Dad and Dante didn’t come home that evening. They would spend the night in the safe house. Safe house. What a name for a house to torture enemies.
After Samuel had made sure I was okay, he drove back there as well. Maybe they were worried Remo might manage to escape or maybe they wanted to keep torturing him throughout the night. Probably the latter.
I grabbed a bag and packed a few things for Greta and Nevio. Then I walked down into the basement where we kept our weapons as well as other necessities in case of an attack. I perused the display of guns and knives. I strapped a gun holster to my chest over my T-shirt. It allowed me to strap a gun and a knife to my sides as well as another gun to my back. Just to be on the safe side, I added a knife holster to my calf. I had chosen loose linen pants for the occasion just for that purpose. After that I rummaged through the medical supplies. Samuel had explained everything to me so I was prepared if something happened, not so I could use it against them. I grabbed a syringe with adrenaline and one with a sedative. After I’d put on my thick cardigan, I stuffed the syringes into its pockets and returned upstairs.
It was quiet in the house. Sofia was probably reading in her room before bed, and Mom was most likely doing the same.
The bodyguards were in their quarters in the back of the house, and two were guarding the fence surrounding the garden. I put on comfortable sneakers then headed for the nursery.
I considered going to my mother, saying goodbye, apologizing for what I was about to do, but words would never be enough to explain my betrayal. Words were too insignificant. They would never understand. I’d try to call her later, once we were safe.
Lifting the bag over one shoulder, I grabbed Nevio and Greta before I made my way out of the nursery, moving quietly.
I froze when I spotted Sofia standing in her doorway in her pink nightgown, brown hair disheveled. Her eyes took in everything and a small frown drew her brows together. “Where are you going?”
I considered what to tell her, how to explain to a twelve-year-old what I had done and was about to do. “I’m leaving. I have to.”
Sofia’s eyes widened, and she padded toward me with bare feet. “Because of Greta and Nevio?”
I nodded. She was young but she wasn’t as oblivious as we all wanted to believe. She stopped right in front of me. “You’re leaving us.”
I swallowed hard. “I have to, ladybug. For my babies. I want them to be safe and happy. I need to protect them from the whispers.”
Sofia regarded my twins. She leaned forward and kissed each of them on the cheek, her eyes filling with tears as she peered up at me. My heart clenched tightly. “I know what people say about them, and I hate it. But I don’t want you to go …” Her voice broke.
“I know.” I tried to hold back my emotions. “Give me a hug.”
She wrapped her arms around me and the twins, and we remained like that for a moment. “Don’t tell anyone, please.”
She pulled back with a knowing look. “You’re going to return to their father?”
I nodded, a half-truth, but Sofia didn’t need to know that our family and her future husband were currently torturing the man she was referring to.
“Do you love him?”
“I don’t know,” I admitted. Sofia looked confused for a moment, but then she nodded, biting her lip, more tears gathering in her eyes. “Dad won’t allow me to see you anymore, will he?”
I swallowed. “I hope one day he’ll understand.”
“I’ll miss you.”
“I’ll miss you too. I’ll try to contact you. Remember I love you.”
She nodded, tears trailing down her cheeks. I quickly turned before I lost it. I could feel Sofia’s eyes on me as I walked downstairs. The light from upstairs illuminated my path as I headed into the garage. I put Nevio and Greta into their car seats then slipped behind the steering wheel. The guns were digging uncomfortably into my back and side. The garage door slid up, and I pulled out and steered the car down the long driveway. I pressed the button for the gate and it opened.
A guard stepped in front of the gate, and I had to pull to a stop or run him over.
The windows were tinted, so he couldn’t see the kids on the backseat. I let down the window a gap.
“Miss Mione, nobody informed us you’d be leaving.”
“I’m informing you now,” I said firmly.
He frowned. “I’ll have to ask the boss.”
I scowled. “Get out of my way. I’m driving over to the safe house to kill the man who raped and tortured me.”
