
The bar erupted with applause but it all faded to the background. This was about Remo and I. I charged forward and so did he. After that our world narrowed to this fight, to this moment. Remo was fast and angry. He landed a few good hits before my fist collided with his abdomen for the first time. There was blood in my mouth and my right side ached fiercely but I ignored both, focused on Remo, on his heaving chest, his narrowed eyes. He lunged and I tried to duck but then he was upon me. We fell to the floor, his forearm pressed against my throat.
Remo tightened his hold, until stars danced in front of my eyes. “And do you still think she’s worth it?” he muttered into my ear.
I sought Leona’s fear-stricken face in the crowd.
“Yes,” I gritted out. Never had anything been more worth dying for.
Leona
Fabiano’s face was turning increasingly red in Remo’s chokehold. I couldn’t breathe. The crowd around me cheered like madmen as if this wasn’t about life or death. For them it was pure entertainment, something to distract them from their miserable lives.
Fabiano’s blue eyes fixed on me, fierce and determined.
I tried to give him strength with my expression even though I’d never felt more helpless and desperate in my life. The man I loved was fighting for both of our lives. Love – when had it happened? I wasn’t sure. It had been creeping up on me. I hadn’t even told him outright. Perhaps I’d never get the chance to tell him.
And even if he won, Nino might still end his life.
Suddenly Fabiano arched his back and thrust his elbow into Remo’s side but he didn’t budge. Fabiano bowed forward as much as Remo’s hold allowed and then thrust his head back with full force, crashing against Remo’s face. The crowd exploded with cheers and yowls.
And suddenly Fabiano wound himself out of the grip and staggered to his feet before aiming a kick at Remo, hitting him square in the ribs. Remo jerked, but quickly rolled away and pushed to his own feet, and then they were facing each other again. They were circling each other, both covered in blood from head to toe, littered with bruises and cuts. Two predators waiting for a flicker of weakness.
“Perhaps now you realize what you’ve done,” Nino said close behind me. I jumped, and took a step away from him. I didn’t take my eyes off the fighting. What had I done? I’d allowed myself to get close to a man who should have been out of bounds. Had proven that I was more like my mother than I wanted to admit. But I didn’t regret it. And I wouldn’t allow Nino Falcone to scare me. I was past that point.
Remo landed three hard punches against Fabiano’s stomach before he got hit in the face, and then they were kicking and punching so fast, I lost count. They thrust each other to ground, got up, hit and kicked.
Fabiano’s face wasn’t even recognizable anymore from all the blood covering him, but neither was Remo’s. I shivered.
I lost track of time; their fighting grew more erratic and less cautious. There was no holding back anymore. Even to someone who wasn’t in on the rules, it would have been clear that two men were fighting for their life.
Remo grabbed Fabiano and thrust him with full force into the fence. Fabiano bounced off and fell to his knees. I gasped and took a step forward.
Remo gripped Fabiano’s head but somehow Fabiano managed to push off the ground and thrust his knee upwards into Remo’s groin. Both of them toppled to the mat, panting and spitting blood. For a split second Fabiano allowed himself another look at me. Why did it feel like saying goodbye?
I began walking toward the cage, needing to stop this madness. Nino stepped in my way, tall and cold. “You stay where you are unless you want to die.”
“How can you watch your brother die?” I asked incredulously.
Nino’s cold eyes took in the fight in the cage where both men were beating each other with elbows and fists, half kneeling on the floor, too weak to get up from almost one hour of non-stop fighting.
“We all have to die. We can choose to die standing up or on our knees begging for mercy. Remo’s laughing death in the face like any self-respecting man should.”
Fabiano
With every breath I took, it felt like a knife was slicing into my lungs. I pressed my palm against my right side, feeling my ribs. They were broken. I spit blood on the ground.
Remo was watching me closely as I knelt across from him. He’d make sure to aim his next hits on my ride side. His left arm was hanging limply at his side after I had managed to dislocate it with my elbow again. Only this time I couldn’t give him the time to relocate it.
