Chapter 6

Jena

Jena wasn’t crying because of the shootout. She wasn’t even crying because she heard the old man ordering them to take her out.

She was crying because despite all of her efforts, despite having saved money all of her life to open her own business —one that failed miserably, by the way— she couldn’t ever seem to catch a break.

Situations out of her control always came crashing at her door.

And now this. She was either going to die, or leave town or—

No. I’m not leaving.

“What are you doing?” Beast asked, and she turned to him, not knowing whether he was going to follow that old man’s orders or not.

She didn’t find coldness in his eyes, nor pity. He looked at her as if he’d done the worst thing imaginable and was asking for forgiveness.

“I don’t know,” Mills said to him, “what are you going to do?”

Mills released her and suddenly her eyes fell on the dead bodies at the other end of her café.

There was blood on the wall, but not as much as she thought it would be. The floor, though. A pool of blood gathered beneath two bodies.

The older gentleman lay with his back against the wall, the bodyguard faced down, his right arm beneath his torso, the rest of his limp body in an awkward position.

He was dead before he touched the floor.

“I was gonna stop you from—” The taller man said, but stopped before finishing the sentence.

She knew what he was going to say, stop you from killing her.

Mills didn’t reply. He didn’t need to; it was as if they understood each other without even talking.

“What now?” Beast asked.

“We have to take her with us.”

“No,” she whimpered automatically.

She wouldn’t let a couple of strangers kidnap her, she would scream, she would yell for help, until someone heard her. Someone had to.

“Please,” Beast said.

This man looked like he could rip a phonebook in half without breaking a sweat. He looked mean and tough and incredibly strong.

But right now, his eyes weren’t mean and hard. They were pleading. He was asking her to go with them voluntarily.

“If you don’t come with us,” Mills said, “the boss is going to find out you’re alive and then we’ll all be in deep shit.”

“I can hide—”

“You can’t hide from him.”

“And I can’t go to the police, right?”

She knew she was risking it. Mentioning the police was either the kiss of death or a way to show them they could trust her. She was being straight, she was putting all the options on the table.

“He’s Roberto Caronte, head of the Caronte family, have you heard of him? He owns the police,” Mills said.

“You’ll have an unfortunate accident before the procedures even start,” Beast finished.

“A mugging gone wrong.”

“Two bullets in the back of your head.”

“No items taken from you.”

“That kind of shit.”

She started to tremble. She was in deep shit.

“You’re coming with us,” Beast said, “it’s for your own good.”

“Please let me go,” she whispered.

“We will,” Mills said, “we’ll get you out of this mess.”

“Tell your family you’re going on vacation or something.”

“I don’t have a family.”

The men looked at each other.

That’s right. Life was shit, and just when she thought she found her break this happened.

“Well, that makes two of us.”

She looked at Beast, he was telling the truth. He knew how hard this was for her, and, stupid as it sounded, she found a bit of comfort in that.

“There’s no other way,” Mills said and began standing up.

She’d grown used to him. The warmth of his arms around her.

What am I going to do?

She wasn’t fast, if she tried running they would catch her easily.

And if what they were saying was true, that the man was really Roberto Caronte, the “businessman” who everyone in the city knew was a crime boss, they wouldn’t even need to come after her. She knew he would find her.

Not that she had many places to hide, anyway.

She stood up beside Mills, at the end of the counter, trying not to look at the other end of the room.

But she couldn’t not look. It was a primeval instinct. Or maybe deep down she was a monster, who knows.

“Come,” Beast said, offering his hand.

She took it. It was easily twice the size of her own, rugged and warm and welcoming.

“Follow me,” he said.

When he turned to the exit, she saw the white handle of a gun in his belt. It should have frightened her, being around men who made a living like this.

It should have made her want to run away the second they were outside.

Two killers, ready to take out a weapon and use it to end another man’s life, ready to die at any moment.

It should have made her sick.

But instead, it turned her on.