Strapped: A Second Chance Mafia Romance (20 page)

I
really don’t want
to take Sophia out to meet her friend, somewhere that she will exposed and vulnerable, but I also know that it might go some way to making her feel a little better about everything. Hanging out with my friends worry-free had worked wonders for my mood, and I really want the same for her.

It’s way against my better judgment, but I want to be a good husband, I want my wife to be happy. I need to do something to lift her black mood.

It’s utterly heartbreaking that she’s so in denial about her people, but at the same time I know that if I were in the same position, I would likely be doubtful too. It’s hard to imagine that your family, the people you’ve grown up around and that you’ve known your entire life, aren’t who you believed them to be, but at the same time sometimes it’s essential.

I don’t want Sophia to have to find out the truth the hard way, but I don’t know how else I can explain it to her. She rightfully doesn’t fully trust me, and I don’t know how I can change that.

I glance over to her, sitting in the passenger seat of my car, and she’s gazing out of the window with a morose look in her eyes. One that I would do anything to get rid of. She’s been through so much in the last few weeks, more than most people have to experience in their entire lives.

What a fucking mess!

“Where is this place?” I ask her, wanting to pull her from her thoughts for a second. I can’t stand that sad look on her face. “Is it near here?”

“It’s just around the corner,” she tells me. “Hopefully she’ll be waiting outside for me…”

As she tries to find the girl that I can vaguely remember from our wedding, I make a decision to myself. She’s being too trusting, and I disagree with that. I fully intended to drop her off and pick her up as promised, but now I don’t think that I’ll be happy doing that. I decide to park the car up somewhere secretly and to trail her with this girl. Hopefully, it’ll all be fine and I’ll find myself worrying about nothing, but I’d
much
rather be safe than sorry.

“Oh, there she is!” She cries happily, and I pull the car over to let her out. She slides out of the seat quickly, almost forgetting all about me as she races across the road to throw her arms around her friend. I’m happy for her, but sad that she can just drop me without a second thought too.

Once they’re both safely inside the café, I pull my car in around a side road. The entire time my heart is pounding and my mind is racing. I realize that I can’t stand her being out of my sight for even a second. It’s horrible, I keep picturing terrible things happening to her and it’s driving me insane…

But I very quickly find them sitting at a table by the window in the café, drinking coffee and laughing and chatting casually, as if they have no troubles whatsoever. I let out a breath that I hadn't even realized I was holding, and I take a seat in a bus stop opposite, hoping to remain inconspicuous. I’m used to spying on people, it’s always been a big part of my job, but I’ve never felt so guilty about it. This time it feels really wrong.

After a while, they exit the building and I half expect my phone to ring with Sophia wanting to be picked up, but then they carry on their journey, just walking and talking, until they reach the nearest park. It’s a little easier to stay hidden there, behind all of the trees and foliage, but it’s also more challenging to keep them within my sights too. Which is how they get around a corner, just under a nearby bridge, way before me, and by the time I spot them again, two men have their arms wrapped tightly around Sophia.

She’s being threatened, kidnapped all over again, and I’ve done nothing to stop it!

I race forward, listening to her terrified yells. My mind is only on her, and getting her free. No one else even comes into consideration. The rest of the world vanishes, leaving only me and her – plus the danger surrounding us both.

“What the fuck is going on here?” I yell, knocking someone – probably the friend – to one side. “What the fuck are you trying this time? Did those other fuckers not warn you?” These men definitely aren’t the same as the dickheads that burst into my apartment, which suggests that the entire Irish mob is after Sophia – and they’ll stop at nothing to get her.

“Just fuck off,” one of them growls, practically spitting at me. “This is none of your business.”

I start shaking with anger as they blatantly underestimate me. Do they have no idea who the fuck I am and what I can do? They aren’t even looking at me, which suggests that they are treating me as nothing more than an irritating fly.

“Sophia is my wife,” I yell. “She’s
all
of my business, so why don’t you back the hell off?”

As a response to me, the bigger one grabs Sophia all on his own, and he twists her arm painfully behind her back, all the while staring me right in the eyes. He’s teasing me, taunting me, and I’m growing a red mist of anger that’s slowly controlling everything I do.

I grip the gun in my belt, and I watch the other man imitate my actions, knowing exactly what I’m doing. I try to calm my breathing, to steady myself, because I don’t want to do anything that will end up getting me or Sophia killed too. I need to live – we both do. I won’t let these freaks end that.

