Without thought, I lash out with a screech and tug on the steering wheel. Christiano’s scream chills my blood as the car whips to the left and flips. My belt tightens, cutting into my skin as I’m jarred and thrown. Christiano comes out of his seat and it all happens too fast for me to take notice.
The car flips so many times and all I can hear are the sounds of crunching metal as it chisels its way through the asphalt until…until…
…nothing.
∞ Stefan Valentino ∞
“Cammie!” My voice is strained. It cracks and burns my throat. “Cammie!”
I approach the wreck, the white metal of Christiano’s car. It resembles a scrunched up piece of paper and in there, somewhere, is Cammie. I feel as though all of my organs are packed tightly against my spine. One false move and I’m going to throw up all over the road.
I call out her name again, over the click of metal, and bend down by the passenger door. The scent of oil and fuel is overwhelming.
“Stefan?” Her voice is quiet, filled with fear and pain, but it brings me incredible relief. “Stefan. Help me.”
I grab the door and pull on it, but it’s crushed shut. I put my gun down and lay on the road. Glass digs into my body through my suit, but I don’t care. My bicep, where Christiano shot me, fucking aches, but it’s a pain I can push to the back of my mind.
“Shit,” I curse when I see her, her head pressed against the roof of the car, her neck angled awkwardly. I reach into the window and touch her. Her skin is slick with sweat and blood.
“I pulled the wheel,” she utters, turning her head to face me. “There’s blood all over me…and…and I don’t know if it’s mine or his.”
“Can you unclip your seatbelt?” I ask. “You’ll drop, but you’ll be able to crawl out the window.”
“I…I don’t think I can.”
“Try for me, baby,” I tell her, stroking her shoulder with my thumb. “Try really hard so I can get you out of here.”
Behind her, I hear Christiano grunt and groan. He whispers her name and Cammie’s wide eyes lock with mine.
“Ignore him,” I say. “Focus on you.”
Her entire body shakes as she fumbles with something. I hear a click and she drops down with a cry. I shush her, hooking my hand around her bicep. “Come here. Slow. Go slow.”
“Cammie?” Christiano groans. “Where are you going?”
She straightens her body, lying on her stomach against the crumpled roof of the car, and cranes her neck to look at me. I flinch at the sight of her bleeding mouth. There’s a swelling bruise on her cheekbone and a slice across her forehead. She looks terrified, her skin as white as the night she almost died.
Cammie shuffles forward, but stops with a wince, screwing up her pretty face.
“My back hurts,” she whines, panic shaking her voice. “Stefan, my back hurts.”
“Do you think it’s broken?” I ask, reaching into my pocket for my cell.
“No…I don’t think it’s broken just…twisted. Maybe.”
I leave my cell in my pocket. I don’t want to have to call emergency services unless I absolutely have to. I can take care of her. I take her hands in mine and stroke her with my thumbs.
“I know it hurts. I know it all hurts, but you have to get out, all right?”
Swallowing hard, she nods and crawls forward, clenching her teeth. I inch back further and further as she makes her way out the window, nicking her skin on sharp shards of glass.
Words cannot explain the relief I feel when she collapses against the asphalt with a sigh, free from the ball of metal I was sure claimed her life. I pull her into my arms. I know I shouldn’t in case I make any of her unknown injuries worse, but I can’t help myself. Despite her trauma and her injuries, Cammie grimaces when she looks at me. Slowly, she reaches for my face and touches my tender lips ever so softly.
“You’re bleeding,” she whispers and I pull away from her hand.
“Don’t worry about me.”
“I thought they killed you. He shot you.”
“It’d take a hell of a lot more than that to kill me.”
Smiling, she touches my cheek before gripping onto the lapel of my jacket and crying into my chest. I hold her close, patting her matted hair.
“I know a doctor,” I tell her, kissing the top of her head. “We’ll go see him, all right? To make sure you’re okay.”
She could probably diagnose herself, but she is in no state to do so.
Cammie nods. “Okay.”
In the silence, the driver’s side door of the wreck creaks and clanks as it’s opened. Rage boils in my stomach. He’s not getting away from me. Not after this.
I grab my gun and pull Cammie to her feet. She wraps her slender arm around the back of my neck and I pull her against me by her waist. I carry most of her weight around the wreck to the other side, where Christiano lays on his back, panting as he clenches his side. A thick piece of glass has buried itself between his ribs and his face is completely smashed up.
