Page 129 of Mob Bride

He’s thinking what we all are. We’re all livid someone endangered our wives. We’re worried about our parents, but it’s obvious they know what they’re doing. This isn’t their first rodeo. And it’s not like the women my generation’s married are shrinking violets, but none of them have lived through this. Not even the ones who come from mob families. Not even Carrie after what happened at the lumberyard. I understand now how Dillan, Finn, Sean, and Seamus felt when their wives were in danger while they dated.

I think how I feel now is another reason I didn’t admit my feelings to myself. The rage coursing through me that someone attacked the woman I love threatens to consume me. It threatens to make me do something irrational and emotional. If I’d admitted how hard I fell for Carrie when it was happening, I would have done something rash, like bursting into Bartlomiej’s house and killing him just for breathing in the same hemisphereas her. It would have likely gotten Carrie killed. Fuck. I nearly did that day on the trail.

“Suas ann. Ar chlé.” Up there. To the left.

Sean points to an SUV that’s swerving. It could be someone on their phone. Or it could be someone we shot. We switched to Irish because we never want anyone to know our signals. But we also do it because it comes as naturally as English. We frequently switch back and forth during conversations. Hell, half of us could speak Irish and the other half English during the same conversation. It happens.

I glance in the rearview mirror. No one’s behind me, and the radar detector—illegal, but who gives a shite—hasn’t alerted us to any speed traps. I speed up until I pull even with the car.

“Is that?—”

“Motherfucker.”

I don’t let Sean finish before I cut in with my expletive and a stream of them in my head.

“Who is that?” Finn wouldn’t know, but it’ll piss him off when he finds out.

“Someone I’ll kill with my bare hands for betraying Carrie.”

This goes beyond what happened earlier today. This just got personal in a way this piece of shite can’t possibly understand until I put a bullet between their eyes. All bets are off.

“Brace.”

I glance in the rearview mirror again, then over at Sean to make sure they’re all holding on with seatbelts fastened. I plow our SUV into the one carrying my target. It’s sturdy, but it isn’t the tank we make ours. Its reinforced frame won’t stand up to ours. We have tires that roll even when punctured. We have plating on the chassis to protect us from IEDs. The windows and doors are bulletproof. There are small windows slots in the trunk that someone might think are for extra ventilation. They’re so we can slide gun muzzles through them. The entire thing is a giantroll cage. We’ve all been in rollovers, and we’ve all gotten out dazed but in one piece.

All Four Families go to the same custom shop for our vehicles. It’s Switzerland. The owner tries to time it, so we never run into each other. But if we do, it’s neutral ground. We’re on our best manners because no family can afford to be banned. It would be a death sentence. We couldn’t defend ourselves from the very thing I’m doing right now. The only way to tell the different families’ vehicles apart are the hubcaps which are unique like a family crest. It’s handy when meetings don’t work out.

I swerve harder to the left and push the SUV toward the shoulder. There’s a steep drop on the other side of the guardrail. If they don’t backdown and stop, I’ll push them over the edge. I guarantee they won’t survive the fall. If they aren’t thrown from the vehicle, or impaled by something, the inevitable firebomb will kill them. That wouldnotbe a satisfying conclusion, but it would be unalterable.

“Get the quarter panel again. It’s about to puncture the tire.” Sean points to what I just spotted.

The sound of metal crunching metal makes the hair on my arm stand up. Dillan winds down his window and points his rifle at the people in the backseat. I can’t see what’s happening because I have to watch where we’re going, or it’ll be us flying over the rail.

“Ease off. I’m taking the rear tire.”

I listen to Dillan and pull away enough to avoid the car when it spins out. It stops with the rear bumper against the guardrail, and the hood pointing toward the road. I box it in. They can try to push our SUV, but they’re more likely to push themselves backwards over the edge. I made sure I have room to open my door, with the front tire even with their bumper. We flood out of the sides and back. Rifles pointing at the vehicle. I go to the frontpassenger side and pull the handle. I knew it’d be locked, but on the off chance…

I spin my rifle I grabbed on my way out of our vehicle and ram the stock into the window. Seamus comes to help me. The tempered glass holds for a while, but not forever. The moment we hear it start to give, I turn my rifle around, and Seamus steps out of the way. I shift my weight back and point the weapon at the dashboard. I fire, and the window shatters. I pivot and put the barrel to my new nemesis’s forehead.

“Get the fuck out of the car on your own, or I’ll drag you by your motherfucking hair.” I think my parents’ll forgive my language this time.

“Do you realize what you’re doing?”

That gets a laugh from all of us.

“I’d listen to my brother. He’s not known to be as patient as I am.”

Sean’s standing next to me now, his rifle pointed at the driver. None of them have reached for a weapon. They’re going to die, but at least they aren’t rushing us.

“Open the door and get out on your own, Angela.”

She doesn’t comply. Go figure. With my gun still to her forehead, I reach in and unlock the door. She goes for my hand, thinking she can pull my pinky back and distract me. She’s not as fast as I am. I pull my hand back, adjust my target, and put a bullet through her right hand and into her thigh. She howls.

“Get out on your own, and you won’t look like Swiss cheese. Make me say it again, and I’ll torture you for the pure pleasure of listening to you beg. Then I’ll find your family and do the same thing to them. Do you have kids?”

I’d never go after children. No one in my family would, and they’d never let me. But the fuck she needs to know that.

“Okay. I’ll get out.”

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