I glance at all of the people under this bridge in turn. There’s the beefcake who is doing his best to harm Sophia and wind me up, there’s the scrawnier guy who’s showing me the glint of metal sticking out from his waistband, and there’s the girl. As I turn to see her, I spot a nastier expression on her face than I’m expecting. I thought I would see her scared, upset, a total mess… but she’s smirking.

She’s a part of this.

She set her friend up.

She’s deeply involved in all of this… she isn’t who Sophia thinks she is.

I could take her too, do some damage to her in retaliation for Sophia, but I know how quickly that game can escalate and I really don’t want to do anything stupid.

Tick, tick, tick.

Time passes by slowly, each second feels like an hour, as the cogs whir in my brain. I can clearly see the terrified expression on my wife’s face which makes me realize that I’m not being left with many options. I need to act quickly before anything drastic happens.

“Let her go right now,” I say calmly. “And I won’t fucking kill you.”

The men laugh happily together, as if I’ve said the funniest thing in the world. “Two against one?” One of them asks. “Really?”

“It was two against one last time,” I shrug casually. “Those two twats didn’t cause me too many problems.”

Then I see it in the corner of my eye – the gun being whipped out. That’s okay, I’m used to gun fights, and I’m still standing, which tells me something. I’ve not lost yet.

I yank the gun from my jeans too, and I pop the beefcake in the head, not wanting to take any risks with that one, and before the other guy can even react, I have spun on my heels and shot him in the stomach too.

“Argh,” he yells out in agony, tumbling to the ground, dropping the gun in the process. “Fuck!”

“Freddie!” A shriek bursts from the other girl’s chest as she races over to the guy. As she does, something clicks into place in my brain – this chick picked her boyfriend over her best friend. She risked Sophia’s life for something that I’m pretty sure she doesn’t really understand, just for some guy that she’s banging.

But I don’t have time to worry about that.

“Sophia? Are you okay?” I rush to her side as the big guy collapses behind her, dying quickly, freeing her. I grab onto her before she falls too, and she collapses against me, sobbing and shaking with fear. “Are you okay? Oh my God…”

I suddenly panic, realizing what I’ve just done. I made a rash decision to kill the man threatening Sophia, to save her life, but now she might view me as a monster. It’ll make her realize just how deeply involved in this violence I am and always have been, and it could put her off me for life.

But she’s okay… just focus on the positive.

As sound starts to infiltrate my ears once more, I notice the guy and girl talking tenderly to one another behind me, and the anger consumes me once me.

I lean Sophia back against the nearest wall, and I stand up to tower over them, instantly spotting the pool of blood surrounding the guy. He might not have long to live anyway, especially if he doesn’t get medical attention soon, and I feel conflicted about that. On the one hand I really want him to die, but on the other I don’t want to be a total dick about it. Not again, not in front of Sophia.

“I should fucking shoot you now,” I hiss at him, ignoring his girlfriend. “You fucking prick. Do you know how much she trusted you… all of you? And you betray her like this?”

I hold the gun up once more, aiming at his head, but the girl starts to scream and cry, a terrifying sound that actually cuts deep within me.

“No, no, don’t!” She throws her body over his, protecting him. “I need him, I love him. He won’t do anything again, I promise. This is all… it’s a misunderstanding.” She’s lying, I can see it, but people will say anything when they’re desperate.

“I should kill you too,” I respond. I have no intention of following through with that, but I want to put the fear of God into her, and from the way she crumples into sobs, I’ve achieved my goal. “But I won’t. I’m going to let you both live, but you go back and you tell your people to back the fuck off. Messing with us won’t get you anywhere, you
will
end up losing, and you’ll all end up dead.”

“Okay, okay,” she agrees gratefully. “Thank you so much.”

I turn to go back to Sophia, but before I do, I just have one more thing to say.

“You most of all should be ashamed of yourself,” I tell the girl. “Sophia just lost her father, and she was so excited to have someone to confide in, someone who has always been there for her. You betrayed her. You were going to let her get killed.” Guilt crosses her expression, and I know that I’ve gotten to her at least a little bit. “I hope that thought keeps you up at night.”

With that, I scoop Sophia up into my arms, and I carry her away from the scene. I half expect her to fight me, to try and get away from the beast that I am, but she grips onto me gratefully, resting herself against me.

I didn’t want her to have a hard lesson like that, but maybe it’ll help her see the truth now. I hope she realizes that she might not be able to trust everyone, but she can definitely trust me.

