Broken Princess (The Bianchi Chronicles Book 1), page 25
I take advantage of my opportunity and reach up on my tiptoes, pulling him down to meet me. As I press my lips to his I lean into the softness of them, and I feel the most overwhelming sense of belonging. I don’t paw at him or try to devour him. We don’t escalate, we simply sink into the taste of each other. Sweet and delicate, delicious and addictive.
A gentle hum rumbles from his throat as he steals my breath and slides his tongue against the seam of my lips. I surrender to him and am lost to our tangled breaths and gentle moans. I can feel the moment he hesitates, his doubts overtaking his desire as his lips still and he pulls away leaving me bereft. His brow is drawn, like he’s wrestling with himself.
“You are a truly spectacular woman, Aurora.” He sweeps a stray tendril back, anchoring it behind my shoulder.
“And you are worthy, Enzo.”
He hugs me and kisses my forehead as he lingers. I could swear he’s inhaling me, which should be odd, but I’m doing the same thing. My head tucked into his broad chest, brazenly inhaling his scent and letting it engulf me. One day I’ll figure out what it is he smells of, but right now it makes me think of floating down a river in a forest. Clean and fresh with dark woodsy undertones. It’s uniquely him and I find it soothes every part of my soul. There’s no one I feel more at peace with.
He slips out of the room, and I take a deep breath before I open the file in front of me. I don’t think it’s possible to prepare yourself adequately to see someone you love reduced to cold words and photos of their naked body on a slab. I can’t stop the tears that flow, or the aching realisation of the torment Isa was subjected to in her final days.
The anguish flows through me like a torrent of rain, finding the path of least resistance as it demolishes the last of my remaining emotional barriers.
I cry until my eyes run dry and then I return to the mirror. Seeing myself broken, but also seeing myself enlightened. I set to work righting the mess I’ve made, and brushstroke by brushstroke I don’t rebuild myself, I discover myself.
Time to get my game face on.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
NICO
When Aurora appears, she’s undergone another transformation, but it’s not the obvious one. She found the makeup I left in her room, but that's not why she looks like a new woman. It’s the air of confidence she’s bolstered by.
She’s standing tall, shoulders back, and strides into the room like she owns it and everyone present. I can’t speak for the others, but feeling even the slightest bit possessed by this woman makes me hard as a rock.
Given we’re about to head out, that’s just fucking unhelpful.
We’re taking both cars, since we’ll be exiting at opposite ends of the building once Benny lights it up. Benny, Sin, and Zo will take the panel van with Benny’s supplies while Aurora and I are in a nondescript, dark sedan. We have a few we rotate, stored in various lockups, swapping out the licence plates as needed.
After reminding us of our escape routes, we’re good to go and Aurora leads the way. Fuck me. Her ass sways as she struts to the passenger door, and it’s all I can do to stop myself from spanking it.
Once we’re on the road, the silence which starts off comfortably soon grows into something wildly awkward.
“So… we gonna mention the fact that you fucked me so hard I nearly went blind as I came? Or that you spat your lover’s cum into my pussy and then had him lick me clean?”
I can’t help chuckling at her brutal candour.
“Because I am not complaining—in any way, shape or form—I’d just like to know if we’re cool and if we’re going to be doing it again?”
“Inquiring minds want to know, huh?”
“Something like that.”
“I like this new you. Or rather old you. She’s ballsy and bratty.”
“And you love to punish a brat.”
“Fuck yeah I do.”
She’s smiling broadly and trying her damndest not to look over at me. “Can you handle two brats, though? Benny and me, I reckon we’re a handful taken together.”
I groan at the image she’s conjured in my head. Me taking Benny while Benny takes her. Fucking him into her over and over again. I shake my head, trying to release myself from the hold that fantasy has over me.
“You’re a fucking tease, my little cock-warmer.”
“Is it teasing when I’d follow through, though?”
“Fair point,” I say in a growl that reveals my frustration at not having her riding my dick right now. “But you’ll have to wait until later. We’ll be pulling up in ten.”
“Enough time for you to answer the question then, sir.” She squeezes my thigh to emphasise her point.
I glance across at her before resuming my focus on the road. I answer her with absolute conviction, “We didn’t fuck you, Aurora. We claimed you. There’s no way that’s not happening again.”
“Oh.”
“Nothing else to say?”
“What about Sinclair?”
“What about him? He claimed you, too. He has no problem with us wanting you, and we have no problem with him wanting you.”
“What about me wanting all of you?”
“Don’t think I didn’t see what you did there. I have no problem with you wanting all of us. Do you have a problem with my relationship with Benny?”
“Of course not. I love what you have together.”
“So, there’s no issue. We’ll figure everything else out as we go.”
“Well, okay then,” is all she can muster in response, and the silence that settles between us is comfortable again.
As we enter through a shabby side door, we’re given the once over by a sorry excuse for a doorman who takes one look at my size and instantly decides it’s easier just to let me through than to hold me up.
