Nikolai A s much as I meant it at the time, I’m not going to kill Derek. Too much is riding on my plan of revenge, but fuck it if I’m letting some vile slime with a penchant for hurting girls touch my Rose. She isn’t his. She’s mine.
I’m going to enjoy killing him, even if he hasn’t touched her. The fact he wants to-and I know a man like him more than wants to-is enough. If a stray bullet hits Finnegan in his knee, or shoulder, then hey, fuck that, too.
It’s taken too long to roll. The thought won’t fucking quit in my head. I know it took us a minute, maybe less, to hit the road, Tony behind the wheel. The call is out, and we’re speeding through Queenstown, enough cops on our payroll to look the other way if they see us.
Tony is an expert, and he knows the backstreets and short cuts so I don’t worry. Everyone is ready for this, converging onto Vitale Lugo’s fucking territory. If he tries to make war-if he fucking survives-let him. I’ll crush him and everyone he’s ever even thought about.
It won’t come to that. I’m killing him and everyone in there.
“You okay, Niko?” Rush asks.
I check both my guns for the tenth time, not trusting myself to look at my cousin. I need a moment. My blood is boiling. I might lose my shit. I don’t want him here, but I couldn’t stop him when he jumped in the car and refused to get out. To stop to argue would have wasted precious seconds, and I can’t afford a single one.
“Fucking dandy.”
He taps on his phone. “There are cars, and most drivers are out now.”
“Most?”
“All that were out there. Some weren’t with the cars.”
I just nod, catching Tony’s gaze as he drives. He’ll take care of Rush for me.
“Uh, the church-”
“Is empty. It’ll be the building to the right, one of the church halls.” Rush looks up at me. “No church is kinda like a fuck you to her as being ‘used,'” I push out.
My phone pings, letting me know my second team arrived. Not being in a church makes it better. I really don’t give a shit, but there are those who view the walls of a corrupt institution as sacred. I suck in a breath and try to calm, even though I’m shaking inside, going insane at the idea that we’re too late.
“But that makes no sense,” says Rush.
Tony mutters something, then swings hard right. “Yeah, it does. It’s a fuck you to her, not to mention to Finnegan. This is how it’s gonna roll, Rush. You and I will take the east, Boss will go in through the front. Teams are waiting, but some might get out.”
“No-”
“My orders,” I say, “my fucking way.”
Tony will keep him safe. I hate losing Tony in this, but my teams are good. Besides, this is my show and Tony is wise enough to know I’m going in, guns fucking blazing, no matter what.
The moment we pull up, I’m out, and the car drives off. I don’t think of my cousin anymore as I struggle to keep the anger at a usable level. The rest of my men are waiting outside the doors.
I take it in. No guns glint from windows in the cool afternoon air. My men have cleaned the street of any bodies already. Behind the windshields of a couple cars, slumped men sit, very dead. My only regret is I didn’t execute them myself.
Signaling, two of my men open the doors to the building and we burst in. At first, we’re in a room with a bunch of men, all armed, and a craziness hits me.
Where the fuck is my Rose? The fucking so-called groom? Her fuckhead of a father?
I just start shooting, working through the men in record time, adrenaline and the need to cause pain coursing through me.
Rose! Where the fuck is Rose?
I leave my men to it and push through heavy doors, gun freshly loaded, just in time for me to see that fat fuck and my gorgeous little Rose, who crumples to the ground.
My stomach pitches sideways as I take it all in. The pitiful fucking wedding turn out. The lack of Derek, all the security, not one asshole there to catch her as she fell.
I don’t think, I just start shooting before they can move. So do my men. There’s more in here than I’d like, and I’m guessing they’re Vitale’s goons. I want them all dead-no survivors-so I go in hard, chest then head shot, over and over again.
This is the saddest fucking wedding ever. The thought goes through my head as I shoot until I have to reload. A bullet whizzes by me, narrowly missing, and I spin, shooting the fuck in the face.
The room is a riot of noise, and I point my gun at Vitale, but before I can pull the trigger, a large man shouts, “Stop or she dies.”
I turn my head. A guard has a gun pointed down at Rose’s limp head.
She isn’t moving.
In seconds, I weigh it up. This is an empty threat. She’s worth too much, and no one on Vitale’s team would dare kill Finnegan’s daughter. I swing my gun and shoot the man between the eyes.
