Page 38 of Savage Heart

I laugh, looking over at her as she flashes nearly her entire body at me. “Not if I have anything to say about it. Now let's go.”

A man appears from through the door where we need to go. For a moment, my heart skips a beat. Is this one person going to be the reason we can't escape? Over my dead body. It's between us and him.

I pull my gun from inside my tux jacket and aim at his chest before he can say a word. The shot takes him out instantly, and he drops like dead weight to the floor ahead of us.

Sienna screams, but I quickly cover her mouth to silence her cries. “Shhh. It was him or us, baby.”

She nods as tears fill her eyes. “I know. I just wasn’t ready to see you kill him.”

Pressing a kiss to her trembling lips, I whisper, “Trust me. I wouldn’t do it if I didn’t have to.”

Sienna looks up at me and tries to smile, but it never actually makes it to the corners of her mouth. “I know. I trust you, Alaric. I trust you with my life.”

I scan the area to see if anyone else might get in our way but see no one. With that one obstacle gone, she and I look at each other and know we're free.

I throw the door open and yank her outside with me into the darkness as the night swallows us up. I've cased out this entire estate. I know exactly how to get away from here now that we’re out of the villa.

“Alaric, where are we? Which way do we go?” she asks, her hand tightly squeezing mine.

“I got you. Just follow me.”

As we start out across the grounds of Lucius’s villa, she sobs, “I can barely run in these shoes. My god, four-inch heels. I can barely move.”

I look down on her feet as we're running. “Take them off. Kick them away. You don't need them. I'll buy you new shoes. We'll get lots of new shoes. You can have whatever you want.”

She smiles and stops for a moment to kick her left shoe and then her right shoe into the grass. “I never liked those goddamned things. Can you believe my brother thought I should be wearing those shoes? And this dreadful dress? I'd take the dress off too if I could, except then I'd be buck naked.”

I quickly take my jacket off and slip it over her shoulders. “Put this on. Nobody needs to see you racing through the streets half naked.”

She slides her arms into the sleeves that hang low off her hands. With a smile, she says, “I didn’t realize you were so modest, Alaric. What do you care if people see a little skin?”

I look over at her and shake my head as we run moving toward the edge of the Angeloni estate and freedom just steps away. “I care because your mine. I don't need other men seeing you like that. When we get back to the hotel, I’ll get you something else to wear.”

Barely catching her breath, she says, “I sort of like this whole look I have going on with your tux jacket, to be honest. It's comfortable. A little big. I'm sort of swimming in it, but I think it looks good on me. Don't you think?”

I look forward toward the last few yards before we will leave this villa and the Angeloni estate forever and not at her. “You always look good, Sienna. Always.”

The moment we step off Lucius Angeloni's property, I hear Sienna let out a heavy sigh. She knows she's free and she's safe in the darkness. I turn to her, and she throws her arms around me.

“Thank you, Alaric! I wasn't sure how we were going to ever escape from there. Thank you. I can never repay you for this. I owe you my life.”

Pulling her to me, the scent of her vanilla shampoo wafts up to my nose as she rests her head on my shoulder. She smells sweet and warm and fresh, just like she always has.

“You owe me nothing. This is what you do when the woman you love needs you.”

She lets out another heavy sigh against my chest. “I love you. You saved me when I didn’t think we had a chance.”

In the distance, someone lets out a blood curdling screen, It's a woman, and she's joined by others a second later before people begin to cry out the words I’ve longed to hear from the moment I found out what Matteo planned to do to Sienna.

“Lucius is dead! Someone’s killed Lucius!” a chorus of people scream in horror.

While they mourn the loss of the man, I silently rejoice that Alexei was able to avenge his daughter. In our business, it's very rare when you're justified in killing someone. This was more than a job for Alexei, and I'm glad that he got to give Lucius Angeloni what he deserved.

Sienna looks up at me, her eyes wide in fear. “Alaric, that man, that hit man killed Lucius.” She sounds so innocent, as if she didn't believe that Alexei would actually do his job.

Cradling her face, I let out a sigh like I’ve been holding my breath for days. “You're free now. You're free, and your brother is the only one who stands in our way, but that won't be forever. I'll make sure of that.”

I see a darkness cross her expression when I say those words, but with a kiss, she’s the woman I fell in love with not far from here two years ago. As we hurry off toward Gideon’s hotel, I silently pledge that whatever that dark look meant won’t get in our way of being happy.

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