Page 4 of Scorned Beauty

“Hurry up, beautiful. You’re the reason I’m bleeding out.”

What did that even mean? And what was the deal with him calling me beautiful? I was always Sloane or Miss Scott to him. He must be delirious with blood loss. I slammed the van’s side door and hurried to the driver’s side. “I’ll take you to the hospital.”

“No.”

“I don’t want you dying in my van. You’re bleeding all over it.”

I felt Dom’s gaze on me. Somehow, even in his weakened state, I could feel his humor drilling into me. “Are you worried about me messing up your van or me dying?”

“Don’t get cute,” I mumbled.

“Your home,” he said. “In Jersey.”

“I know you don’t want to be questioned at the hospital, but Bianca’s house is closer and I can stitch you up there.” Bianca was his cousin who was married to Sandro, the current Rossi boss. The Rossi and De Lucci crime families used to have a cold war, but with the marriage between Bianca and Sandro, that had ended. I knew Sandro and Dom conferred with each other all the time, which made their house the most logical place to drop him off.

“I don’t want the Rossis involved. Those who need to know have my whereabouts.”

“That you’re with me?”

“Yes.” He raised his arm to point at the road that would take us to Jersey. “You better take this ramp on your next turn.”

“You’re so bossy, even if you’re bleeding half to death,” I retorted. “It will take me an hour to get to Hoboken. I need to look at your wound.”

“I’ll be fine. It stopped bleeding.”

“You said you were bleeding out.”

“I lied,” he grunted. “Stop arguing and just drive.” If he wasn’t in any way injured, hot mafia boss or not, I would leave him on the side of the road. But an edge sharpened his voice, hinting that he was trying to keep the mood light. After another twenty minutes, we entered the tunnel on our way to New Jersey.

I shot him a quick glance. His head was thrown back and his eyes were closed. The night had taken a weird turn, and I had a feeling I was in the middle of a power play. What did Dom mean by I was the reason he was bleeding out?

I met him last year when I helped Bianca escape to prevent further escalation of hostilities between the Rossis and the De Luccis. But that wasn’t the end of it. As it turned out, someone in Sandro’s past had come for revenge, which resulted in Bianca getting kidnapped. During her rescue, I accidentally shot Dom. He had a supernatural ability to make me jumpy. Yet when he appeared tonight, the jitteriness I had felt during and after I left Grigori’s job faded. It was as if I was finally safe. Like Dom was my armor against the Russian bratva. Conflicting feelings seemed to be my default mode when it came to him. I tried to avoid him at De Lucci gatherings, but he always made his presence known. A secret smile would play on his lips. He would never approach me but watched me across the room. Like two months ago at Bianca and Sandro’s wedding, his burning gaze willed me to look at him. And I wasn’t imagining his attention because when I did glance at him, he raised his glass to me as if in a toast. I was a mouse, and he was the cat toying with me.

But this? “You okay?”

“I’m alive.”

“Don’t be dramatic.”

A chuckle reverberated in his chest as he shifted in his seat. A pained groan escaped him. “Don’t make me laugh.”

“I’m not.”

“Now is the time to get rid of me if you want to.”

The drive through the tunnel was smooth. He wasn’t wearing his seat belt, and I presumed it was so it wouldn’t rub against his left side. I was glad that I’d disabled that aggravating sound that was a reminder to buckle up because I frequently put heavy loads on the passenger side.

“Tempting,” I replied. “Anyone want you dead?”

“How much time do we have?”

“Wow, that many?” We had another thirty minutes to my apartment.

My peripheral vision caught him turning to me. “Bad idea to confess to you.”

“The Russians?”

“No, my injuries are not because they want to kill me. At least, not Grigori.” He muttered something under his breath that sounded like “I hope.”