Page 113 of The Mafia Marriage Contract

Bronx barely comes to a stop outside the emergency room before I push open the door and jump onto the pavement. My heart explodes against my ribs, panic flooding my insides as I tear through the waiting room and stop in front of the reception desk.

“Livvie Viacava.” The name explodes out of my lips when a nurse with furrowed brows looks up at me. “She was just brought in with a gunshot wound.”

The nurse’s lips pull into a tight line. “And you are?”

“Her husband,” I choke out. “Where is she?”

“She’s been taken into surgery. I will have the doctor come out and talk to you as soon as he can.” She nods toward the rows of chairs around the perimeter of the room. As if I can sit. As if I can keep my shit together enough to calmly wait for answers… answers I might not want to hear.

Bronx and Reign run in minutes later. I pace a row of windows, fisting my hair as fear knots in the back of my throat.

“She can’t die,” I mutter, more to myself than to them. “I fucking loveher. I can’t lose her. Not now.”

I catch the look Bronx and Reign exchange, and my heart sinks into my stomach.

I know what it means.

But fuck that. I won’t accept it. She has to live and I’ll doanything, pay whatever it takes to make that happen.

A doctor walks out of the double doors, a surgical mask covering the bottom half of his face. But his eyes freeze the blood in my veins. He speaks quietly to the nurse at the desk and looks over at me and my brothers. His shoulders square and he walks over to us, pulling down his mask.

"Mr. Viacava? I'm Dr. Chen, one of the trauma surgeons.” He pauses for a long second. “Your wife is in critical condition."

"How critical?"

"The bullet damaged her subclavian artery and brachial plexus. We're working to repair the vessel, but there may be permanent nerve damage to her left arm."

The words hit me with the force of a machete to the chest. Permanent damage. To her violin arm. The arm that makes music, that makes her who she is.

"Is she going to live?"

"We're doing everything we can. The next few hours will tell us more. The rest of the surgery could take anywhere from four to eight hours, depending on what else we find."

He turns and walks back through the double doors, leaving me in a waiting room that stinks of disinfectant and fucking death. I pace the floor, blood still caked under my fingernails, while Bronx handles the administrative bullshit at reception and Reign barks orders to our cleanup team from his phone.

"We have it all taken care of," Bronx says a little whilelater, joining me. "Private room, best surgeons. Whatever she needs. It’s sorted. She’ll be treated like a queen, K."

I nod but don't stop pacing. Eight hours. She could die in eight hours. Or wake up and never play violin again, which might be worse for her.

An hour later, my parents appear with a bunch of security guys surrounding them. Dad in his expensive Italian suit, Mom clutching her Birkin purse like hospitals are beneath her.

Bronx said they were out at some benefit function when he got through to them. Dad takes one look at me and his expression hardens to stone.

"What the hell happened?" he bites out.

"Not now."

"Kingston, we need to discuss?—"

"I said not now." My voice comes out as a snarl that makes him recoil. "My wife is in surgery. Everything else can wait."

Mom takes a step toward me, her eyes flicking over my stained clothes before they focus on mine. "How is she?"

"Could go either way."

She nods, gives my arm a squeeze, and sits down without another word. At least one of my parents has sense.

Dad starts to say something else, but Mom grabs his arm. "Sit down, my love. We need to wait for the surgeon to give us an outcome."