I inform him I’m escorting a replacement for one of the girls, and he checks a clipboard on the desk in front of him, nodding when he sees a name crossed out. We paid Cherry a boatload of cash to make sure she wouldn’t be here tonight. After seeing this place, I hope she takes the money and runs as far away as she can.
From the building plans we’d figured the front-of-house would be a strip club and as I follow Aurora through a threadbare red velvet curtain, we’re greeted by a gloomy room full of half-empty seating arranged around a stage that’s seen better days. Half of the bulbs are blown in the lighting rigs and the spotlight hardly has enough lumens to highlight the barely-legal stripper doing her best to enthral the lacklustre audience. As fronts for brothels go, this one is piss poor.
Everything about this place feels dirty and the stale smell turns my stomach as we head towards the bar.
I take out my phone and send a text to the group chat.
Gonna be hard to blend in with the clientele.
Boss-Man:
Shit.
Bambi:
Do I need to solo it?
Boss-Man:
No.
Sin:
No, you won’t.
Fuck no.
Bambi:
Thanks for the faith in me.
Boss-Man:
It’s not that, and you know it. You’ll only have one exit route and that’s got the only security.
Bambi:
Fine.
We stick to the plan. Sin goes with you. Zo, we’ll meet you out back with our passenger.
Boss-Man:
Agreed
Aurora finishes up with the barman and hands me a bottled beer. She grabs hers and sidles up to me, reading the group chat to catch up. Bottled beer is a wise choice in this place. I don’t trust that there’s a single clean glass behind that bar.
We’re early so we can set up in the room before Marco arrives. I nod towards the door to the left of the bar. It’s covered by a grotty grey-black curtain as tattered as the one we entered through.
This place is just fucking delightful.
We move leisurely and I make a show of running my hands over her in a lascivious manner while she plasters the fake smile of an indentured woman on her face. She’s able to channel it far too easily, and it makes my already sickened stomach roil.
The stiff curtain scrapes against me—so stained in fuck-knows-what it barely drapes any longer—and we pass through into a dimly lit hallway. According to the layout Benny showed us, there are six rooms back here and our target is the last one on the left, closest to the fire exit. The fact there’s no security strengthens my disdain for the place. Anything could be happening to the girls. There aren’t even cameras in the hallway.
Pushing open the door, Aurora retches at the state of the room. I doubt anyone has ever cleaned anything in this room except the bed sheets—and they look dubious.
She looks around, peering suspiciously and refusing to touch a thing.
“Something’s not right about this.”
“You’re not wrong.”
“No, I mean it, Nico. This doesn’t feel right. Why would Marco, a man of significant influence, be caught dead anywhere near this place?”
“According to our intel, Marco’s been seeing Cherry here every week for two years.”
“But why? Why not set her up somewhere after all that time? Why come here, of all places?”
I think about it and come up short. Pulling out my phone, I see that we still have ten minutes, so I open the group chat again.
You sure we can trust our source on this, Zo?
Boss-Man:
Why?
Phoenix:
Because the likelihood of a man like Marco patronising this establishment voluntarily is slim to none. It’s a fucking dive.
What she said.
No one replies, no three dots. My unease builds until at last Zo responds.
Boss-Man:
Looks like the intel’s good. Marco just arrived with two men. Benny and Sin are tailing them. They’re off comms.
You’re a go.
Aurora nods but still looks unconvinced. We wait. We wait longer than I expect, considering he only has to cross one room, the bar, and a corridor to get here.
My foot taps on the floor and Aurora glares at me, and crooks her head, reminding me I’m supposed to be hiding behind the door. As I move to position, I can hear the sharp clack of pretentious shoes on the creaky floorboards in the hallway. They pause outside the door for a moment, and then I watch as the handle slowly turns. The door creaks painfully, imitating the sound of nails down a chalkboard, sending a shiver down my spine.
As the door opens, an overly cocky Marco saunters through, adjusting his tie in a brash fashion and then reaching into his suit jacket, he arrogantly proclaims, “Which of Enzo’s lackeys am I going to have the pleasure of killing tonight?”
My pulse quickens and I feel my stomach drop—he knew we’d be here, and everything is about to take a turn for the worse.
When his eyes land Aurora, he hesitates and I take that as my opportunity to slam the door shut and barrel into him, disarming him of the gun he was reaching for when he entered.
From under my firm grip, Marco stares at Aurora. Eyebrows raised, incredulous tone revealing his shock at seeing her. “You’re supposed to be dead. He said you were dead.”
“Well now,” interjects Aurora, “one would have thought, if you had any knowledge of your don’s daughter being murdered you would have, I don’t know, told someone maybe?”
“This is going to be another easy interrogation, isn’t it?” I say as I grip Marco’s throat. He’s choking, but only slightly. I squeeze his rolls of neck fat just hard enough to restrict his windpipe and compress his carotid artery at the same time. I need him lightheaded and pliable, as opposed to agitated or unconscious.