His eyes grew wide, and he lowered his gaze, the shame of all Outfit soldiers reflecting clearly on his face. “I’ll have to make a quick call.”
He lifted his phone to his ear, and I considered hitting the gas. He lowered the phone, touched the screen again then lifted it once more. “Samuel, I can’t reach your father. Your sister is at the gate, trying to leave.”
He held the phone out to me. I took it with a glare.
“Fina, what’s going on?”
“Tell him to let me leave.”
“Fina.”
“I’m coming over. I need to … I need to see what you’re doing. You owe it to me, Sam.”
Guilt sliced through me, but I shoved it back.
“You should take a bodyguard with you.”
“Sam,” I whispered harshly. “Let me leave. Do you want me to beg? I’ve done enough of that, trust me.” A lie, one I’d never wanted to use on Samuel.
He sighed. “Okay. But right now we’re not doing anything. Dad, Danilo, and Dante are catching some shut-eye. It’s been a long day.”
“I’ll be there in fifteen minutes. Let them sleep for now. They don’t need to know I’m coming over yet. You know how Dad can be.”
I handed the phone back to the guard and after an order from my brother, he finally let me through.
Samuel was waiting for me outside the safe house when I pulled up. I programmed the heating so it would keep the car warm for my babies before I exited. Samuel regarded me with a deep frown. He was wearing a different shirt than last time I saw him, and as I got closer, I noticed the red under his fingernails. He wrapped an arm around my shoulders, and for a moment I tensed because I worried he could feel the holster, but his arm was too high up and my cardigan too thick. He led me inside. My eyes searched the main area.
“They’re in the sleep area upstairs. Do you want me to wake them?”
“No,” I said quickly. My eyes were drawn to the screen. It showed Remo lying on the floor, not moving. I tried to gauge the angle. Samuel followed my gaze. “We’ll continue in about an hour.”
I raised my eyes to his. Dark shadows spread under his eyes. “You look like you should get some sleep.”
“Someone’s got to keep watch.”
“He doesn’t look like he can do anything.”
Samuel’s lips curled. “He’s a tough fucker.” His expression softened. “But we’ll get him to beg. At some point, even he will break.”
I doubted it but we’d never find out. “Do you have something to drink for me?”
Samuel nodded and walked over to the table in the corner. I took out the syringe before I followed him. “Water okay?” he asked as I stopped close beside him.
I touched his chest. “I’m sorry, Sam.” His brows snapped together in confusion, and I shoved the needle into his thigh.
Sam jerked. “Fina? What?” But he was already staggering, his eyelids drooping. I clung to him, trying to stop him from falling and injuring himself, but he was too heavy. He sank to the ground. His eyes began to lose focus. I bent over him and kissed his forehead. “I hope you’ll forgive me one day.”
I stepped into the torture room, my eyes landing on Remo. He was sprawled out on the floor, lying in his own blood, naked except for black briefs, his arms and legs tied to hooks in the ground with rope. Bruises and cuts littered almost every inch of him. On the table to the right, I could see torture tools. The knives covered in blood, but some of the others were still pristine and untouched, waiting for their purpose.
Remo’s eyes peeled open in his blood-covered face, and they knocked the breath out of me again.
A dark smile twisted his mouth, but there was an emotion in his eyes that tightened my stomach. “Angel, have you come to watch your family cut off my dick? I hear that’s scheduled for today.”
I crept closer to him, my sneakers trudging through his blood covering the rough floor. My steps didn’t falter. Blood did nothing to me. Not anymore.
Remo regarded me quietly. His eyes slid down my arm to the tip of the knife peeking out from my long cardigan sleeve. “Or have you come to do it yourself?”
I stopped right above Remo. Even though he was on his back, cut and bruised, covered in his own blood, he appeared powerful. Remo couldn’t be broken because he didn’t fear pain or death.
Was this love? Or madness?
I sank down to my knees beside him, kneeling on the sticky floor, my white linen pants soaking up the blood greedily. My pants soon stuck to my skin with Remo’s blood. “No,” I whispered, finally answering him.