“Where do you think you’re going?” I snap, sitting Cammie on the side of the road.
“Stefan?” she pleads. “Let’s just go.”
Groaning, he rolls onto his good side and tries desperately to crawl away. Not today. Gritting my teeth, I cock my leg back and I kick him hard in the face, throwing him onto his back. I kick him a few times before pointing my gun at him.
“Go ahead.” He spits blood on the road. “Fucking do it.”
I gently press my index finger against the trigger, drawing out the satisfaction I feel having him beneath my feet like this.
“Stefan…” My name blows into my ears, carried by the sweetest tenor, followed by a light touch to my arm. “Look at him. It’s not worth it.”
I look at her. She managed to pull herself to her feet and amble over to me. How can she want me to spare this piece of shit? I can’t let this go. I don’t deal in forgiveness. I deal in death.
Death is all I know.
Her eyes are soft, her eyebrows furrowed with worry. “Let Moretti deal with it,” she says, shuffling closer.
Let Moretti deal with it. Moretti. Shit. Our victory tonight will be short-lived once Moretti catches drift of what we’ve done.
“You want him to live?”
Cammie nods. “It’s far worse a punishment for him than ending it all right now.”
I lower my gun and Christiano chuckles in pain. “She makes you weak.”
It swiftly turns into obnoxious hacks as he coughs up blood. It takes a lot for me to walk away from him…but I do it for her.
I wrap my arm around Cammie’s waist and help her over to my car. I pull open the door for her and ease her inside, tucking her long red dress around her feet. Christiano yells at us from a distance, but neither of us can hear what he’s saying. Quite frankly, neither of us cares, either. I clip the seatbelt around Cammie and close the door before pulling my phone out of my pocket and calling Beau. He’s hesitant when he answers, and even more so when I give him a brief overview of our injuries, but he agrees to help me in the end. I give him my address since we’re going to leave for Melbourne in less than twelve hours, and he assures me he’ll be at my house soon.
In the distance, I hear sirens, and I quickly circle my car and drop into the driver’s seat. Cammie places her hand on my thigh and I cover it with my own. I take note of the way her fingers tremble in my grasp and I look at her. She rests her head against the headrest and offers me a small smile that lights up her face. It breathes life into me.
“Are we going home?”
I nod, my own smile manifesting. “That’s exactly where we’re going.”
Cammie closes her eyes with a gentle exhale and I drive off. I go slow, careful not to hit any of the bumps in the road.
The further I get out of town, the deeper my internal panic goes. I should have left her to bleed out in the pool the very first time we clashed—and I mean that in the nicest way possible. All of this pain I’ve caused her c
ould have been avoided…
I’ll be honest for the first time since this whole fiasco began. I’m no different than Christiano. I’m selfish, aggressive, erratic—Jesus. I’m a never ending list of frustrations and abnormalities. She’ll see that soon enough and she’ll hate me for it…but God knows I’m going to try to open my life up to her since everything she’s built for herself has been obliterated in the aftermath of my bad decisions.
The only thing pushing me down this track is the one thing I remember my father telling me when I was young. He said to keep a woman happy is not rocket science. He narrowed it down to three core components.
Humility―never act like you’re better than her or anyone else.
Honesty―never lie, even if it’s to protect her feelings.
And Hope―always give her hope that every new day spent with you will be bigger and better than the last.
The theory of happiness is what he called it. I never understood it, really. I didn’t understand how someone could directly influence and impact someone’s emotions like that.
Until her.
I find myself saying yes when I should say no, and no when I should say yes. I can’t promise Cammie that I’ll always be humble or honest. Hell, I can’t even promise that every new day will be better than the last, but…I can promise that I’ll try.
I can promise that I’ll never hurt her or betray her and I can promise that every new day will be as big as she lets me make it.
I promise that I will leave such an imprint on her mind, body, and soul that anyone she dares to love after me will never, ever measure up.
Epilogue
∞ Melbourne ∞
We’ve been in Melbourne eight months now and I think Stefan is in love with the city.
I think I am too.
I survived Christiano and he survived the wreck, but surprisingly, he still remains a semi-distant memory. Stefan reckons Christiano will show up, Moretti too, but I don’t like to dwell on maybe. We’ll deal with them when they come.
