Page 41 of Covert (Ruthless Love #2)

Chapter thirty-eight

Maddox

T he bell to the front door chimes as Beckett, Axel, and I wipe down our individual stations.

It had been a pretty steady stream of work, and I was looking forward to relaxing with the boys and Nikki this evening.

I was thinking of ways we could spoil her, of the things I wanted to do to her in bed, with a loopy, lovestruck smile on my face.

Looking up at the boys, they have similar looks, even Beckett.

"Sorry, we're closed," Nikki calls in a singsong voice from her side of the pony wall.

A second later, an earsplitting clang of a metal tray falling, and the more delicate tinkling of the piercings inside that tray comes from the front, and we look up.

In an instant, I see Nikki, barefoot, no sweater, sprinting for the back door, skirt swishing around her milky thighs.

I look behind her to see what she's running from, when my stomach sours with dread.

Four men, in formation, three flanking the one in the front, all dressed in black suits, stand guarding the front door. Unmoving.

The back door opens then, and Nikki skids to a stop. Beckett moves to protect her, but the burly man who walks through the back door raises a gun to Axel's head.

"Stand down!" Nikki shouts as I go to charge the man in the back, her hands in fists against her thigh, back rigid. I freeze. Who is she telling to stand down? Us, or them? We don't have weapons, so it can't be us. Why does she think that will work against the five men who just ambushed us ?

The man holding the gun to Axel lowers it immediately.

What the fuck?

Axel shoots me a quizzical look while Beckett just looks confused, wanting to go to her, but unsure how to read the situation correctly. Guns are involved, and if there's any chance his actions could cause Nikki to get hurt, he'd never forgive himself.

Nikki turns to look at me, and my heart shatters. My beautiful girl, with big brown eyes, looks heartbroken. Tears stream down her cheeks as her lower lip trembles. Her eyes hold so much love and remorse that I can't stand it. I step forward to hug her, but she stops me.

The four men from the front door have now positioned themselves on this side of the pony wall.

Nikki turns and faces them. I get the same feeling I did when she put herself between me and loaded guns at the rally.

I want to run to her; to protect her from these men, these must be her "them".

The ones who tried to sell her. But then Nikki does the unthinkable.

I watch in horror as she turns and walks straight into the arms of the man in charge.

He's handsome, with tan skin and black hair, and muscular, but his nose is crooked - likely broken before - and he sports several scars on his eyebrows and chin.

He wraps one arm around her shoulders and holds her head to his chest with such tenderness with the other.

He rests his cheek on her head and sighs, deep and weary.

"I've missed you," my girl whispers, sobbing against his chest.

"I've missed you, too, Letty," he whispers back before taking her face in his palms and swiping at her tears. "No tears, remember?"

She smiles sadly before looking back at us. "That was before I had anything worth losing. "

In less than a breath, three things happen.

I step forward to pull Nikki from this man's arms and protect her. To question her. To demand that she explain what's happening.

The asshole in the back raises his weapon at me in warning.

Nikki shoves her hand into the suit coat of the man she was hugging and, in a flash, has a weapon pointed at the man in the back.

"I said stand down," she growls, a tone of authority and anger I've never heard from her before. "Raise your weapon at my man again and you'll be leaving here in a fucking body bag."

My mouth drops open, stunned. Nikki transforms in front of my eyes.

How does she know how to use a gun? Where did the balls come from?

And how come the leader allowed her to take his weapon?

Even now, with his gun pointed at his man, he seemed unaffected.

Nikki still has an arm around his waist for Christ's sake.

The goon pales and hesitates for a moment before lowering his gun. "Your man?" the leader whispers lowly.

"Later," she replies.

Axel slumps down, sitting in his work chair. His shoulders hang forward as realization hits him hard. "Nikki," he breathes out on a sigh. "Letty. Nicoletta. Nicoletta Ricci."

Nikki visibly winces, and she looks at him apologetically.

"Who the fuck is Nicoletta Ricci!?" My anger, which had seemed so distant recently, was now back in full form. My girl is getting taken away from us, and there's nothing I can do about it. And who the fuck is Nicoletta Ricci!?

"The lost mafia princess," Axel continues, looking at Nikki like he's seeing her for the very first time. She is the embodiment of regret .

"How did you find me?" she whispers. Regret and compassion spread across the leader's face.

"One of our new recruits came in for a tattoo and recognized you."

"Can I at least say goodbye?" she asks. The leader nods.

She walks to me and wraps her arms around my neck, giving me the saddest smile. "I told you I didn't get to keep you," she whispers against my lips. She holds my face tenderly as she kisses me. It feels an awful lot like a goodbye kiss, but I refuse to let her go when she tries to pull away.

"I have to go with them," she whispers to me. "Please don't follow, please don't try to find me. I don't want them to hurt you."

"This is your 'them'," I whisper back, running my thumb along her cheek to wipe away the tears.

She simply nods sadly. I'm frozen. I can't fight these men.

I can't steal her away. I can't stop her from leaving, and the future we had been building together crashes around us.

I'm powerless as I watch her walk up to Beckett and wrap her arms around him.

I slump against my table, already trying to come up with ways to get her back.

But as I watch Beckett bury his face in the crook of her neck, my heart breaks for him, too.

He was finally getting better. He'd been smiling, for the first time since I first met him.

She had brought him back to life, and now she's leaving.

She whispers something to him, and he nods, and I swear his lower lip trembles.

Fuck, I hate seeing men cry. He collapses against his chair and holds his head in his hands.

She moves to Axel next, who gives her a watery smile - one that doesn't reach his eyes.

He reaches out for her and pulls her against him, getting as much body contact as possible.

He threads his fingers through her hair and presses a deep, passionate kiss against her mouth.

They whisper to each other, but I can't make out the words.

While I don't want Nikki to leave, I need her and the mafiosos to leave so we can formulate a plan.

We watch in stunned silence as one of the men behind the leader approaches Nikki with bright pink back hostlers with small pistols and helps her put them on, before handing her another that wraps around her thigh.

I can't combine these two different versions of Nikki in my mind.

My sweet, sexy Nikki, with this Nicoletta, who wears weapons and apparently runs with the mafia.

She gives us all one last sad look before the bell rings above the door again, and she's gone. The eerie silence that follows is unnerving. It's not just the sound of her, it's her presence. It feels like it did before she came into our lives -- dull, grey.

I stand, anger and desperation forcing my muscles into action. "No! Fuck this. We're not letting her go." I refuse to let her go. I don't care what she said, what she wants, there's no future without her in it.

I start with Axel. "What did she say to you?" Maybe there will be clues, or something that hints that will help us get her back. I need to know everything.

Axel stares at the floor, unmoving. His stillness is eerie, but his eyes say he's lost to himself.

"She said she loved me and that she would send me her new tracker info," he whispers, almost defeated.

Tracker? I'm about to ask him what he means when it dawns on me.

The scar on the back of her neck. She must have dug it out herself, so they couldn't track her.

My heart clenches in on itself at the thought of my sweet, brave Nikki, at fifteen, digging a knife into the back of her neck so she could be free.

So she wouldn't be sold. If she's the missing mafia princess, why would her family sell her?

And is she in danger of being sold again?

Fuck!

"Text Diesel. He needs to know. Maybe he can help us."

"Beckett?"

He looks up at me with such grief and sorrow, it breaks my heart all over again.

"She said she would find her way back to us. That we were worth fighting for."

That's at least good news - that she's not just resigned to leave us.

"Let's go home. We need a plan. We need to know everything there is to know about the Ricci family."