“Just get the engine started!” Cormac spat then he faced Kara again.
“Sir—” the captain tapped Cormac’s shoulder anxiously.
“What?” Cormac bellowed as he spun to face the pilot.
The look of confusion and concern vanished from the pilot’s face at the same instant he swung a fist right at Cormac’s face. Cormac’s expression went blank as the blow landed, and he crumpled, his body rolling in thuds down the stairs to light inches from Kara. Kara scrambled back, afraid Cormac would wake up and grab her. When he didn’t move, her gaze shot back to the pilot who stood in the doorway grinning.
“I told you if you didn’t buckle up, we wouldn’t fly, dickhead.”
Kara’s mouth dropped open. She had no idea what was going on. That confusion only deepened when the pilot suddenlypulled a gun out, but he didn’t aim it at her. He aimed it inside the plane at the only other person in the cab: Jim, Cormac’s man.
Lights flashed across the night as half a dozen SUVs came roaring across the tarmac. They all screeched to a halt surrounding the plane in a semi-circle. She turned just in time to see a door fly open from the nearest vehicle.
“Kara!” The shout was hoarse… but it was the most wonderful thing she’d ever heard in her life. Because it was Angelo.
He wasn’t dead.
That realization changed the tragic trajectory of her life for a second time. Angelo had had defeated death twice… for her.
He knelt down on the concrete beside her and pulled her into his arms, his soaking wet clothes dampening hers all over again and she didn’t care. It was the most wonderful thing in the world even though her head was pounding and her ribs hurt.
“Tesoro mio…” he whispered over and over as he pressed kisses to her lips, to her closed eyelids, her cheeks, the top of her nose.
Kara let him, her fingers clenched tight in his soaked sweater, feeling everything all at once. Letting it overwhelm her because that was life, wasn’t it? Letting love and joy be a tidal wave as powerful as grief. She let herself be swept away by that love and didn’t fight it.
“I love you,” she found herself whispering as he held her in a tight hug. “I love you, Angelo.”
“I know,” he chuckled.
“Tell me now…” she begged.
He drew back a few inches, their mouths her breath apart. His warm brown eyes held the answer to her future… to their future. He’d said those three words she wanted to hear in thecar, but it was going to be different this time because his I love you was no longer a goodbye.
“I love you,” Angelo murmured in the crown of her hair as he pulled her close again.
The franticI love youin the sinking car had spurred Kara to survive… but thisI love youwas an early spring that blossomed as the harsh winter of her soul melted against the kiss of spring.
“I love you,tesoro mio,” he said again, his smile widening and softening at the same time as a storm of butterflies rolling through her stomach.
A sudden groan made them both flinch. Cormac stirred, clutching his face as he tried to sit up.
“What the bloody fuck?” He spat blood out as he got to his feet. Angelo pulled Kara up and immediately put her body behind his.
“Don’t worry, I got this.” The pilot trotted down the steps, and without another word pistol whipped Cormac with his gun, knocking the man into the ground. He was out cold this time.
Kara stared at the pilot, her mouth agape.
Asher stepped forward, eyeing the pilot. “Thanks for the assist, Atlas. I didn’t think you’d make it here in time, after the car bomb situation.”
Atlas? Who was Atlas? Kara wondered. And car bomb? What had she missed?
“Oh, I made it,” Atlas said with a grin at Kara. “And I brought your father’s men along.” He nodded it to the SUVs. “The Cabrinis helped me get the Westies here in time. Thank God, that asshole,” he gestured to Cormac. “Didn’t recognize me.”
Several rough, scary looking men got out of the vehicles along with the Cabrinis. Kara wanted to run, but she held her ground. The Cabrini brothers were among the massive group of men who departed from the vehicles, and their guards stood at the ready behind the Westies.
“So this is Kara O’Brien?” One of the men stepped forward, speaking with a soft Irish accent as he eyed her with interest.
Kara lifted her chin and took one clear step forward, away from Angelo so she could stand on her own. “I am. But I want to make one thing clear, I don’t want my father’s life or his businesses. I want to be left alone to live my own life far away from all of this. Do what you wish with his businesses. I give it all to you. Just stay out of Chicago. This city ismyhome.”