Remo’s eyes traced my face. He looked almost at peace. “To kill me?”
I tilted my head, regarding him. Remo was Nevio. Nevio was Remo. As if they had been carved from the same template. My children were the spitting image of their father. Even if I didn’t have feelings for the man before me, I could never kill him because the faces of Greta and Nevio would remind me of him every day of my life.
“I always thought it was meant to be that way. Your hand ending my life.”
I shook my head. “I won’t kill you.” I leaned over Remo, my fingers spreading through his blood on the ground, my hair dipping in it. So much blood.
“You didn’t marry Danilo,” Remo murmured.
“How could I?” I whispered, bending low until Remo and I were almost touching. “How could I marry him when I was pregnant with your children?”
Remo stiffened. I’d wondered how he would react if I ever told him about Greta and Nevio, but nothing came close to the look on his face. Complete and utter shock, and more than that … wonder.
“When you gave me up, I carried your babies in me, Remo. You gave us up.”
“I thought you’d return to me,” he rasped.
“You pushed me away.”
“I set you free.”
“I wasn’t free,” I hissed. How could I ever be free when his name was etched into my heart?
“You were pregnant,” he said quietly.
“I was pregnant, a living breathing reminder of the greatest failure of the Outfit, a living breathing reminder of something dark and shameful. A reminder that you took something from the Outfit, took something from me. That’s what everyone thought. My family and everyone else in the Outfit. I knew giving birth to a child of yours would ruin any chance I had to find my way back into the Outfit, back into my family. I knew I’d seal my fate if I had your child. I’d be damned to live a life of pity stares and disgusted expressions.”
Something flickered in Remo’s eyes. Dread, maybe even fear. “You got rid of the babies.” And his voice wavered ever so slightly.
A cruel, unbreakable man.
My nemesis, my captor, the man who took everything from me and without knowing it gave me the greatest gift of all.
I’d always wondered what it would take to break Remo, and I realized I held the power to do it, to crush the cruelest, strongest man I knew in my hand, held it on the tip of my tongue. One word would shatter him. The knowledge filled me with unparalleled joy, not because I could break the man before me. No, because our children even without knowing them meant so much to him that their death would destroy him.
“Oh, Angel, have they sent you to deliver the ultimate blow? Tell Dante he wins.”
I shook my head. “No,” I said quietly, then fiercer, “No. I didn’t get rid of the babies even though everyone wanted me to do it.”
Remo held my gaze.
“How could I get rid of the most beautiful creation I can imagine? Greta and Nevio are pure perfection, Remo.”
He exhaled, and the look in his eyes … God, that look. This cruel man had stolen my heart, and I had let him.
“They look like you. Nevio is you. Everyone who sees him knows he’s yours.”
Remo smiled the darkest, saddest smile I have ever seen. “Have you come to tell me before my death that I’ll never see them? Angel, I must say you are crueler than I could ever be.”
I linked my fingers with his bloody ones, the blade cupped between our palms. “Our children are perfection but here, in the Outfit, they represent shame and dishonor. People whisper behind their backs, call them Falcones as if it is something sinful, something dirty. Our children are beautiful.” My voice became fiercer with every word. “They are meant to hold their heads high, not be ashamed for who they are. They aren’t meant to bow, aren’t meant to live in the shadows. They are meant to rule. They are Falcones. They belong in Las Vegas where their names carry power and respect. They are meant to rule at the side of the cruelest, bravest man I know. Their father.”
Remo didn’t say anything but his expression set me aflame with emotion.
“How badly injured are you?” I whispered in his ear.
“Badly,” he admitted.
I nodded, my throat tightening. I reached for the syringe in my pocket and pulled it out. “Adrenaline.”
Remo’s mouth pulled wider. I injected him with the liquid and he shuddered. His pupils were dilated when he met my gaze again.
My lips brushed his lightly. “How strong are you, Remo Falcone?”