I pressed my palm against the ground, trying to push myself back into a standing position. The floor was slippery with blood. The room shook with roars and clapping when both Remo and I had managed to get to our feet. We were both swaying. We wouldn’t be able to last long. Every bone in my body felt like it was broken. Remo winced, not bothering to hide it. We were past the point of pretending we weren’t in pain. This was coming to a close.
“Thinking about giving up?” I asked.
Remo pulled back his lips in a bloody smile. “Never. And you?”
He could have had me killed without getting his hands dirty. He could have put a bullet through my skull and would have been done with it. Instead he chose to give me a fair chance. Remo was hated. He deserved that hate like few other men in this world, but for what he did today, I’d respect him till my last breath.
“Never.”
I barreled toward Remo under the thunderous applause of the crowd. The money the Camorra would win with bets tonight would set new standards. My body exploded with pain as I collided with Remo. We both fell to the ground, and began wrestling. We had no strength for kick boxing anymore. This would be settled on the ground, with one of us choking the other or breaking his neck.
Something exploded. Remo and I fell apart, disoriented. The door to the fight arena went down, and men stormed in. They shouted at each other in Italian and English. Not the Russians.
The Outfit or the Famiglia attacking Las Vegas’ ground?
They spread in the room, beginning to fire.
And Remo and I sat in the middle of the room in an illuminated fighting cage like goldfish in a bowl.
From the corner of my eye, I saw Nino pushing Leona to the side so she fell to the ground out of the fire line. He began firing at the intruders as he rushed toward us. Remo and I pressed to the floor, trying not to be hit by straying bullets. It wasn’t an honorable death to die kneeling on the ground, unable to fight back.
I could see one tall masked intruder heading our way, already reloading his gun. This wasn’t the end I’d imagined. Being shot in the head by some Outfit or Famiglia asshole.
Nino reached the cage when two men began firing at him. Before he dove under a table, he threw a gun over the top of the cage. It landed with a soft thud in the blood puddle between Remo and I.
Remo had only one good arm though, so I dove forward and grabbed the gun with my right hand while I used my left one to punch Remo’s dislocated shoulder to stop a grappling match before it could even start. He growled as he fell back. I knelt immediately, gun pointed straight ahead.
Remo smiled crookedly and opened his arms in invitation. “Do it. Better you than them.”
Sorry, Remo, not like that.
I took aim, trying to stop my bruised arms from shaking, and then I pulled the trigger. The bullet hit its target right between the eyes.
Remo whirled around to what was behind him and could only watch the attacker who had been pointing a gun at his head tumble to the ground. I stumbled toward Remo, ignoring my body’s screams of pain. I didn’t waste time, nor warned Remo, instead I grabbed his dislocated arm and located it with one practiced tug. Remo groaned, then stumbled to his own feet. I threw my arm over his shoulder and steered him toward the door of the cage, shooting at anyone who looked like they might be a threat. I hammered against the locked cage door, but people were busy saving their own asses. And Remo’s men and brothers were having a shooting match with five attackers who were hiding behind the bar.
My eyes searched our surroundings. Where was Leona? Was she save? She knew this place and would be hiding somewhere safe. She was clever, I tried to calm myself. It wasn’t fucking working. I ripped at the door, but the thing was built to last. “Fuck!” I screamed.
Remo tried his luck as well but that thing was too strong. It rattled but apart from that: nothing.
Suddenly Leona’s head popped up before us. Her eyes wandered between Remo and me, but she didn’t say anything. She’d probably given up understanding me and this world a long time ago. She fumbled with the key in the lock until finally the door swung open, releasing us. I let go of Remo and jumped out of the cage, gasping at the impact. I’d be bruised for weeks.
If Remo let me live that long; I was still supposed to die for my betrayal. Remo landed beside me, and picked up a gun from a fallen man on the ground. “I go ahead, you have my back,” he ordered like in old times. I pressed a kiss to Leona’s lips. He watched with an unmoving expression.
“Let’s leave,” she begged. “This isn’t our fight.”
