Page 59 of Inevitable

I lay back in bed grinning like a fool. How could one person make such a difference in someone’s life. I can’t believe how lucky I am to have Ashlynn in my life, and soon we will have a baby too. We will be a family. That is nothing new though, Ashlynn has always been my family. That’s why her finally being mine has felt like coming home.

5 minutes go by and I am ready to dig into these cookies with or without her. What is she doing, milking the cow herself? I head downstairs to see what is taking so long.

“Angel? Everything ok? You get lost or something?” I chuckle as I walk into the kitchen and stop dead in tracks.

My blood turns to ice in my veins and my face goes pale. There, sitting at the breakfast table is Ashlynn with duct tape over her mouth and a panicked look in her eyes while a pistol is pressed against her temple. I move my eyes from her to see that the man holding the gun to her head is none other than Francisco Farelli himself.

He is what you would picture a fat old Italian man to look like. He is wearing a suit that doesn’t fit his stomach with his black hair greased back. The only thing missing is a spaghetti stain on his white dress shirt. With him are 3 goons spread out across my kitchen. Fuck.

“What are you doing here Farelli?” I try to make my tone even and threatening, but on the inside I’m freaking the fuck out.

Ashlynn is being held hostage and there are too many of them for me to take on without a weapon. I think about the gun that is strapped under the kitchen island. If I can get to it then it will certainly even the odds.

Farelli’s gruff voice scrapes against me as he speaks. “Just taking care of some business. I won't bother with the villain monologue. It’s been a pleasure, Mariano.” He points his gun towards my head and I instantly know, I am out of time.

I leap for the island and grasp the gun just as I feel a searing pain rip through my bicep. It throws me back just for a moment. I push down the pain and it quickly fades into the background as adrenaline courses through me. I look to see all 3 goons have their guns trained on me as they begin firing wildly.

I shoot the closest one to me and he drops instantly. Quickly, I duck down from the onslaught of bullets being fired at me for a bit. I peek around the side and shoot the guy on the far side in the head, blood splattering the white cabinets as his body falls to the ground.

When I swing around to take out the final guy I see out of the corner of my eye, Farelli running out of the house with Ashlynn. She is putting up a fight, but she is too small to do much. The man in front of me fires a shot and I just barely weave out of the way before it whizzes past my head. I shoot aimlessly just hoping to hit him somewhere so I can get to Ashlynn. I catch his thigh and he drops his gun, wrapping both of his hands around the wound. I raise my gun again taking aim at his head when a blood curdling scream rips through the air, coming from outside. Ashlynn.

The man takes advantage of my hesitation and charges me, hitting me across the jaw so hard I fumble to the ground. He advances on me and begins to beat the hell out of me. His meaty fists are using my face like a punching bag, each one sending stars bursting behind my eyelids.

After a moment I realize I am losing time, I have to do something. I buck up slightly and it gives me the window I need to hit the man in the face and then the throat. He rolls off me gasping for air as I stand up as quick as I can manage. I reach for my gun and pull the trigger quickly, finally finishing him off before I tear out of the house.

The driveway is empty except for the bodies of 2 of my men near the front gate. That answers how they were able to get inside undetected. I run to the end of the driveway to check for breathing but their bodies have already gone cold and lifeless. When I look down the road and see it quiet and empty my stomach drops. Whatever car they were driving is long gone now.

“FUCK!” I roar.

Running inside, I rush to grab my phone before quickly dialing Gio.

“Yeah, Boss?” He answers.

“Farelli broke into my house and took Ashlynn. Tell everyone to get their asses out there and look for them. Now! And come pick my ass up. I’ve been shot and can’t drive. We are going to the Warehouse on Messer now. HURRY!”

I hang up before he can even speak and race downstairs to my weapons vault. I grab everything I can, loading up on multiple guns and mass amounts of ammo. This ends tonight, and no member of the Farelli will make it out fucking alive.

Not 4 minutes later, Gio is pulling up to the house and I am throwing guns and ammo into the back before he even has a chance to come to a full stop. I hop in quicky and we are peeling out in seconds. Once we barrel down the driveway and on to the road, I lean my head back against the head rest. This is the first moment I have sat back and caught my breath since they showed up and I got to say, the pain is starting to set in from being shot and is pretty fucking excruciating.

“Would you like me to attend to that sir?” A soft voice asks from the backseat.

I swing around with my gun raised at the person before noticing that it is one of the doctors we have on our payroll. I glare at Gio as he continues to drive. Did he seriously stop to pick up a doctor? Gio shrugs.

“You know I would have been here in 2 minutes if I didn’t stop.”

I nod my head and move to the back seat so the doc can patch me up. I can’t risk passing out in the middle of a fucking war. He stitches me up quickly and gives me a hit of morphine which is more than I was expecting.

Unfortunately, Farelli has at least a 10 minute lead on us and we also don’t know where they are going. I can’t explain it, but I have a weird feeling about the place on Messer. When it came up empty the first time we checked I was a little surprised. If I had been in their position that is where I would have hidden out. It’s just outside of the city but close enough to keep their eyes on things. It is also huge so they could hide all of their men there inconspicuously. They have to be there. Ashlynn doesn’t have time for me to run all around the city trying to track them down.

“Did you call everyone?” I ask

Gio nods. “Everyone is on the streets now searching all of their known locations again. I couldn’t get a hold of Mario, called him 4 times.”

“Shit. Send some people to his house. Hopefully, they didn’t go after him too.” Gio nods again and gets on his phone, sending a message.

Where we are heading is about a 25-minute drive. That leaves me at least another 15 minutes to calm my mind and prepare for what is next. But all I can do is think of Ashlynn and the baby. Oh my god the baby, my bambina. If they kill Ashlynn, I lose them both. I can’t even think about that right now. It’s not an option. We have to get there in time and when we do, I am personally sending every single member to hell.

Gio tells me that he has 2 groups of men following us for back up, hopefully we are all heading in the right direction. We are only a couple of minutes away and my body is pounding with adrenaline when all of the sudden we come across several armored SUVs blocking the road. Gio stomps on the brakes and our tires squeal as we skid to as stop. As soon as we are stopped, men open fire on our vehicle from behind the SUV’s.

---