Page 26 of His Bride

Please no bloodshed tonight, God. Please. I hope my silent prayers are heard tonight.

“Daddy, what are you talking about?” I ask after talking a calming deep breath.

“Mia figlia, I hate to be the one to break this to you because I love you so much, but you are a terrible fucking actress. Why are you lying to us?”

“I’m not a terrible actress. Am I?” I ask no one in particular.

“Ooh, babe. Yeah. ya not great,” Theresa says.

“What?” I say, near tears. Dorian squeezes my fingers. I look up at him. His face is grim. He’s going to tell on himself. I realize that I don’t want him to do that. If we stay the course, it’ll blow over.

“Your phone call the other day was total bullshit and you know it. Someone had better tell me the truth right the fuck now.” He calmly pulls a fucking gun out of his coat and points at Dorian. Hell no! I just fell in love with the man, he can’t die now.

“Daddy!” I scream, standing up knocking my chair over. It hits the hardwood floor with a loud thunk. Dorian stands, pushing himself away from the table but doesn’t pull the gun I know is in his waistband. Derry does pull his and points it at Dad. Dorian reaches his hand out and pushes Derry’s weapon down. He gets the idea and holster’s it.

“What is it you want to hear?” Dorian asks, like he’s not about to die at the hands of my father. My mother and sister don’t say anything or react in any way.

“Did you two know about this?” I ask, straight up sobbing now. They don’t say anything, but they do look down at their laps. Shit. They are going to be no help at all. “Daddy, this is ridiculous. Please put the damn gun away. Nothing is going on here.”

“I want to know the truth, O’Shaughnessy. We welcomed you into our circle and this is how you repay us?”

“Do youwantto hear that I kidnapped her? That I took her because she’s mine? Is that it? Let it go. She’s mine now no matter how it came to be. She could be carrying my baby right the fuck now.”

“Dorian, stop it. Please,” I beg.

“It’s okay,mo ghrá.Let me handle this,” he says. His eyes plead with me to leave the room, but fuck that. I’m so in love with this man that we can already silently communicate with each other. I don’t know why I fought it, fought him, so much. This is so much more than Stockholm Syndrome. This is that crazy, all-consuming love that people dream of and never truly find. And it happened to me. Of course, it gets taken away. I’ve got to do something to stop this madness.

“Motherfucker,” Daddy spits out. His eyes change and I realize that must be what the great Nico Vitali, Senior looks like when he’s about to make a kill. I’ve never seen it before. He’s always just been Daddy. Everything around me kind of slows down. I see his finger twitch on the trigger. Moving faster than I ever have before, I leap sideways and jump in front of my husband. Searing pain hits my shoulder just before the rest of my body crashes into the dining room table. I skid a few inches then stop at the edge of the table. Dishes clatter and people are screaming. I land on my back. My head bangs into the table so hard, my vision is blurring. That might have hurt more than the freaking bullet. I’m staring up at the ceiling. Suddenly, Dorian’s face comes into view above me.

“Matilde? Baby?” he’s shouting but he sounds so far away.

“Are you okay?” I ask. I flinch when I lift my arm up to try to touch his face, but I have to put it back down. It hurts too much.

“I’m fine. You saved me, my queen. Get the fucking doc,” he growls to someone, probably Derry. Would anyone else know how to contact him? He called me his queen, I guess that means he’s my king. I can hear my mom and Cashel screaming.

“She can’t die. She can’t. She’s my best friend. My only friend,” Cashel sobs.

“Cash?”

“Matty?”

“I’m gonna be fine. Stop screaming though. My head hurts.” The screaming immediately stops.

“Matty?” Daddy says coming into view next to Dorian.

“You shot me, Daddy.”

“I wasn’t aiming for you,” he says, brushing my bangs out of my face.

“That’s fair.”

“Matty?” Declan asks, shoving Daddy out of the way.

“I’m okay, Dec.”

“You’re bleeding a lot.”

“I know. The doc will stitch me up again.”

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