I smiled apologetically. “This will always be my fight as long as Remo lets me.” I pushed her under the side of the cage where she wouldn’t be spotted easily. “Stay there. It’s too dangerous.”
She nodded like she understood why I had to do this as she pressed herself against the side of the cage.
Remo and I turned around, and then we did what we did best. It took another hour to break down the attack. The last two attackers raised their guns to their heads to end their own lives before we could get our hands on them. I shot one of them in the hand before he could pull the trigger, then I was on him. “You’ll regret the day you decided to enter our borders.”
He spat onto my naked feet. “Fuck off.”
Remo chuckled, then coughed and spit blood on the ground. “That’s how your spit is going to look soon too,” he murmured.
We let Nino and Savio bring the man down to the sound-proof storage room. Adamo stood back against one of the booth, looking shaken. He held a gun in his hand and stared down at one of the attackers. Was this the day of his first kill?
I could feel Leona’s eyes on me as I followed after Remo to press details out of the attacker. I knew she was appalled by what I was doing. But she knew what I could do, and was still here.
It took forty minutes to get the information we needed, Remo and I both were bruised and tired, and needed medical treatment. We couldn’t waste time on elaborate torture methods. Luckily Nino did most of the work. The man was lying on the ground, wheezing. Remo knelt beside him. “So let me get this straight,” he said calmly. “The Outfit sent you to my territory. For what?”
The man shook his head. “I don’t know. I’m following orders. Your territory is bigger than ours. We want a piece. This was a good time.”
Remo nodded. “Playing dirty. I like it.”
He stood and gave me a look. I shoved my knife up the sucker’s throat.
“This means war. If the Outfit thinks they can play strong, we’ll show them what we are capable of.”
I wiped my knife on my bloody shorts. “I bet that would be interesting.”
Remo raised his dark eyebrows. “Would be?”
I straightened despite the pain in my ribs. “I’m supposed to die, remember?”
Remo and I stared at each other for a long time. Nino and Savio exchanged looks as well. I wondered what they wanted. Me dead? I couldn’t say, and they weren’t the ones to decide anyway.
Remo put his hand on my shoulder, eyes fierce and full of warning. “This once I will let you live. You proved your loyalty by putting a fucking bullet into the head of my enemy when you could have killed me instead. Don’t go behind my back again, Fabiano. That time there won’t be a death match, I’ll just put a bullet through your skull.”
“As you should,” I told him, then pressed my palm again my side again. “Leona must be safe. She must be mine. I want her at my side, want to spend my life with her.”
“If that’s what you want.”
I nodded. “She’s seen me at my worst, and she’s still here.”
Remo waved a hand at me. He couldn’t comprehend. “She is yours, no worries. Now go to her and get a nice long blowjob as a reward for your troubles.”
I rolled my eyes and dragged myself up the staircase. I doubted I’d get one up today. Every part of my body was aching, but I was willing to give it a try.
The moment I stepped back into the bar, Leona hopped off the bar stool she had been waiting on and rushed toward me, throwing her arms around my waist. I gasped from the stab of pain in my ribs, my shoulder, fuck, my entire body. She loosened her hold, worried eyes peering up at me. Her hair was all over the place, and there was a small cut over her cheekbone. I ran the back of my index finger over it. “You are hurt.”
She choked out a laugh. “I am hurt? You are bleeding and bruised. I thought you would die in that cage, and when you disappeared with Remo down into the storage I feared you wouldn’t come out again,” she whispered.
“I’m fine,” I told her, and she gave me a look. “I’m alive,” I amended. For my fucking body to get anywhere close to being fine again, that would take a while.
“But what about Remo? Won’t he kill you?”
Wasn’t she worried about her own life as well? Perhaps she’d forgotten but my fight would have decided her fate too.
“We came to an understanding. He gave me another chance.” Fuck, to think that I would see that day.
“He did?” Leona voiced the disbelief still anchored in my body.
I nudged her in the direction of the entrance. “Now come, I want to go home.”
She froze. “We’re not going home. You need to go to the hospital. Remo must have broken every bone in your body.”
“I broke just as many of his,” I said immediately.