I could carry him out the fire escape, but I don’t want to.
His garbled rants fade to an incoherent mumble, so I release him and steer him back towards the door. We need to get him out, but only once Benny and Sinclair take care of his guards. That’s when we hear a fire alarm—and that’s our cue.
Aurora opens the door, and we can see flames consuming the curtain that leads to the bar, and beyond that is a raging inferno spewing out acrid black smoke into the hallway. While I manhandle Marco, Aurora forces the fire door open, and we burst out into the back alley. The van isn’t here. Enzo was supposed to leave the town car for Benny and bring the van to us.
“Shit.” I’m searching the street for any sign of the van, but there’s nothing. Looking back into the club, there’s no one else exiting through the fire escape. That means there was no one else in the five other rooms off that corridor.
We are so fucked. I’m not entirely sure how fucked we are, but we’re definitely fucked.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
AURORA
We tumble out of the fire exit, struggling with the weight of a half-unconscious Marco. He’s still slightly loopy from the lack of oxygen, but he’s also damn heavy.
Complacent and overconfident capos are usually as overinflated as their egos, yet most have intellects the size of their dicks. I have no idea how some of these men have amassed the power and support they have. My father would never fully explain why men that turned my stomach made up his inner circle, but he would often say, “Just because something is ugly doesn’t mean it can’t be useful.”
He was a clever man, and managed his capos well, but he spent far too much time and energy working a broken system.
Enzo and the van are nowhere to be seen, and I know in the pit of my stomach that something is wrong as I feel the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. I hear the vehicles before I see them. Tyres screeching as they hoon around the corner and come to a stop in front of us. The doors of three black SUVs with tinted windows, spring open as soon as they stop and eject at least half a dozen men with guns drawn. All trained on us. No matter what Nico has concealed on him, he can’t get to it quick enough. We are out-manned and outgunned.
Nico drops our cumbersome guest on the ground and we both raise our hands automatically. Marco rolls around as he tries to right himself. No one moves to help him. These people are not his rescuers. They’re here for us.
My pulse races and I struggle to halt the ragged breaths that assault my lungs. I can’t be taken—I can’t be captive again. I wrestle my traitorous body into submission, refusing to give these assholes the satisfaction, burying my fear.
No one speaks, but the gun closest to us waves its barrel towards the SUV on the far left. Guess that’s our invitation. Behind me, I can hear our captors manhandle Marco into the back of one of the other vehicles. As we’re pushed into the rear passenger doors, I can see that Sin, Benny, and Zo are not here.
I’m desperately hoping they escaped. My teeth are clenched so hard they’re beginning to ache under the strain. Saliva pools in my mouth and as I swallow, I realise from the sharp copper taste, that I’ve bitten my cheek so hard I’ve drawn blood. They have to be alive. Shaking my head, I try to snap myself out of this spiral.
The familiar faces of Salvatore’s lackeys register just before they throw a bag over our heads. It’s oppressive and jarring to be suddenly without one of your senses, but it’s not foreign and I find it oddly calming. This was one of Max’s regular punishments when I was in the basement for any length of time. It’s an excellent way to disorient your captive and make them lose their sense of time and reality. After four days chained in darkness, I was usually at my most malleable.
Their scare tactics lighten my mood and make me chuckle—nothing about this situation is funny, but equally there’s nothing these men can do to me that would intimidate me—it’s like they’re following the Henchmen’s Guide to Intimidation. I receive a swift jab to my ribs from what I assume is the butt of a handgun, but the corset boning does a fantastic job of absorbing a majority of the impact. Nice little bonus there—stylish and practical.
It’s ridiculous that they’ve covered our heads, such a pointless thing to do. Once we get wherever we’re going, it’s highly likely we’re going to be executed, so what’s the fucking point in hiding the destination from us? As low-level lackeys go, Salvatore De Luca’s are not the smartest.
My best guess is it takes about twenty-five minutes for the cars to come to a stop and we’re dragged out of the backseat. Rough hands grab my arms, wrenching me out of the car, before I’m handed off to someone else who makes sure to grip my hips hard enough to bruise when they spin me around and push me forward to walk in front of them. I start a mental tally of exactly how many men I’m going to kill or simply castrate if I get out of this. Gotta have hope, right?
I’m pushed from the frosty night air into a warm room, which only serves to highlight the icy claw-like fingers that clutch the back of my neck under the bag—that makes number three. I distract myself by coming up with a list of unique ways to remove someone’s balls.
I can hear the scuffles of multiple sets of feet struggle with what I can only guess is an uncooperative Nico. The scratchy, musty-smelling material is wrenched off my head and hands force me down on my knees in front of a familiar desk. My tender ankle objects to the sudden movement and shift in weight.
Well, this is just fucking great. We are so fucked.
Forcing Nico to his knees beside me, we are frisked, our phones taken and switched off before the two men assume their sentry behind us and place the barrels of their guns to the back of our skulls. “Don’t fucking move.”
