Page 68 of Shackled By the Mafia Boss

“What does that mean?”

“I knew who you were from the second I met you.” His eyes skim me and they’re burning with something dark and dangerous. “And I used you because you were easy to use.”

My heart shatters completely. “What?”

“Do me a favor, princess. Don’t ask me about it again or I’ll make sure you die in the same way your father did.”

My fingers ball into fists. I raise my hand to slap him, but he catches it mid-swing and forces it down. “I won’t let that slide next time,” he says with a low, deep and dangerous tone.

I wrench my hand from him. “I will bring you down, Marcus. I’ll be the one to kill you.”

He angles over me and whispers, “Will you?”

I grit my teeth, my nostrils flaring. “I would kill you and bring you back to life so I could have a second chance to kill you.”

He pulls a gun from the holster on his chest, opens my hand and slaps the gun in it. “Shoot.”

“What?”

He nods his head to the gun in my hand. “You said you’d kill me. So, shoot.”

My face is wet with tears now. “Fucking bastard.” I level the gun at his head and bring my finger to the trigger. “You think I won’t?”

He smirks and it’s dark. It reminds me even more of who Marcus—a mafia underboss, carved from a world of darkness. A world I shouldn’t have gotten entangled in. “What is wrong, princess?” he asks when he sees me trembling. I am fighting between the rage burning inside me and my feelings for him.

I should shoot him. I’m a cop, I could lie and say I wanted to ask him a few questions when he attacked me. There are manyways I could get away with killing Marcus Romano—legally at least. I have a feeling his brothers wouldn’t let me get away with it though, but still, I could get away with it.

But for some reason, my finger is weak against the trigger and my resolve to shoot him isn’t as strong as it should be. My muffled sob resounds in the entrance, his eyes boring into mine with a deadly dare.

This isn’t who I am. I am not a killer. I didn’t join the police force to shoot my father’s killer in the entrance of my apartment building with his own gun.

I can’t kill Marcus without confirming the facts of what happened that night with my father. It may be nothing but excuses my head is conjuring, a mental escape from this dreadful situation, but a voice at the back of my head won’t let me pull the trigger.

Even a monster like him deserves a chance.

I can’t kill him until I’m certain of what role he played in my father’s death.

Lowering the gun, I toss it at his feet and wipe my face with the back of my hand. “I’m not going to kill you. I’ll find evidence and if you had anything to do with it, I’ll put you behind bars for the rest of your life.”

Chapter Sixteen

Marcus

“She thinks I killed her father.”

She thinks I killed her father.

For some reason, my stomach twists and my heart feels like it been wrapped in barbed wire, which is strange because I’ve never felt anything like this before—this intense pang of pain is eating away at me in every way possible.

Antonio marches beside me. He lifts his gun at points it at the target standing a few feet away from us. “Why didn’t you tell her the truth, Boss?”

I aim at my target, squinting one of my eyes before I pull the trigger, the bullet leaves a hole in the head of the sketched figure I’m imagining to be Victor’s head. “What is the truth?”

“You didn’t kill her father.”

I scoff. “Not true.” I’d helped. I’d shot him in the leg and that had slowed him down, giving Victor’s men enough time to kill him.

I’d never thought a day would come where I would feel guilt for killing anybody. Janes makes me feel things I never thought I would. She makes me weak.

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