Page 45 of Deadly Alliance
A terrible, ringing silence, broken only by the hiss of the rain through the shattered windows and the ticking of the overheated engine.
I am trapped beneath a mountain of heavy, unmoving muscle. It’s completely dark, the smell of blood and rain is suffocating me.
"Cassio?" I whisper, my voice trembling, tears mixing with the glass dust coating my face.
He doesn't answer.
His weight feels different. It is the dead, slack weight of unconsciousness.
"Cassio!" I scream, panic tearing my throat apart. I try to push against his chest, but he is too heavy. My hands slip against the fabric of his white shirt.
It’s wet.
Not with rain. With something thick, hot, and sticky.
"Boss!" Matteo’s voice is frantic, muffled by the ringing in my ears. I hear the sound of his door being kicked open, the crunch of glass under his boots. "Dante, cover the ridge! Boss, talk to me!"
The rear door is wrenched open. Cold wind and rain blast into the ruined cabin. Matteo’s hands grab Cassio’s shoulders, hauling his heavy, slack body off me.
I gasp for air, sitting up frantically.
Cassio slumps back against the torn leather seat, his head lolling to the side. His eyes are closed, his face is deathly pale in the flashing tactical lights of the approaching perimeter guards.
And blooming across the right side of his chest, just below his collarbone, is a massive, dark, expanding stain of blood.
He took the bullet. He took the sniper round meant to tear through the cabin, shielding me with his own body.
"No, no, no, no," I chant, a hysterical, broken sob ripping from my chest. I scramble across the seat, pressing my hands frantically against the bleeding wound, trying to stop the dark flood spilling through his ruined shirt. The blood is hot, slipping between my fingers.
"Get him out!" Matteo roars at the arriving guards. "Get him to the safe room! Call the fucking surgeon!"
Strong hands grab me, pulling me out of the shattered wreckage of the Maybach, but I fight them. I scream his name, my voice is raw and bleeding, the rain washes his blood down my arms.
He promised he would protect what was his. He promised no one would ever touch me.
Cassio.
17
Noemi
The heavy iron gates of the Vellutini estate scream open, and Dante doesn’t even slow down. The ruined, bullet-riddled Maybach tears up the winding driveway, the shredded tires grinding agonizingly against the asphalt. Sparks fly in the rearview mirror, but all I can see, all I can feel, is the heavy, lifeless weight of the man crushing me into the backseat.
Cassio is entirely motionless.
The heat radiating from his massive body is completely swallowed by the slick, terrifying warmth of the blood pouring from his chest. It soaks through his pristine white shirt, soaking into the emerald silk of my dress, coating my bare arms, my hands, my trembling thighs. The metallic, sickly-sweet stench ofcopper fills the cramped, airless cabin, choking the oxygen out of my lungs.
The car violently jerks to a halt in front of the grand steps of the main entrance.
Before the engine even cuts off, the doors are ripped open. A dozen armed guards swarm the vehicle, their tactical flashlights slicing through the blinding rain. The shouting is deafening, a chaotic, panicked roar of Sicilian curses and frantic orders.
"Get him out! Get him the fuck out of the car!" Matteo roars, his voice cracking with a terror I have never heard from the stoic underboss.
Strong hands reach into the darkness. They grab Cassio’s broad shoulders, his belt, his arms, violently hauling his massive frame off me. The sudden absence of his weight leaves me gasping for air, but the cold wind whipping into the cabin feels like ice against my blood-soaked skin.
I scramble out after them, my high heels catching on the shattered ballistic glass covering the floorboards. A guard grabs my arm to steady me, but I violently yank myself free, stumbling blindly up the marble steps into the blazing light of the grand foyer.
It’s an absolute madhouse.
