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That bullet had been meant for me.
It had been meant for me, but Jessica had gotten caught in the crossfire. As I aimed my weapon, I pushed Juliana to the ground behind me and tried to shield her with my body.
Screams and gunshots rang out and my gaze swung to Debi. Danio was already pulling her out of the church.
Women and children hit the floor as they had all been trained to do from a young age while the men exchanged gunfire.
The wedding had been a trap.
Fury had taken over my body and was driving my actions.
The Società wanted me dead and had used Juliana to lure me to L.A. today.
Here I was more vulnerable than if I were in my own territory of Chicago. My organization would be substantially weakened if I was killed—and the Società had probably planned to take out my brothers today as well.
Once I saw that Debi had reached safety outside the church, I grabbed Juliana and dragged her to her feet and out of the church with me.
“What are you doing?” screamed Juliana.
“We need to get out of here!” I pulled her behind me and half dragged her out of the church.
Outside I shouted at Camillo. “Protect Debi. Don’t let her out of your sight!” I saw him bundle her into an SUV with him and Danio.
Juliana struggled as I pushed her into another SUV. “Let me go!”
I remember her saying those exact same words to me in her father’s office after signing the engagement contract—I hadn’t let her go then, and I wasn’t letting her go now.
“Jess was shot! I need to make sure that she’s alright. I need to be with her.” Juliana was more worried about her sister than herself and her eyes reflected the shock she was in. Her voice became higher and her tone more pleading. “I need to stay with my sister. Please don’t do this. Please!” she cried, looking back toward the church.
But it was no good. Perhaps I should have felt some guilt at what I was doing. But I wasn’t a good man. I was a Made Man.
She had signed the contract.
She had signed herself over to me.
She was mine now.
And I was never letting her go.
I saw Alessio dragging the body of one of our injured soldiers out of the church. He pushed him into another vehicle and then ran over to our SUV and got into the driver’s seat.
The injured had been all loaded into vehicles now and we needed to get them medical attention ASAP. I could see our soldiers getting ready to go on my signal.
Once I was sure that Camillo’s vehicle had safely moved off, I told Alessio to hit the gas. Through a cacophony of shouts, slamming car doors, squealing tires, and the roar of adrenaline in my ears, we sped away from the carnage at the church.
“I’ll tell Camillo and Danio to head to the private airfield to the west of the city. That will be our best bet for escaping L.A.,” said Alessio, as I reloaded our weapons with more ammunition.
I nodded in agreement. “I’ve already ruled out the city airfield as that’s more likely to attract the attention of the FBI. Even with our backhanders to the FBI, they won’t ignore a shootout in the middle of the city which could pose a significant danger to the civilian population.”
“The airfield to the north of the city is out of the equation too. It’s too easy for the Società to cut us off en-route there.”
Alessio had multiple planes on standby, providing us with different exfiltration options in a fluid situation such as this.
“A couple of Società vehicles are on our tail,” said Alessio as he checked the rearview mirror.
I glanced over my shoulder. “We need to lose them.” I pulled out my gun. Lowering my window I took aim at their tires, at the same time trying to dodge their bullets.
Both our cars and theirs would have bulletproof glass, but we could still aim for each other’s tires to derail the vehicle. I was the best shot in the Fratellanza, and together with Alessio’s defensive driving skills, I took out both Società vehicles, one by one.