“Strong enough to take you and our children home where you all belong, Angel.”
I smiled. I wedged the blade under the rope. “Swear not to kill my family. Not my brother, not my father, not my uncle. Swear it on our children, Remo.”
“I swear it,” he murmured. I cut through the rope when I heard the creak of the door. I dropped the knife in Remo’s now free hand.
“Serafina, get the fuck away from the asshole!” Danilo growled, gripping me by the shoulders and pulling me to my feet. I whirled around on him, getting in his face. “Don’t tell me what to do. I have a right to be here.”
Danilo was breathing harshly, his chest heaving. I took a step back, closer to Remo again. Dante and my father stepped in. I shielded Remo mostly from their view but that wouldn’t last long.
“You shouldn’t be here, dove. This isn’t something for a woman,” Dad said gently.
He still believed in my innocence, but Dante and Danilo regarded me more cautiously. “Where’s Samuel?” Dante asked.
I wrapped my arms around my body and slid my hands beneath my cardigan, my fingers curling around the gun strapped to the holster there.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered and pulled the gun on them.
Dante put his hand on his gun at his waist but didn’t pull it. My father and Danilo were completely frozen.
“Samuel’s going to be okay. He’s knocked out behind the sofa.”
“Fina,” Dad said in a soothing voice. “You’ve been through a lot. Put down the gun.”
I took another step back, releasing the safety catch. “I’m sorry,” I said again, biting back tears, thinking of Samuel, of what he would think once he woke up. In my peripheral vision, Remo cut through the last rope around his ankle.
Dante pulled his gun and so did Danilo, but I barred their view of Remo. They wouldn’t shoot me, not even now that I was holding them at gunpoint. I was a woman, someone to protect. I was their responsibility and their failure. Remo staggered to his feet behind me, and Danilo aimed. I shot at him, nicking the outside of his upper arm. He gasped, his eyes flashing at me.
“Not a single move,” I warned. Remo pressed up behind me, as usual not heeding any safety measures, towering a head over me. “We only want to leave. No one has to get hurt,” I whispered.
Remo reached for my gun but I shook my head. “My back,” I told him. His hand slid under my cardigan and pulled the gun from there.
“Dove,” Dad croaked. “You don’t owe this man anything. He raped you. I know emotions can get confused in a situation like this, but we have people who can help you.”
I smiled sadly at him and then Samuel stumbled inside, holding on to the doorframe. I hadn’t dared use a higher dose on him than was absolutely necessary; obviously it wasn’t enough. He stared at me uncomprehendingly, his arm with his gun hanging limply at his side. My twin, my confidante. For most of my life I had been sure my love for Samuel, for my twin, could never be challenged, and I still loved him, loved him so much the look of betrayal on his face splintered me in half, but now there were my children and the man behind me.
Remo’s gaze moved from me to him, and he touched my hip. I swallowed the rising emotion.
“Please let us leave, Uncle,” I addressed Dante. “This war is because of me, and I can tell you I don’t want it. I don’t want to be avenged. Don’t rob my children of their father. I’ll go to Las Vegas with Remo where I belong, where my kids belong. Please, if you feel guilty for what happened to me, if you want to save me, then do this. Let me return to Vegas with Remo. This doesn’t have to be an endless spiral of bloodshed. It can end today. For your children, for mine. Let us leave.”
Dante’s cold eyes were on Remo, not me. “Is she speaking in the name of the Camorra?”
Remo’s grip on my hip tightened. “She does. You breached my territory, and I breached yours. We’re even.”
“We’re not!” Samuel roared, stepping forward, swaying. Remo lifted his gun a couple of inches. “You kidnapped my sister and broke her. You twisted her into your fucking marionette. We won’t be done until I’m standing over your disemboweled corpse so my sister is finally free of you.”
“Sam,” I choked. “Don’t do this. I know you don’t understand, but I need to return to Vegas with Remo, for myself, but more importantly for my children.”