“
P
ut me down
,” I eventually pant as soon as I can be sure that we’re a safe distance away from all of that nightmare. It’s not that I want to be away from Enzo exactly – although what I saw him do was truly shocking – I just need a moment to myself. I just need a second to process all of that.

“Hang on, I’ll just take you into this clearing here where we can be alone.” As soon as my feet hit the ground, I start pacing, letting everything come out. It all comes spilling past my lips like garbage, and I can’t do anything to stop it.

“Oh my God Enzo, what the fuck is going on? Everything was so normal, I didn’t suspect Arial at all… then those guys jumped me, and they said something about Aiden killing my dad… was that what you meant when you told me that he couldn’t be trusted?”

I watch Enzo’s face go through a range of emotions, which already answers the question before he nods. I want to ask why he didn’t just tell me, but I already know the answer. I didn’t believe him anyway, and that would have been one step too far. I would have gone mental, I would have run away in an instant.

He did it to protect me.

I try to gulp down at least some of the crazy emotion that’s coursing right through me, but I don’t do a very good job of it, so instead I find myself still talking. “I just can’t believe that Arial did that to me. Why would she want me killed? Why is she getting involved in things that aren’t any of her business?”

“Because of Freddie,” Enzo tells me simply. “She loves him. She raced to him and begged me not to hurt him.”

I obviously didn’t see any of this because I went into shock. As soon as Enzo fired that gun and the guy grabbing me slumped to the ground, everything vanished. I found myself sitting in a black hole of nothingness until Enzo grabbed onto me once more.

“Freddie?” I ask questioningly. He must have been the guy that I heard on the other end of the phone this morning, but that doesn’t make any sense. When I asked Arial about her mystery man, she said it was someone that she’d been dating in secret for a year, and that she wasn’t quite ready to reveal his identity yet...

My birthday party!

I suddenly remember my seventeenth birthday party that was held in my home. A lot of my friends were there, but so were my dad’s men. It had been a crazy night, and one of the girls from school snuck in a bottle of vodka, so under the noses of my parents I got wasted. It wasn’t much fun to be honest, but it felt like a youthful rite of passage at the time.

Now I remember wondering where Arial disappeared to halfway through the night, but at the time I’d been too drunk to do much about it.

She must have met him there and then. They must have been together ever since. Had they been planning on overthrowing my family and killing my dad from back then? Was that the only reason she continued to be my friend?

Suddenly nothing makes sense anymore.

Nothing except for the man standing in front of me – the one who will do anything to protect me.

I step forward and I pull him into a hug, wanting to cling onto him forever. This man is supposed to be the enemy, but somehow he’s the only one who’s been honest with me. Clearly I have none of my old friends and family anymore – I don’t even know if I can trust my mom, I know how easily she’s swayed, but that’s something that I’ll have to deal with at another time. But Enzo is constant. Enzo has always been the same.

He’s my husband, and he’s actually proving himself to be worthy of my affections.

So without even thinking, I pull back, and I press my lips against him passionately. I hold him close to me, snaking my tongue inside his mouth, and for a moment I allow the rest of the world to just melt away. No one else matter, no one else cares.

It’s starting to seem like it’s Enzo and me against the world.

“What are you…?” He tries to pull back for a second, to make me see sense, but I don’t want that. The emotion is coursing through me painfully, and I’m frustrated that I can’t do anything about any of that.

But I
can
do this, and this is all I want in the entire world.

“Stop talking,” I plead with him. “I need this, I want this.”

“But what you saw me do?”

For a second, that terrifying murder scene bursts into my mind once more, and I have to shake it away. There was no other way, I know that. I’m more terrified of the consequences, rather than what I probably
should
be thinking of. “You did that to protect me,” I tell him confidently. “I know that. Now please just shut up and kiss me.”

Luckily Enzo doesn’t need telling twice, he pulls me back to him once more, and I allow myself to meld into his muscular body, feeling his abs pressed up against my soft, silky skin. We kiss passionately, like horny teenagers, and my heart starts to pound excitedly with what’s about to happen.

This
makes sense.

Nothing else does, but this.

No one else does, but him.

Enzo pushes my body back against the nearest tree, which I hit with a thump. Then he starts to hike my skirt up around my waist, and as it slides up my legs, bolts of pleasure prick all over me. I know that we’re in a very secluded spot, and that it’s unlikely we’ll be seen, but I’m so turned on right now that I honestly wouldn’t care if we were. I don’t think I’d be able to stop even if we had a massive audience watching us. I need Enzo, and that’s all that I can think about.

