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Chapter Thirty-Seven
- Dante -
DEAD MEN TELL NO TALESand the unfortunate souls that had been on that boat couldn’t give me an explanation of who they were or what the hell they wanted.
I listened to Noemi tell me what she saw out the window as we sat down to a light dinner. I had spent hours calming her rising fears. Hours that I should have spent trying to figure out who the fuck tried to blow up my yacht with me, Noemi, and my crew still fucking on it.
Noemi explained how she saw one boat out the window just before I arrived before the explosion. What she didn’t see from the cabin windows was the vessel on the port side. One was a decoy. Two men pretended to be adrift at sea. My crew sounded the alarm as soon as they spotted the boat. I watched from the wheelhouse as one of my crew approached them in the tinder to aid them. They shot him.
I didn’t care much for having my people murdered in front of me. I took a rifle and scope from my arsenal and snipered his ass from a window in the wheelhouse. It took us a while to realize that the other boat had arrived. Driven by remote control, it was rigged to explode when detonated. Ten minutes of negotiations with the second man yielded nothing. He either pretended not to, or legitimately did not, speak English. We didn’t realize what was going to happen until he raised the detonator over his head and started screaming at us.
I handed the rifle to Captain Burrowes and ran to protect Noemi. The damn boat would explode right below the windows of the master suite. While the boat was far enough away and thankfully not powerful enough to blow a hole in the side of the boat, Noemi would have gotten a face full of glass if she had been looking out that window when the boat exploded.
After the bastard detonated the motorboat, after I got Noemi into the safety of the stateroom, I returned to the wheelhouse. Negotiations were done.
He started blabbering as soon as I reappeared. He shut up when I put a bullet in his forehead.
“So, they were pirates?” Noemi asked as she took a forkful of her salad.
“More than likely, though I’ll never know for sure.” I didn’t lie to her.
“You killed them?” she questioned; her fork stopped in front of her mouth.
“The motherfucking cock suckers tried to steal my yacht and then they tried to blow it up. With all of us on it. Yes. I killed them.”
To be fully honest, I had my doubts as to whether they were real pirates or hired assassins pretending to be pirates. Word may have gotten out that the contract on my life hadn’t been fulfilled. But that didn’t explain how they knew where to find me. It made more sense that a small band of pirates had watched our departure and thrown together a hasty plan to steal theMary Theresaor take us hostage or kill us.
“Don’t feel any sympathy for them, Noemi. I doubt they would feel any for you.”
She swallowed as my words sunk in.
“You saved my life. Again,” she said softly.
I didn’t want her gratitude because I didn’t want to be in this position. I didn’t want to save her because I didn’t want to care for her. But if she ever had to go, if she never cared enough for me to protect me the way I’d protected her, it would be my hand that took her life, not some piece of shit, incompetent hit man or low-life pirate.
“You’re welcome.” I cut into my steak, but Noemi put down her fork.
“It just doesn’t seem right,” she sighed as she picked up her wineglass and took a small sip of the Pinot Grigio I stocked just for her.
“What doesn’t?”
“That we’re sitting here, now miles away from what happened, diningal frescoaboard this beautiful yacht that two men lost their lives over. I mean, it’s not like we’re celebrating or anything, but it feels so... casual compared to what’s happened in the last forty-eight hours.”
I steepled my fingers together as I decided what I wanted to say to her. “Right or wrong has nothing to do with it,bambina. Do you remember what I told you the night before your parent’s funeral? You asked me what you were going to do. What did I tell you?”
A small smile played on her mouth. “Survive,” she said quietly with a trace of that memory lingering in her eyes.
I pushed the pads of her fingers against my mouth. “And that’s all that we’ve done. We have no need to feel guilty over any of it, just as you had no need that night to feel guilty about your grief. Life is too short for us to linger in regrets.”
I released her hand and returned to my steak. I revealed something that I had neglected to mention to her earlier.
“I lost one of my crewmembers today. They shot him in cold blood when he tried to help them. As far as I’m concerned, they deserved what they got. I have no regrets.”
Her fork clattered to her plate. “Dante, I’m so sorry. Why didn’t you say something earlier? Did he have a family? Did you... I don’t even know what to say,” she stammered. “Those mother sucking cockfuckers. Then I’m glad they’re dead.”
I blinked at her bungled-up swearing.
“Mother sucking cockfuckers?” I smiled at her across the top of my wine glass.
Her eyes widened. “No, I guess that’s not right, but still... Wait. Are you smiling? Dante Calegari, is that a smile on your face?”
I shrugged, wiping it away as quickly as it had appeared. “You’ll never prove it, and no one will believe you. Ever.”
She laughed, that rich, beautiful laughter that I hadn’t heard in days. I didn’t realize how much I’d missed it. Hell, I hadn’t even realized I’d ever noticed it until then.
“Really? You wait until all Hell has broken loose before you get a sense of humor?”
Someone took a contract out on my life. Someone else sent three dead men to kill Noemi. And now pirates killed one of my crew and tried to blow up my yacht. People were going to start paying for what they’d done to me. If it were just me that I had to worry about, I’d be more at ease with what I had to do. But now I had to protect her.
One corner of my mouth ticked upward as the urge to truly smile passed. “You’re wrong, baby girl,” I said as I swiped a thumb over her bottom lip. “All Hell hasn’t broken loose yet. I’m just getting started.”