“I knew you should have gotten rid of them,” Samuel rasped, his eyes glassy. Remo’s hand on my hip jerked and I knew without the promise he’d given me, he would have killed my brother for his words.
Dad came up behind Samuel and put his hand on his shoulder. “Send them with him to Las Vegas. They are Falcones, but you aren’t Fina. Be free of them and him. You can start a new life.”
“Where my children go, I will go,” I said. “Don’t you think I’ve suffered enough for all of your sins? Don’t turn me into another pawn in your chess game. Set me free.”
Realization settled in Sam’s eyes, and it broke my heart. I ached, ached for my family who would never understand. I could only hope they’d come to hate me one day so they didn’t miss me anymore. Remo’s grip on my hip loosened. Even the adrenaline wouldn’t keep him on his feet for an endless amount of time. He was too injured for that.
“Let us leave. You failed me once, and now I’m lost to you. But please allow me to bring my children to a family that will love them. Allow me to bring my children home. You owe it to me.”
Danilo made a disbelieving sound, his hand around his gun tightening.
I hated myself for playing the guilt card, but I knew it was our only chance. For Remo to get out of here alive, I had to hurt the family I loved.
Dante’s cold eyes met mine. “If I allow you to leave today, you are a traitor. You won’t be part of the Outfit. You will be the enemy. You won’t see your family again. There won’t be peace with the Camorra. This war has only begun.”
Samuel heaved a deep breath, his eyes begging me to reconsider. Could I live without him?
“When will this war ever end, Uncle?” I asked quietly. He looked at Remo, and I knew what he would say. “Never,” I whispered the answer.
Dante inclined his head. Dad looked at me as if this was the final goodbye, a daughter lost for good.
“Leave,” Dante said coldly.
Danilo shook his head incredulously. “You can’t be serious, Dante. You can’t let them go.”
Dante glanced at my ex-fiancé, looking tired.
“Set me free,” I said softly.
“Leave.”
Relief and wistfulness slammed into me hearing that word. “Thank you.”
Dante shook his head. “Don’t thank me. Not for that.”
Remo nudged me lightly, and I walked closer to the door, keeping my body between him and the others. I walked backward to keep an eye on my family. They didn’t attack. They didn’t stop us. Dad and Samuel looked broken. I had landed the ultimate hit, had broken them. I wondered how Mom would react when she found out. She’d be crushed. My heart was heavy as I led Remo to the parked car. He sank down on the passenger seat, passing out immediately. I closed the door and got behind the steering wheel. Greta and Nevio were still fast asleep in their seats.
I hit the gas and sent the car flying down the long gravel road. I quickly connected to Bluetooth and called the Sugar Trap. It was the only number I’d found on the Internet.
It took a while before the guy I talked to agreed to call Nino and to give him my number. I was starting to go crazy.
Remo wouldn’t survive if I had to drive all the way to Vegas with him, and I couldn’t take him to a hospital in Outfit territory. What if my family got over their initial shock and decided to get rid of us after all? I needed to reach Camorra territory.
My pulse spiked when my phone finally rang. I picked up after the second ring.
“Is he dead?” Nino asked at once.
I glanced at Remo who was slumped against the passenger door, breathing shallowly.
“Not yet,” I got out.
Nino was quiet for a moment. “Did you call to gloat? To let me hear my brother’s last screams?”
That’s what he thought?
“I’m in a car with him. We got out. We’re on our way.”
“You got him out?” Nino asked sharply. “Where are you? We’re taking a helicopter and meeting you halfway. We’re in Kansas City. I’ll calculate the best spot now.”
I told him where I was heading, and we agreed on a meeting place eighty miles from where I was.
“He’s badly injured,” I said quietly.
“Remo is too strong to die,” Nino said.
Tears stung in my eyes. “I’m driving as quickly as I can.”
“Serafina,” Nino began. “He thought you’d come back. He wanted you to come back on your own free will.”
