Page 15 of Married to the Mafia Devil

She glares back at me. “No one deserves to be tortured. Not even them.”

I can’t help but admire her. I’ve got a knife in my hand, two bound men bleeding at my feet. Yet she stands up to me. So shy but with such a strong moral core. “They hurt you, kidnapped you, conned your father. Why do you care what happens to them?”

“You shouldn’t torture them. It says as much about you as it does about them. Please, for my sake. Stop torturing them.”

“So be it.” I take out my gun, shooting the two bound men in the head. “Satisfied?” I ask as my ears ring from the shots.

I walk toward the car. “You can’t leave those women back there,” she says, pointing at the brothel. “Please. You have to help them.”

Alex raises his eyebrows as I turn back toward Peter. I know what he’s thinking. We don’t like what Petrovitch does but maintaining the truce is more important than getting involved in Russian affairs.

I walk up to Peter. “You got the keys to the cells?” I ask.

“Nope,” he replies.

I put my gun under his chin. “You sure?”

“Oh, you mean these keys?” He pulls them out of his jacket and hands them over.

In return I rummage out a couple of hundred bucks from my wallet. “I hear South America is pleasant this time of year.”

“Was hoping to get working on my tan.”

He takes off with the money, leaving me to head back inside. I unlock one door after another, the smell making me retch.

As the women stagger out, thanking me in Russian, a thought occurs to me. I go into the office, picking up the pile of banknotes on the desk. I take the cash and follow them out, handing it to Alex. “Divide it up,” I say.

I take Emma by the arm and lead her toward my car as Alex watches me closely. “Happy?” I ask.

“You did the right thing. You should be happy.”

Alex taps my shoulder. “A word, boss?”

“Wait in the car,” I tell Emma. “What is it?”

He lowers his voice. “Petrovitch will work out you came for her. He still has the suitcase. If he does crack the code on the file, he’ll have everything he needs to win the deal. That’s a billion dollars down the pan. Enough money for him to raise a private army, take over the whole city. Get revenge on you.”

“Is the church ready?”

“What if your name doesn’t protect her?”

“Honeymoon until the day of the deal. Out of the country, out of danger.” I head over to where Emma’s sitting in the car. Pulling the door open, I lean in. Time she finds out her fate. “What is it?” she asks. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

I climb in beside her. “We’re getting married.”

FIVE

Emma

Somewhere in this vast house, Matteo is stripping out of his bloodstained clothes, climbing into a steam filled shower. I’m in a living room bigger than our entire apartment, trying to make sense of everything that’s happened.

He killed two men. He was going to torture them but he didn’t because I told him to.

He freed all those women, again because I asked him to. Why did he even listen to me? What made him come and save me at all?

Based on what my father said, he shouldn’t care about anyone but himself. And now he wants to marry me to keep me safe? Thinks his name will protect me.

I tried to argue with him on the way here, tell him I couldn’t marry a murderer. It was like talking to a brick wall. I suggested getting the police involved and he told me to go ahead. They laughed when I called them, said they don’t get involved in Rossi or Petrovitch problems.

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