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I beg of you, Maria … don’t do it. There will be no going back from thi—

“Maria,” he heard her name being called from inside the car.

No! His soul cried out for her when she dropped her eyes from his to the man inside the car.

He knew it the second she looked away that he had lost her … when he almost had her. He didn’t watch as she got in the car, looking instead at the man who had just stolen everything from him.

Dominic didn’t know what façade he had put on for Maria, but staring into the gold eyes through the dimmed window, he knew the real Kayne Evans …

And he hadn’t fucking changed at all.

Watching the car drive off with his true love, the boogieman’s voice echoed in his mind.

Kayne still bleeds the same as Lucifer.

Twenty-Three

Maria Will Never Forgive You

Opening the car door, the man slid inside the front seat behind the wheel, only noticing the presence of another when he looked into the rearview mirror.

The man in the driver’s seat didn’t move a muscle. “What are you doing, Dominic?”

Dom had been in the back seat of the dark vehicle for a bit, just waiting for his mark, as he held his Glock pointing at the back of the seat.

Staring down the rearview mirror, his hazel eyes met the furiously glowing blue-green ones. “We’re done, Lucca.”

“Done?” Lucca coldly mocked him, his words slashing the cool air. “We haven’t even begun.”

“You did,” he assured him, keeping his voice as steady as his gun. “You have taken everything from me … Angel … Kat … and now Mari—”

“I didn’t take Maria away from you. I have been trying to help yo—”

“Bullshit!” Dominic’s voice exploded in the car. His gun no longer steady like his voice, he waved the metal piece with each word he spoke. “You could have done something! Like you made me do with Kat!”

“I told you, Maria would never love you if I did that,” the underboss gritted out through clenched teeth.

“Yes,” he agreed. “But you could have kept her away from him, and you fucking know it.”

Lucca went silent for several deadly moments, and then his voice lost the bite it had before, and in its place was disappointment. “I thought she would have chosen better.”

“Well, she didn’t.” It broke his heart to say those words. Both of them knew Maria’s choice was final. She had stopped hiding her relationship with Kayne when she had left publicly in his car.

Making a move, Lucca suddenly stopped when Dom placed the barrel against the back of his skull.

“I need a cigarette, all right?” Lucca slowly continued to reach into his pocket without permission, pulling out a pack, along with his Zippo. “It’s not exactly like I fucking have a chance of outshooting you, even if you didn’t have that gun in your hand.”

Dom actually had a slight burst of laughter, his erratic brain not sure what emotion to feel next. In some way, he felt like, if the two of them hadn’t been sworn enemies, they might have been friends.

Lighting up a cigarette, Lucca took a couple of hard hits before he continued, “You just didn’t give it enough time; you have to keep trying with Maria.”

“Time?” Dominic switched back to his angry tone and feelings of them being enemies. “How much time has she had with Kayne? I’ve spent my days since the wedding too busy, proving to your father that I, nor any of my men, are One-Shot. And while I’ve been fighting for my family’s lives, you’ve managed to let Maria fall in love with someone else.”

“I thought she knew better,” Lucca hissed. “I wanted to see who she would choose.”

“So, what? You wanted to test her?” Dominic’s voice shook the vehicle. “This is Maria’s life we’re talking about here! She isn’t one of your sick, little experiments. You wanted her to choose? Well, congratulations. She chose, and now we both will pay for it.”

“You’re not going to kill me.”

“You should never underestimate a desperate man, Lucca.” Dom’s hazel eyes glowed in the night.

That was exactly where the underboss had pushed him, and that was his downfall. The worst thing to do was back a dog into a corner because, eventually, there’d be a fight.

Seeing he was serious, Lucca’s strange eyes glowed back. “My father will kill you for killing me, and you know it.”

“I actually think he might thank me for getting rid of his biggest enemy. What do you think?” he asked with a tilt of his lips, but Dom wasn’t that naïve. “Even so, he won’t let me off, but I could get him to leave my siblings out of it.”

Lucca stared back at him through the rearview mirror, unafraid. “After everything you’ve lived through, you’re just going to give up?”

“I don’t have anything without Kat, and now especially without Maria.” Dominic said the words with such pain that it rocked the earth itself. “You told me fifty-fifty, Lucca. You lied as you shook my hand and looked me in the fucking eyes.”