I swallowed. This wasn’t about Remo and me. This was about my children, and yet my chest ached with emotions as I regarded the man beside me. His dark hair sticking to his bloody forehead. “I need to drive,” I said and hung up.
About one hour later I steered the car toward a deserted parking lot where a helicopter was already waiting. Nino and Savio stood beside it. I’d hoped Fabiano would be there. I trusted him more than these two.
I came to a stop. They had their guns out, not trusting me. And I didn’t trust them either, but Remo was barely breathing. I gripped my gun and pushed out of the car. Nino approached, as usual a blank expression on his face. I had my gun pointed at him like he had his pointed at me. Of course, with his skills I’d be dead before my finger as much as twitched on the trigger.
I lowered my gun and walked toward the passenger door, opening it. Nino still regarded me cautiously. Savio came up behind him, his gun at his side, not pointed at me. “Will you help me? Or do you want Remo to die?”
Nino moved forward and the second he saw his brother, he shoved the gun into his holster and rushed to my side. He quickly checked Remo then gripped him under the arms. Remo groaned. Savio took his legs and they were about to lift him out when Greta woke and let out an earsplitting cry upon seeing two men she didn’t know. Nino and Savio both jerked their heads back then froze. Nevio had also awoken and his dark eyes stared back at them. My small Remo.
“Holy fuck,” Savio gasped. His brown eyes flew up to me. “They are Remo’s.”
It wasn’t a question because one look at Nevio and they knew he was their brother’s. “They are and he passed out before he could see them.” My throat constricted.
Nino held my gaze for a moment and I knew then that I wouldn’t regret my decision because already now I could see that my kids would be Falcones.
“Quick,” Nino muttered, and he and Savio carried Remo over to the helicopter.
My heart thundering in my chest, I walked to the back door and opened it to unbuckle Nevio and Greta. “Shh,” I soothed my daughter. Nevio looked merely curious and a little sleepy.
“Do you need help?” Savio asked close behind me, surprising me.
I looked over my shoulder, hesitating, my protectiveness rearing its head.
“Don’t give me that look. Your kids are safe. They will always be safe, and not just because Remo would kill me if something happened to them.”
I nodded. “Can you take Nevio? Greta doesn’t like to be held by anyone but me.”
Savio moved to the other door, opened it, and bent over Nevio, who regarded him with big dark eyes. “I’ve never held a baby,” Savio said reluctantly.
“Speak to him soothingly and lift him against your chest. He can support his head by himself.”
“Hey, Nevio,” Savio said as he slid his hands under Nevio’s armpits and carefully lifted him. It looked as if was holding a bomb about to detonate, but I was glad he was being careful. I hadn’t thought Savio could be like that.
I turned to Greta and quickly lifted her as well then straightened to keep an eye on Savio. He held Nevio against his chest, and my son seemed content to be held by the unknown man. Savio’s eyes were curious and fascinated as he looked down at my boy. No resentment, no associated shame.
Together we walked toward the helicopter. Greta pressed herself against me from the noise of the rotor blades. Nino was bent over Remo inside the helicopter. Remo was already getting a blood transfusion and another IV with a clear liquid while Nino felt his body.
A man I didn’t know was in the cockpit.
Nino turned to us when Savio held Nevio out to him. He grabbed my boy immediately, a strange look on his face as he regarded him. Savio climbed in and held out his hand for me. I awkwardly got in with Greta still clinging to me for dear life.
I sank down on the bench, and Savio helped me buckle up. Nino handed Nevio back to him and Savio sat beside me. Nino’s eyes kept darting between Nevio and Greta, as if he couldn’t comprehend what he was seeing. The moment the helicopter lifted off, Nino returned to Remo’s side.
Nevio stared down at his father, then at me, and I swallowed the emotion. What if Remo died before he could see his kids? What if my children never met their father?
I’d never expected Remo to want his children, but now that I knew he did, guilt washed over me. I thought I protected them by keeping them from him, by staying in the Outfit, but I had been wrong. Las Vegas was their home because it was Remo’s home.
