Page 15 of Caruso (Vegas Mafia #3)
Chapter Fifteen
Taylor
I am surprisingly calm. Call it closure if you like.
I had no idea it would be this easy to take a life in cold blood.
I was wrong. It was the easiest thing I have ever done, and I would do it again in a heartbeat.
His abuse has been ingrained in my soul for far too long now.
I ran from him in fear, and yet seeing him today — weak, shattered, broken and yet still clinging onto any power he once had was the closure I needed.
He was pathetic. A mere grain of sand in a full ocean.
Irrelevant. He’s gone. Thank fuck for that.
The guys follow me as we leave the house to burn.Once again, we take our places in the cars, and they don’t hang around. The sound of an explosion rocks the neighborhood as we go.
“Fuck!” I turn and stare at the place I once called home, and yet it never was, not in the normal sense of the word. It was my prison, and now I am free .
“I’m sorry, Matteo.” I sigh as I turn and leave the burning image as a memory.
“What are you sorry about?”
His voice is husky, and for some reason I squirm on my seat, wondering why killing a man turns me on so much.
“There may be witnesses, who would report your license plate to the cops.”
“What license plate?”
I turn and his eyes gleam in the darkened interior.
“We don’t have any, and as there are no cameras—we checked, by the way—nobody can pin that on us.”
“But a neighbor, they may have recorded it on their phone.”
“Then it’s fortunate we know their location and my men warned them that the next person we call on would be them if they discussed anything regarding today.”
He leans back and, to my surprise, reaches for my hand.
“I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“For your childhood, your bad luck in stepfathers and your mom’s overdose.”
“Don’t be. Shit happens, and then you develop a taste for it.”
I’m surprised when he tugs me onto his lap, his strong arms closing around me and his hand forces my head against his chest. I’m even more shocked when he kisses my hair and whispers, “You are magnificent, Taylor. That wasn’t easy what you did back there. ”
I’m speechless. I’ve never been hugged before. Not like this. It’s as if he wants nothing from me but to comfort me. To make things better and for the first time in many years, a lone tear trickles down my face.
His arms tighten, and he says in a low voice, “Don’t say anything, baby girl. I’ve got you— we’ve got you. Grieve for your mom, for your past, knowing you are free now.”
“Am I though?”
My heart aches as I experience something I’ve only dreamed about. Nobody has ever had my back, unless you count Jason, but he never hugged me. It was too awkward between us, but Matteo doesn’t appear to care about that.
I snuggle in, loving the traces of earth and spice, his manly scent that I could take deep breaths of all day long, surrounding me with reassurance.
His muscles comfort as they provide a welcome reprieve for my cheek to press against. Skin on skin through the open-buttoned silk shirt he wears so well.
He strokes my hair and kisses my head softly, not saying a word, just reassuring me that I’m not on my own.
As we pull into the airfield, I sense this may be the only time I get the softer side of the man and, almost in desperation, I whisper, “Can I stay with you tonight?”
“Of course.” His words sharpen as he whispers in my ear. “We have a deal—remember. I get your virginity, and nothing is going to change that.”
I disguise my smile because, thank fuck for that. I thought he was going soft on me. I can’t deal with that. Not when I’ve just found him, and as the car comes to a stop, I shift off his lap and wink. “I won’t tell if you won’t.”
“It’s our secret.” His easy expression is soon replaced with the usual glare as the door opens and he says roughly, “Follow me. Let’s get the fuck out of Oklahoma.”
As soon as we step foot on the plane, Matteo points to my seat. “Strap in, we have a quick slot to make.”
I watch as the doors close quickly and the brothers take their seats, and before long, we are airborne.
There is a solemn atmosphere, and I don’t miss the tension between the brothers as they sit in silence, not even looking at one another. It sets me on edge, and when the seatbelt sign goes off, Matteo says gruffly, “Go to the bedroom and get some sleep. You could do with it.”
I say nothing and do as I’m told, desperate to be on my own, to be away from the weird atmosphere that has come out of nowhere. I head to the bedroom and as I slip inside, I gaze around with wonder as I relish the moment I am finally free of my past.
I got my revenge. I made it happen. Ding dong, the witch is dead. In this case, the wizard.
As I lie on the silk sheets and curl up in a ball, so many things pass through my mind as I finally fall asleep, secure in the knowledge that I did what I came here to do.
Jason is nervous. He’s never nervous. For some reason he won’t look at me, and I’m worried its something I’ve said—done even.
“What’s happening tonight?”
I attempt to make conversation, and he shrugs, gazing moodily over the horizon as he sits smoking a cigarette on the hay bale.
“The usual.”
“Fighting?”
He sighs, flicking the butt some way from the hay, watching it flicker in the sunlight before it takes its last gasp of oxygen.
“Are you nervous?” For some reason, I think he may be, and that’s not like Jason.
“I’m never nervous about fighting.”
He sighs, raking his fingers through his hair as he fights internally for once.
“It’s my birthday today.” I remind him with a happy smile, and he nods, his eyes downcast and his mood grim.
“What are you doing for that?”
I don’t know why he asked, because I never do anything for my birthday and I never have. I only know it’s today because my teacher once told me and made the class sing happy birthday before class started for the day. It’s the only happy memory I have of my birthday.
“Nothing, I guess.” I smile to take away the pain that always brings with it. Mom died a while ago, and my stepfather is merely counting down the birthdays until my eighteenth one, when my present will be his cock inside me.
Jason nods, defeat heavy in his eyes, and then surprises me by saying softly, ’’I’ve got you something.”
“You have.” My heart leaps a thousand miles as I prepare for something that has never happened before. A gift?
He removes his braided bracelet from his wrist and beckons me across.
“Your bracelet?”
My eyes widen as he grasps my wrist, and I’m surprised at my reaction to his touch. A warm shiver of delight fizzles through me, and I stare at him wide-eyed, wondering if he felt the same.
His expression is an unreadable mask but there is a muscle twitching in his cheek as he stares at his braid on my wrist, his fingers smoothing it over almost lovingly.
“I want you to have it.”
He stares into my eyes, still holding my hand, and I smile, touched by the gesture, the happiest I have ever been in my life.
“You look after yourself, Taylor. Promise me that. Remember what I’ve taught you and don’t let them win.”
“Never let them win.” A huge smile breaks across my face as I experience a lightness in my spirit that has never been there before.
“Thank you, Jason. I love it.”
He nods, a sad expression in his eyes as he whispers, “Remember this, Taylor. There is some good in the world.”
He holds my wrist as if he can’t bear to let go, and I wonder if he is more attached to the bracelet than I imagined.
He has always worn it. Ever since I can remember, and when I asked him about it once, he told me it was special.
He never elaborated on that, and I didn’t think he’d appreciate me asking, so I brushed it away and never thought of it again, until my birthday. The day I lost him forever.
I never saw Jason again. That was the night my stepfather told me he had won the fight against him and Jason was now a corpse in an unmarked grave in the mountains. He noticed the bracelet on my wrist and ripped it off, tearing it apart with an evil smile.
I never believed him. Jason wasn’t dead. He was a warrior; more than a match for my stepfather, but he never came back. Doubt began to creep in, and it was the only explanation.
That was the day I lost all hope—forever.