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I holstered the gun but kept my eyes on him. I wasn’t letting this slimy fucker out of my sight. The gun was out of bullets, so I reached behind to grab my knife.
“Nico,” Raven cried.
The sound of her voice broke through the red haze that had clouded my vision since I’d left Onyx.
Everything I’d been trying to keep at bay flooded in all at once.
She was alive.
Gabe was alive.
The raw lump at the back of my throat grew, and a strange wetness stung my eyes.
Gabe let her go, and I caught her up and pulled her close, pressing her hard against the wounds from the explosion’s debris. It stung, but I didn’t care. I pulled her closer, but it didn’t feel close enough. I wanted to pull her right into me so no one could hurt her ever again. If I held her any tighter, I’d hurt her, so I tried to focus on the feel of her chest rising and falling against mine, her breath against my neck, her warmth seeping into me—all things I’d feared I’d never feel again.
“I’m fine, by the way. Thanks for asking.” Gabe shot me a cocky smile.
I swallowed hard, putting far more effort than should have been necessary into making sure my voice came out level and calm.
“I know you’re fine,stronzo. Now, make yourself useful. Tie him up and make him quiet.” I nodded to the piece of shit writhing on the floor.
The bloodlust I’d felt just a moment ago had given way to something so much more potent. I still wanted him dead, gone, never able to lay a finger on Raven—or Gabe—again, but I didn’t particularly care how he got there.
“I thought you’d died,” Raven whispered against my chest, digging her fingers into my shoulders. “The explosion…” Her voice cracked, and she pressed her face hard against me.
“Never,” I lied.
Death would come for me eventually, but not today. I’d escaped it for now, but there were others who hadn’t been so lucky. I had to tell her, but how was I supposed to do that?
I kept glancing over at the blazing ruin of the right wall, waiting to see two figures walk right through it, but no one came. The flames licked higher and higher, and there was no denying the charcoal and sulfurous odors of bodies burning. It was a repugnant smell that pasted itself inside the nostrils and mouth. It would remain there long after the burning was done.
Salvatore was gone, and though she wouldn’t feel that loss as much as me, she would feel the loss of Dante. And while I’d left Leo tending to Dominic outside the building, it was entirely possible Raven had lost two members of her family today.
Two brothers.
If I’d kept her safe, they never would have been here.
“Raven, I…” I slammed my jaw shut. No part of me wanted to tell her, but she’d hate me all the more if I tried to keep it from her. “It’s Dominic.” I forced the words out.
She stiffened against me. “No,” she croaked. “Where is he?”
She pulled back, looking around wildly for her brother, but finding only the blood-spattered faces of Greta, Vito, and the various Costa and Luca men around her.
“He’s outside,” I said, nodding back the way I’d come, but holding onto her for one more moment.
Just one more moment before whatever she’d felt for me got caught up in the flames around us and vanished with the smoke.
Chapter Forty-Nine
Raven
The early morning light had just begun to lighten the night’s sky around the horizon, bathing the world outside the warehouse in muted shades of gray. Everything was gray aside from the fire, like it had sucked all the color of the world into itself.
A shirtless gray Leo was bent over a motionless form on the ground, ripping strips of fabric from his shirt and tying them around the motionless form’s extremities like bandages.
I could feel my pulse pounding in my neck as I crossed the distance between us. It felt like I’d been plucked from my body and dropped into this strange gray world where nothing made sense. Not the bloody wounds that wept from Leo’s scarred, bare back. And certainly not the body on the ground that looked far too much like Dom. It wasn’t real.Thiswasn’t real. It couldn’t be.
“Leo,” I whispered, dropping down next to him. I could see the tears in his eyes.
