Page 98 of Nanny's Baby for the Italian Mafia Boss

When I come to, I’m tied to the driver’s seat. My vision is blurry, and unconsciousness is still trying to take hold of me. I groan, squeezing my eyes shut to clear the fog. A splashing sound has me turning my head, and that’s when I see him.

Michael.

He’s smiling while pouring gasoline all over my car. The windshield blurs his face as he continues to pour. When he sees me, he grins, but the toothy smile he gives me has a slither of terror swimming down my spine.

“You’re awake. Good. Don’t bother trying to unlock the doors. You can’t. I disabled the locking system and I have your keys. You’re locked in.” He dangles the keys in the air and tosses them into the woods.

“Why are you doing this?” My body is tied so tight against the chair, I can barely move my arms. “Please,” I sob. “I’m pregnant. Don’t do this, Michael. Please.”

He slaps the driver’s side window. “Shut up, shut up, shut up!” he yells, licking his lips, sounding like a complete madman. “Be quiet. I’m so fucking sick of you. Do you know how hard it was to pretend to want you? You’re disgusting. All I thought about was avenging my father. Every day. But then you grew on me, and I wanted to have fun with you. I had hoped to at least fuck you before I killed you.” He douses the window in gasoline again and I flinch, for a moment thinking it was going to hit me. “Maybe after,” he grins, a psychopathic glee twisting his lips.

“Fuck you!”

He hits the window again. “No, fuck you! Fuck you and your family. Your father took everything from mine. He was a sorry excuse for a lawyer and ratted my dad out to the cops. When my father realized he didn’t kill you, he told me I could be the leader of the family if I finished what he started, to have people fear us once again. My dad couldn’t do the honors because he is sick, so I’m on a time constraint, Sophie. But don’t worry.” He lights a cigarette and inhales, blowing smoke against the window. “It won’t be quick. You’ll finally feel what your backstabbing father felt when he died. And to make it better, one of your boyfriend’s own runners betrayed him and kept me close. Isn’t that horrible for you? Unfortunately, he got most of my guys killed a few months back at the docks, but that’s neither here nor there. The real cherry on top is that I’m killing Milazzo’s heirs. How wonderful is that? The O’Brien name will be on top again.”

“He’ll never let you live,” I yell, fighting against the ropes. “He will kill you.” I spit.

“Not if I kill him first, during his heartbreak.” He flicks the cigarette onto the car and the entire vehicle goes up in flames. “Burn, you fucking bitch.” He steps away to the other side of the road, watching and waiting for the flames to burn me to death.

The heat paralyzes me. Smoke swirls its way through vents. It’s getting harder to breathe. The heat is getting stronger, the flames brighter. My head is pounding. The orange tendrils lick through the vents, creeping closer.

Flashes of the house fire flicker in my mind, the past and present colliding. I cough so hard, I taste blood in the back of my throat, and my head lulls to the side.

I can’t move.

I can’t think.

***

Matias

The tires screech as I hurl the car around the corner, seeing a shadowy figure at the dead end of the dark road. It’s Michael. He’s backing away from her red beetle, but I can’t see her.

Where the fuck did he put her?

I assume she’s hidden somewhere, and maybe he’s just playing with me by being out here with the empty vehicle. But before I have a moment to catch my breath, her car is on fire. The blindingly bright flames lick against the red-hot metal as I pull up, and then I finally see her. In the car.

Fuck.

I throw the car in park several paces away from them and I jump out, running over to see him grinning like a maniac. The light from the fire flickers across his features, causing shadows to dance across his eyes and morphing his face into something more monstrous than before.

It’s disturbing, even for me.

He turns to me, and I watch the arrogance melt away as I unclip my gun from its holster on my hip and raise it to his knees. I won’t kill him that easily. But I’ll fuck him up a bit.

“Perfect timing! You’re up next.” He taunts me with that twisted grin as I keep walking toward him, cocking a bullet in the chamber and shooting twice, once in each kneecap, and he falls to the ground, wailing. “Shit! Fuck!”

I feel tears stinging my eyes as I look back to Sophie. She’s not moving in there, and I don’t have a lot of time. I can barely see her from the smoke that’s building inside the cab of her car. I cock my gun again, and shoot into the car, away from her, shattering the glass as plumes of smoke billow out. I reach in, pleading for her to be okay.

***

Sophie

A gunshot rings out, I think—or maybe it’s just my imagination. I’m losing consciousness.

Glass shatters, a few pieces hitting against my skin.

“Sophie! I’m here, okay? I’m right here. I’m going to get you out. Hold on for me, baby. Hold on.” The rope tying me to the driver’s seat is loosened and Matias pulls me out of the window, since the doors won’t open. “I got you. Sophie, hey, look at me. Open those beautiful eyes. Come on.”

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