While grunting through the pain of a possible cracked rib, Dimitri stands to his feet, dragging a stunned Maddox with him. After pinning him to the car like his body isn’t aching from the beating Maddox subjected it to, he throws his fist into Maddox’s unprotected face, leaving me no choice but to grab the gun stuffed down the back of his pants and aim it at the back of his head.
“Oh shit, Demi. What the fuck am I meant to do now?” Rocco chuckles out at the same time I tell Dimitri, “Let Maddox go, or I’ll shoot you.”
The gun rattles in my hand when Dimitri slowly slants his head my way. The exhaustion on his face reveals he’s hurting as much as Maddox, but he doesn’t understand the meaning of the word defeat. He’d fight to the death if he deemed it necessary.
After glaring at me long enough I’m certain he’s scorched my skin, Dimitri shifts his narrowed, deadly eyes to Rocco. A word doesn’t spill from his lips. However, it seems as if Rocco understandsexactlywhich ones are screaming in his head.
“I can’t, Dimi. I ain’t got no beef with her.” I can’t see Rocco, but I picture him shuffling side to side like he’s nervous when dust kicks up around my ankles. “Besides, it will teach you better gun management. I’ve told you that many times the past couple of ye—”
Quicker than I can blink, Dimitri snatches his gun out of my hand before stuffing the remainder of Rocco’s comment into the back of his throat with a stern jab to the nose. It’s clear Maddox watched me more than my cousin during high school when he seizes my wrist to tug me behind him in a protective stance. Dimitri is already pissed, so having a Petretti ‘property’ stolen out from beneath him directly in front of him will only make matters worse. A visiting professor at Seaforth Academy learned the hard way what happens when you try to claim ownership of something you don’t own. Last I heard, he’s teaching fish under gallons of salty water.
Ignoring both Rocco’s chuckled assurance he’ll get him back for his hit later, and Maddox’s silent warning that he’d rather die than stand down as my protector, Dimitri locks his stern blue eyes with mine over Maddox’s shoulder. His anger is at a pinnacle. The veins pulsating in his fisted hands are very telling, much less the tightness of his jaw, so you can imagine my shock when he says the last thing I anticipate for him to say. “You should have come to me sooner.” His fists tighten even more when he drifts his eyes to the warehouse I’m certain his father was in at some stage today. My uncle’s lingering aura can make my skin crawl even hours after he’s left the room. “Aboutallof it.” He returns his eyes to me. “I could have helped you…” he pauses, swallows, then starts again, “Icanhelp you.”
He waits for me to nod in gratitude before he shifts on his feet to face Rocco. Once again, he doesn’t speak, and once again, Rocco has no issue understanding him. “I’ll update them as per your instructions…allparties included.” Acting ignorant to the slightest bit of dribble of blood running out of his nose, he rubs his hands together like a kid eyeing a dozen presents under a Christmas tree. “Want me to pop a bullet in him while I’m at it?”
Dimitri’s sigh is silent but very much noticeable. The rumble it causes his chest is compelling enough to shudder my toes. It’s as powerful as the one I release when it dawns on me who they’re talking about. I wish Rocco could take out my uncle as easily as he suggested it, but unfortunately, that would place his head on the chopping block in less than an hour.
“Don’t mention her again.” Dimitri’s threatful words aren’t for Rocco or me. They’re for Maddox. “If you do…” He doesn’t finalize his sentence. We all know what will happen if Maddox falls out of line. Tonight’s punishment will seem like a walk in the park, and Dimitri will use more than fists during round two.
When Dimitri’s eyes once again lock with mine, I dip my chin in farewell. It’s cowardly for me to do, but no number of genie wishes could alter the facts. He showed restraint tonight. He is a killer in every meaning of the word. If he wanted Maddox dead, he would have shot him in the head within a nanosecond of pulling him out of the car.
Rocco was right. Dimitri’s wrestle with Maddox tonight was merely about him blowing off some steam.
“What the fuck, Rocco?” Maddox breathes out heavily when Dimitri disappears into the shadows of a parking lot on the west side of the warehouse. “You were supposed to get him here on the pretense the people who have his daughter were in attendance, not fucking rat me out.”
Woah. Hold on. What have I missed? Does someone have Dimitri’s daughter?
Rocco smirks at my confused expression before stacking more turmoil onto my already overflowing plate. “If you think that’s all he’s keeping from you, keep asking questions, sister. That boy is a treasure trove of secrets.”
His tongue peeks between his quirked lips when Maddox responds to his taunt with a tooth-bearing growl. “Start talking, Rocco, because I’m dying to hear your excuse.” As Maddox steps up to him, he puffs his chest out. “That’s how you operate, isn’t it? Excuses by the bucketloads, and a fucked-up-enough childhood to get away with it.”
The anger on Rocco’s face reaches boiling point before he mutters, “You wanted a way out of tonight’s fight.”
“I wanted to get Demi and Sloane out of Col’s grasp.”
“And?” Rocco asks as if Maddox is slow. “That’s what I’ve done, isn’t it?” He barely nudges his head to the right an inch when the interior lights of a dark SUV illuminate, revealing a scared yet very much alive Sloane in the passenger seat.
Rocco stops my race for Sloane by seizing my wrist in a painless grasp, and just as quickly, Maddox shoves him back three places with a brutal shove, dislodging his hold. “I don’t care who the fuck you are. Don’tevertouch her without asking.”
Violence isn’t the solution for anything, but I’d be a liar if I said I didn’t love Maddox’s protectiveness. When I told him I hadn’t been sexually assaulted by my uncle, he promised I would never be touched against my will. At the time, I thought he was issuing a promise he couldn’t keep. Now I know better.
After adjusting his plain black shirt into place as if it is a tuxedo, Rocco responds to Maddox’s shove with words instead of his fists. “Think wisely, my friend. You’re burning bridges you can’t rebuild.”
Maddox acts as if his warning has no heat. “That bridge was burned alongtime ago.”
Certain they’re moments from coming to blows, I step between them. Maddox isn’t happy, but since it returns Rocco’s focus to me, I’ll handle his wrath at a more suitable time. “Why can’t I see Sloane?”
While rubbing his hands together, Rocco’s tongue delves out to replenish his lips. “She asked for a couple of minutes to get her head straight. Who am I to deny her request? When a girl has been through hell and back, you give themeverythingthey ask for.” He floats his eyes to Maddox, who’s still glaring at him. “Am I right?” In Rocco’s massively dilated eyes, I see Maddox lift his chin without pause for reflection. “And you’d take a beat down like a man to ensure her every want is answered, am I right?” When Maddox nods again, Rocco continues, “Then quit your fucking whining. Shit could have been way worse. Dimitri went lenient on you.” He returns his eyes to me. “Bothof you.”
Although I am desperate to ask if Sloane specifically stated for me to be ousted from her self-reflection, I lose the chance when Rocco moves into the shadow of the awning he was camped under when we arrived to snatch up a gym bag—a gym bag that looks remarkedly similar to the one Maddox lost in the back of a cab.
Does that mean what I think it does? Was Agent Brahn working with Dimitri?
Surely not. He was too honest for that. Too straitlaced.
My deliberating is left for another day when Rocco tosses Maddox’s gym bag onto the hood of the car Maddox borrowed from his fleet of many before he says, “Your first run is Monday. Dimitri trimmed them to three runs a week so you’ll have plenty of time to prepare for fight night each week.”
I’m curious to learn what Maddox is ‘running’ for Dimitri, but since I’m more concerned about what fight syndicate Dimitri has pre-scheduled for Maddox to participate in, I can’t get my mouth to cooperate with the demands of my head.
