AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Chapter Twenty
-Dante-
IT HAD BEEN A LONGtime since I overindulged in alcohol. I was on my fifth shot of Dalmor and well on my way to getting the drunkest I’d been since I turned twenty-one and endured that rite of passage.
I spent a few minutes cleaning up the mess I’d made, the desk much heavier and more difficult to set upright than it had been to tip over. I used the papers to scoop up Mary’s shattered pieces but couldn’t bring myself to toss the broken porcelain into the trash. Maybe there was a way to save her. Superglue or some shit like that. I pulled open the top drawer of the desk and dropped the pieces inside.
I tossed my jacket over the back of my chair, unbuttoned my shirt and kicked my legs up to rest on the top of the desk, tipping back in my chair and wishing to hell that tonight had never happened. I braced my shot glass against my forehead and sucked in a deep breath.
I tried not to engage her, but Noemi was determined, and I was weak and going around in constant circles.
I wanted her.
I needed to stay away from her.
I needed to protect her.
I needed to avoid her.
She challenged me. She saw through me. If she saw my fear, and called me out on it, couldn’t she also see what she’d done to me? Did she know how deep she’d gotten under my skin? She’d managed to reach parts of me I didn’t know existed anymore, parts I had lost touch with in my youth. Parts that were torn from me by the reality of what I’d been born to do, of who I was destined to become. The more pieces of myself that I found, the more I needed Noemi. Those shards were useless without her. In the deep puzzle of my tormented psyche, she was the only one who knew where those pieces fit.
I had no fucking clue what I needed.
I just knew that I needed her.
Right then, I needed to know that she was all right.
Fortunately, my work laptop was still in my travel bag. I hadn’t smashed it on the floor with Mary. I pulled it out, logged in, took a deep, guilt-ridden breath and accessed the camera system.
I needed to go backward. I wouldn’t be able to see much, but I wanted to know how she’d been when she left the house. Was she crying? Did she march away with as much indignation as she’d expressed in my office? Was she as confused as I was?
I rewound through footage of Noemi leaving through the kitchen with angry and determined strides. I changed cameras and watched her walk slowly down the driveway where she stopped. Gabriel met her in the driveway, and it looked like he... I leaned forward and squinted at the screen. He put his arm around her. Pulled her into a hug. Touched her. He was my brother and I knew his actions were platonic, but I didn’t care. Was I jealous? Fuck, yes, I was, and it was another unfamiliar, uncharacteristic emotion that pissed me off.
In my unjustified anger, I smashed the rewind key, going back further than I intended. The screen blurred by and I stopped, but I leaned in again at something that didn’t make sense. I fast forwarded, watched for a second, then rewound again. Noemi and Gabriel leaving. Rewind. Gabriel walking to Noemi’s house. I watched the footage of Gabriel and Noemi leaving in Gabriel’s Lexus. Fast forward five minutes and another car pulled up in front of her house.
What the fuck?
I watched a man get out. I couldn’t see his face. He wore a long coat and a knit winter hat. He walked up her driveway to the side of her house outside of camera range. He didn’t knock on the front door like a visitor would. He went to the side of the house. Why? To hide? To not be seen? Was he a friend?
I marked the time and took several screenshots of Noemi’s mysterious visitor. Desperate for an explanation, I switched through all the outside cameras looking for another glimpse of him, but I couldn’t find anything. The man in the knit cap wasn’t the only thing I couldn’t find. I know Noemi left with Gabriel and she’d be safe with him. Gabriel had his own group of shadows who followed him from a distance to ensure the boss’ safety. I went through the footage and found one of Gabriel’s SUVs on camera as it discreetly pulled away from the house and followed Gabriel and Noemi.
Which meant no one was watching Noemi’s house when Knit Cap arrived. The hair on the back of my neck stood up, and my hand shook. I fast forwarded again. Five minutes. He was out of camera range for five minutes. What the fuck was he doing?
Years of instinct kicked in. This wasn’t just a “bad feeling.” My intuition was never wrong as the result of decades of evil honed into skills that no man should possess.
My nerves made me fumble through the combination on my hidden gun safe. I took a deep breath.Focus, Dante, fucking focus!
I grabbed my Glock 26 and headed out through the doors of my office to the back yard. From there, I ran to Noemi’s house. Shivering in the cold, I rang the doorbell then banged on the front door. She didn’t answer soon enough for me, so I banged some more and yelled her name louder. “Noemi! Open the door! Noemi!”
If anything happened to her it was my fault. I let down my guard. I should have made sure someone was watching her house twenty-four seven whether she was in it or not.
My heart plummeted when she still didn’t answer.
“Godammit, Noemi! Open this fucking door!” I yelled, not recognizing the desperate, scared man I’d become.
She should never have been in this position. She should never have been alone. I should have been with her; guarding her, protecting her, picking out fucking Christmas trees with her.
I leaned on the doorbell and banged again, only stopping when the door was jerked open.