Leona shook her head, unbelieving. “I don’t care about him. But you need treatment.”
I leaned down, my mouth curling despite the fucking cut in my lower lip. “I know just the right treatment for me.”
She angled her head away. “You can’t be serious.”
I brushed my hand over her side. “I am dead serious. Won’t you honor the wish of a dying man?”
She shoved me, angry and half amused. I winced because my body fucking ached like hell. “Sorry!” she blurted, fingers ghosting over my chest in silent apology.
“I almost lost you, and my fucking life, don’t you think I deserve a reward?”
She shook her head again but her resolve was melting. Her fingers lingered on my abs, the touch a mix of pain and promise. “I really don’t think…”
“I won’t go to the hospital,” I interrupted her, then buried my nose against her throat “I want to feel you. Want to feel something else than this fucking pain.”
She opened the passenger door of my Mercedes for me. I raised my eyebrows. “You can’t drive.”
I handed her the keys without protest, enjoying her surprise. “Then you will.”
I could tell she was terrified of wrecking my car. As if I gave a fucking damn about the thing. “Take us to our hill,” I ordered when she pulled out of the parking lot.
Her brows puckered again but she did as I asked. After she’d parked, I pushed myself out of the car and carried myself toward the hood. I sank down and let my eyes take in my city. Leona stepped up beside me. “And now?” she whispered.
I pulled her between my legs and kissed her softly, then harder but had to pull away when my vision began spinning. I tried to mask my dizziness but Leona’s eyes narrowed.
“Your body is a mess, Fabiano. Let’s go to the hospital. There’s no way you can do anything right now anyway.”
I guided her hand to my dick, which was growing hard under her touch.
Her blue eyes met mine. “So every part of your body is hurting except for him,” she said, squeezing my cock through the fabric. I chuckled and regretted it at once. “Seems so.”
“Sure,” she murmured doubtfully. “You should really go see a doctor.”
“I will, later,” I said quietly. “Now I want to remember why life is better than fucking death.”
She leaned forward once more, kiss sweet and almost shy, as if something in her mind was distracting her. When she pulled away, her uncertainty had been replaced by resolve.
She slid down my shorts, grazing several wounds on the way, and got down on her knees before me. My cock jolted at the tantalizing sight. I hadn’t expected her to do it after what she’d said about cock sucking being degrading and all, but I wasn’t going to remind her. She wrapped her fingers around the base of my cock, opened her mouth and slowly took me in inch by inch.
Holy Fuck.
I’d been with so many women, but every experience with Leona outshone my past. She gagged when my tip hit the back of her throat and quickly moved a bit back, and I had to resist the urge to grab her hair and hold her in place so I could fuck her sweet mouth. Instead I forced my body to relax under her soft tongue, allowed her to explore and taste me. But eventually I needed more, so I took control. I began moving my hips, sliding my cock in and out of her warm mouth harder and faster every time.
Leona and I could have been dead by now. But we weren’t. I jerked my hips upwards, and she let me. She struggled to take as much of me into her mouth as possible, and the sight fucking undid me. My balls tightened and I called out a warning but Leona didn’t pull back and I released into her mouth.
It was the most painful orgasm I’d ever had, and yet as I watched Leona lick her lips uncertainly, I decided it was also the fucking best.
She ran a hand over her mouth, looking up at me. I could see vulnerability in her eyes.
I pulled her up to me despite the agony that shot through my ribs, needing her to get it out of her head that anything I did was to degrade her and finally understand what I felt for her, even if I had a hard time understanding it myself. “Leona, nothing I do will be to degrade you. And no one else will ever dare to degrade you either.” I softened my voice. “Are you okay?” I ran my thumb over her soft lips.
She ran a hand through my sweaty, blood-streaked hair. “Can we be together now? I mean for real?”
“We can and we will. I want you to move in with me. I want to bind you to me, want to stop you from getting away ever again.”
It wasn’t romantic, it wasn’t nice. But I wasn’t either of those things.
“Then I’m okay.”
I let out a small laugh, then winced. She lightly traced my ribs but even that hurt.