He moves in closer between my legs, giving me a feel of his thick, throbbing erection, and my excitement level grows even higher. I love the fact that he’s just as turned on as me, it makes me feel gorgeous, and confident. It makes me feel like I can tackle anything – and with everything else that’s going on, is a very welcome feeling.

“Are you sure?” Enzo gasps, desperately, and I know that he’s gagging for me to say yes. He’s being kind and respectful, but that’s not what I need right now. I want him to take me hard and fast up against this tree, so that I can forget about everything else.

“I’m sure,” I insist. “I’m really,
really
sure.”

I loll my head to one side in pleasure, and I part my lips towards him, begging him to kiss me once more, to give me what I so desperately need. After giving me one tiny, chaste kiss, he runs his mouth all over my neck and my collarbone, and it takes all that I have not to scream out in lust. I moan gently and quietly, not wanting to attract too much attention to us, but in the end I have to bite my lip to keep the cries in.

As his fingers start to tease the outline of my underwear, my mouth runs dry with desire. This is all too intense, too much, and I’m going crazy with it.

“Stop teasing,” I beg, as he gets tantalizingly close to my hot, wet desire without actually exploring it. “I need you, please.”

Giving me a little of what I need, he starts to thumb my clit quickly and ferociously, bringing me dangerously close to the edge of desire way too quickly. Then with the other hand, he slips up my top and he starts to explore my nipples too.

There are too many sensations flooding my body, too much going on, which luckily forces my brain to shut off completely. I can’t even begin to think when my body is going so wild – it literally feels like it’s on fire – there’s not a chance in hell.

Not wanting to get lost before he can fill me up with that delicious erection, I fumble with his jeans. I want them unlocked, I need him free so that he fully understands what I want from him. So as soon as the zipper bursts open, I plunge my hand excitedly into his underwear and I grab his length in my hand.

“Oh God,” he groans. “You feel so good, you drive me wild.”

I try to form a response, to tell him that he does the same to me, but I can’t seem to do it. I’m too breathless, too consumed, so I’ll just have to hope that my body is letting him know what he’s doing to me.

Luckily, he seems to get it, because it isn’t long before he’s moving my hand off of him, and he’s slipping himself inside of me. I groan loudly as he plunges deep into me, giving me every single inch of him. As he thrusts, the bark of the tree scratches against my back, but as each movement is rubbing against my clit, it’s a weird pleasure and pain combination that somehow feels amazing.

“Oh fuck,” I cry out. “Don’t stop, this feels amazing.”

He takes me harder, faster, more powerfully, which causes an intense ball of pleasure to explode all over my body. As the orgasm consumes me, I grip onto him, digging my nails into his back to keep myself upright. I feel like if I let go for even a second I would collapse onto the ground, and that’s the last thing I need right now. This is the best that I’ve felt for a very long time, and I never want it to end…

Once we’re finished, we slump to the ground beneath the tree, where we sit for a while in a comfortable, panting silence. With the bliss still coursing through my veins, I feel a little more confident that we can overcome this somehow. This might be the worst time of my entire life, but somehow it’s kind of the best too. I might not have met Enzo under the best circumstances, but the more I learn about him, the more I realize he truly is right for me. I never expected to have any feelings for my husband, but already it’s like I can’t live without him.

He’s protected me, killed a man for me, harmed three others. He told me about Aiden, forced me to stay inside despite my wishes because he knew it would keep me safe. He trailed me, followed me with Arial because he sensed what I couldn’t.

He cares about me, he really does.

He doesn’t have to care about me, he could be using our wedding to his advantage and he could actually be harming me, but he isn’t. He’s doing what he can to look after me.

He’s probably the first person in my life to truly have my best wishes at heart.

“Come on,” he eventually drags me from my thoughts. “Let’s get back home – we can decide on our next move from there.”

“Okay,” I agree, knowing that I’m going to listen to anything he says in future. There will be no more mistrust here, not from my end. Not when he’s proven himself over and over again. I make my intentions clear, by grabbing his hand and intertwining my fingers in his as we walk. I’m prepared to be committed to my husband now, and I want him to know that. At first he looks a little stunned, but as we move closer and closer to his car – completely avoiding that horrendous bridge that could currently contain any awful scene right now – he grows increasingly comfortable with our connection and bond.

This is it now, we really are going to have a future. Together.