I work at the public hospital on the edge of the CBD while Stefan sleeps most of the day away. He’s out most nights until midnight, working. Whoever’s employing him here in Melbourne has a lot of work for him to do, but I don’t mind it. It keeps him busy, and being busy is something he likes. The best part about dating a dangerous man like Stefan Valentino is that although he works with the kind of people one could compare to Christiano, he’s subtle. No one knows who he is, and therefore, has no idea who I am. It’s magnificent.
I scoop up the last of my pancake and slip it into my mouth. I got out of the shower this morning to room service knocking on our door. Stefan ordered me breakfast when he got in sometime last night since he hates that I skip breakfast before work.
“You’re not dressed yet?” Stefan asks, and I glance over my shoulder.
He smooths his large palm over his beautiful bare torso and adjusts the waistband of his sweatpants. I smile. He must’ve forgotten that today is my day off.
“I thought I’d hang around the apartment with you today.”
He smiles, excitement flashing in the dark depths of his eyes. “I have something I need to do now, but it should only take me an hour.”
I smile back at him. “Okay.”
Leaning forward, Stefan bypasses his pancakes and goes straight for his fruit salad. He’s no longer cautious around his food in my presence. He’s still a long way from eating at restaurants, but I’m working on it. There are so many amazing food places here and I’m tired of being the only one who eats it.
Stefan snags a nectarine and pushes out of his seat. Holding it in his hand, he stands over me and bends low, kissing me softly on the lips.
“I’ll see you in little bit? We can go for walk, maybe go to the museum?”
He kisses me again and I hum my agreement.
“Sounds perfect.”
Biting into his nectarine, he saunters off the balcony and back into the house. I toy with my hair, wrapping it around my index finger as I stare after him. I stop when he turns around and marches back to me, tossing his nectarine on the table. I squeak, my heart in my throat, as he yanks me out of my chair and into his arms. I wrap my legs around his waist as he kisses me harder, squeezing me against him.
I break his kiss and shrug out of my black satin dressing gown, exposing my translucent nighty, which showcases my hard, pink nipples perfectly.
“Do you have time?” I ask, wrapping my arms around his neck.
“I’ve got five minutes.” He glances down at my breast as he cups my ass in his strong hands. “I’ll be done in two.”
I giggle and he kisses me deeper than the last. I revel in it, in the way goosebumps ripple over my skin every time we touch. Stefan and I aren’t exclusive, or at least we haven’t had that talk yet, but it doesn’t matter. I feel as though he only has eyes for me.
Only. Me.
∞ Stefan Valentino ∞
I carry out the contract Falcone and Mikhailov gave me as quickly as I can. I glance at my BPM monitor. I’m in the perfect range to take the shot. I glance down my scope once again and watch as Petro, the piece of shit political parasite who has been blackmailing my employer for months, slaps a young girl across the face and shoves her off the sun lounger.
The girl is way too young to be there with a man of his age and what she’s about to see will fuck her up for life, but I’m not postponing this. I hold my breath.
Bang!
I shoot Petro in the head, spraying skull and brain across his balcony. Across the underage girl.
The shrill screaming begins and I pack up my shit and leave. I text Falcone and Mikhailov that it’s done and they ask me around for drinks at their place, but I decline.
Why? Because I have a date with someone that I am absolutely, head over heels in love with.
BEFORE YOU GO…
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Acknowledgments
Husband and my girls, I love you to the moon and back. Always. Thank you for your never-ending patience.
To Limitless Publishing and my editor Toni, I am so lucky to have you and working with you all is always a pleasure.
Thank you to my readers too! You put up with my erratic writer brain and support my decisions to flick over to write passion projects.
About the Author
Skyla Madi was born in the small town of Port Maquarie, New South Wales in 1993. She spent half her life growing up in Wauchope, a thriving rural town at the heart of the Hastings River Valley before making the leap to the busy city of Brisbane.
Whenever this young Australian writer isn’t changing diapers, watching cartoons, cooking for her husband or doing other motherly-wife things she is actively working on her writing and improving her writing skills.
Facebook:
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Website:
http://skylamadiauthor.wix.com/skylamadi
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http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6554179.Skyla_Madi
Skyla Madi, Beautiful Assassin
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