“But why did you want me in the first place? I’ve been wondering about that from the start but I knew you’d never tell me the truth anyway,” she said.
“And now you think I’ll do?”
She traced the cut below my cheekbone. “You are pretty rattled. I think now is my best chance.”
“You are becoming more cunning.”
She shrugged. “Survival of the fittest, and all that. Or what did you call it?”
I slipped my hand under her shirt and bra, and ran my forefinger over her nipple. It puckered immediately under the ministration. Leona licked her lips as her eyes glazed over. “Why?” she repeated her earlier question. I tugged at her nipple. She smiled. “Stop distracting me.”
I slid my other hand up her thigh and into the leg of her shorts. My thumb brushed aside her thong and slid into her wet heat. She was still tight but there was no resistance. Her walls squeezed around my finger as I slid it in and out slowly. She moaned and began rocking her hips.
“Why,” she ground out again as she rocked her pussy against my hand. I exchanged my thumb for two fingers and moved faster. I stood and lifted her shirt, then closed my lips around that perfect pink nipple. I tasted sweat on her skin. She’d been afraid for me, for us. I sucked her nipple harder. She gasped, slowly coming undone. I added a third finger and she clawed at my shoulders, her expression a mix of ecstasy and discomfort. Pain shot through me when her fingers dug into bruised skin but it felt fucking good. I thrust my fingers harder and faster into her, enjoying her tightness, her wetness, her whimpers. Fuck, those breathless sounds were music to my ears. Her walls clamped down on my fingers and she threw her head back, letting out a long moan. I released her nipple and watched my fingers slide in and out of her. Her grip on my shoulders loosened. Slowly her eyes peeled open and she watched me. I kept moving my fingers in and out of her very slowly, letting her ride out the last gentle waves of pleasure. “Because you didn’t judge me. You didn’t know me. You didn’t go into our conversation hoping to get something out of it.”
Leona smiled. “But I got something out of it. I got you.”
I shook my head at her. Slowly I slid my fingers out of her. “You don’t know what’s good for you.”
She released a small breath, then lifted one shoulder. “Good’s overrated.”
I kissed her again, tasting myself on her.
“You almost died today for me,” she whispered. “Nobody has ever done something like that for me. People can keep telling me to stay away from you if they want, but it won’t make me love you any less.”
My body grew taut at her admission. Love was a dangerous thing, something that had brought the hardest fighters down to their knees. Weakness was something I couldn’t afford, not if I wanted to stay on Remo’s good side. But love wasn’t a choice. It was like fucking torture. Something that happened to you and you were unable to stop it. It was the only form of torture I was unable to resist.
I brushed a sweaty curl out of her face, wondering how she could have put a tear in the impenetrable façade I’d built since my father had abandoned me. She, with her infuriating naivety, her shy smile. In my life I’d watched the people I cared about leave me one after the other. I’d sworn to myself to never allow anyone else into my heart. And now Leona had changed everything.
“Your expression is a bit on the unsettling side. What’s going on?”
I shook my head in exasperation. I hadn’t been afraid of anyone in a while and here I was being a fucking pussy about this. “Fuck,” I breathed. “I love you.”
She took a small step back, astonishment reflecting on her beautiful face. “I didn’t think you’d say it.”
“You didn’t think I loved you?”
She laughed, then wedged herself between my legs again, bringing us closer and sending a stab of pain through my body from the movement, but I couldn’t have cared less. If I didn’t think it might shove one of my broken ribs into my lungs, I’d have fucked her right then. No, made love to her, God help me.
“After you agreed to a death match, I was fairly sure you did,” she said with a small smile. “But I didn’t think you’d admit to it.”
Sometimes I forgot how well she’d come to know me. That she still wanted to be with me filled my heart with a strange sense of comfort but at the same time with a bone-deep fear I hadn’t felt in a long time. The idea of a death match with Remo hadn’t scared me, death and pain didn’t, but Leona’s love and my love for her: scared me shitless. But it was something I’d just have to deal with because Leona wasn’t going anywhere, and I wouldn’t stop loving her.