“I’m not good with ultimatums,” I mutter as he falls like a sack of potatoes on top of Rose.
I go for the groom, but he’s gone, ran off during the commotion, probably hiding or looking for a secret exit. The frightened man with the book tries to scrambles away, but I shoot him, too.
Fuck him. Fuck everyone. Fuck Derek for handing her to the piece of shit, Vitale Lugo.
Then I drop, shoving the dead man off Rose, and breathe out at the warmth of her skin, the rise and fall of her chest as I scoop her up. “Let’s move.”
Without wasting another second, I stride out, surrounded by my men, Rose pressed against me. My gun’s still in my hand and she stirs. “Rose, I’ve got you. We’re going home.”
It’s not really her home, but it’s where she belongs right now. It doesn’t take us long to hit the pavement, where one of my men has a limo waiting. It’s highly pimped out in a bulletproof exterior, and the door’s open, like I’m carrying my bride from our fucking wedding instead of a bloodbath.
I don’t need to say a thing as I slide in. He closes the door and gets into the driver’s seat.
Her eyes flutter open, and for a moment, the need and pleasure there make me hard as fuck. Need for me. Pleasure at seeing me. Then it shifts out of focus. She blinks and tries to draw back as distrusts hovers there. Her fucking pupils are too big, and there’s blood at the corner of her mouth, splattered across her white dress. I grip her hips hard as I hold her on my lap, moving her so she straddles me. It’s torture, it’s glorious, and it’s vital.
I need to feel her. She needs to feel me. There. Hard. Real.
I shift my gaze past her to catch the driver’s eye. From the front seat comes Rush’s voice over a speaker. “Well?”
“I’ve got her. I want men out to hunt down Finnegan. Bring him to me.
It’s time we had some words.”
There’s a pause, a crackle, then: “The plan?”
Fuck. I breathe out. “It stands.” I stroke my hand over her hair, and her soft little breaths do something to me. I don’t want to talk to anyone but Rose. I need to make sure she’s all right, and this fucking dress… “Talk. Vitale, on the other hand…”
“Got it, Niko.”
I turn to Rose, capturing her face gently in my fingers, and she winces. The fury in me shoots high. She’s bruised, a little swollen on the side with the trickle of blood. I lean in and lick the blood, then feather my lips over hers.
Rose sighs softly, so warm against me as she sways. My stomach clenches. They’ve definitely drugged her, the cowards. They’ve probably kept her like this all the time we’ve been apart. I don’t know what they gave her or how much, but I’m plotting the deaths of everyone involved. If I can pick them off one by one, I will. If not, the moment I have Derek’s power and assets, I’ll fucking rip them apart barehanded. Speaking of…
Rose is wearing some kind of hideous thing, and she smells like candied flowers. I take hold of the bodice and rip, tearing the dress off, tossing the shredded thing to the floor. She’s naked on my lap.
White hot anger lances me as I brush my fingers over her nipples, not even letting the pleasure of how they peak for me register. Instead, I slide lower. She’s lost weight in the time her father had her. I dip between her thighs. She’s dry, starting to moisten, but she doesn’t wince, doesn’t seem swollen or hurt. What I want is to unleash myself and lay my claim all over again, thrust deep into her, hard. I want to push my fingers inside her and fuck her into an orgasm, but I don’t.
She sways again, and she whispers. “Nikolai, you came for me.”
“Yeah, Rose. You’re mine. Did they hurt you?” I shuck my jacket and pull it around her. “Did they?”
Her eyes darken, her pupils too wide. She can’t quite manage to focus.
“No…he…”
“What?” Keeping my voice calm is one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do.
“He tried to put his fingers in me, but Daddy stopped him.”
Daddy? Fucking Daddy? Her voice is thick and slurred. My blood turns to solid ice.
“Call Tony,” I bark at the driver.
A few seconds later I hear, “Boss?”
“When you get Vitale, I want him alive and brought to me. Understood?”
She touches my face with trembling fingers, and my attention is back with little Rose. “You left me with them, Nikolai. Just…collateral dam…” Then her eyes flutter shut, and she slumps down.
Collateral damage. It’s what I told her she was to me-all she was to me. It isn’t true.
I’m going to enjoy ending one Vitale Lugo. Her father? Oh, that’s going to be drawn out and more painful than I ever imagined.