Page 52 of The One Night Match (Mafia Matchmaker #1)
FIFTY-TWO
RILEY
I ’m in and out of consciousness on the way up the mountain, my body succumbing to exhaustion with a pile of blankets and my husband wrapped around me.
Everything is foggy, but at least the rain has finally eased. It just would have been nice if it had done so a few hours ago.
I’m semi-conscious when we reach the house, only aware of being loaded into an ambulance while still wrapped in Cruz’s arms, and Lexi being irritated that they won’t let her in as well.
“Sir, she needs to be examined,” a male voice says.
“You can examine her from where she is,” Cruz retorts.
The paramedic sighs. “It would be easier to assess her if she were lying flat.”
Cruz’s body thrums with barely contained emotions, and I bury my face into his neck, trying to soothe him as best I can while being mostly unable to move. “My wife has been through hell tonight. She needs me right now.”
“She also needs to be properly assessed before we reach the hospital to ensure the appropriate resources are waiting for her when she arrives,” the man argues.
A few beats pass before I’m carefully lifted and placed on the hard gurney, dragging an involuntary whimper from my throat.
A large hand envelops mine, and I know without opening my eyes that it’s Cruz. “I’m right here, Kitten. I’m not leaving your side.”
I squeeze his hand, unable to force words to the surface.
“You wanna know how I realized you were missing?” he says, his voice hoarse. “Mr. Whiskers was destroying my desk, knocking shit off, being his usual menace-to-society self, but then I saw the blood. He was trying to show me the calling card you left.”
A smile tugs at my lips, and tears fill my eyes.
“I thought he was just angry at me, but he was trying to save you,” he chokes on his emotions. “I never thought I’d be so grateful to that little dick.”
I scoff and turn my head, forcing my eyes open to look at him. “He’s a good boy,” I murmur.
“I’m buying him one of those trees for every room in the house and a truckload of those treats he likes,” he tells me.
“That little fucker can have a whole house to himself if he wants. He can have anything his little demon heart desires, and I’ll still owe him the world for being the reason we knew who took you. ”
The next laugh that tumbles out makes my chest ache uncomfortably, but I don’t care. All I care about is that I survived by some miracle.
Against all odds, even when I’d given up, I still made it through.
“Did you mean it?” I ask.
“Did I mean what?”
“What you said in the clearing. That you love me.”
Cruz drops his face until his breath whispers across my cheeks. “Fuck yes, I did. I love you so fucking much it hurts. I love you with every damn beat of my heart, and every breath through my lungs. I love you with every single piece of me.”
“I love you too,” I whisper. “When I landed in the water, I thought I was going to die, and all I could think about was all the things we never got the chance to do.”
“Me too, Kitten. Me too.” He brushes his fingers through my damp hair. “Once we’ve sorted everything out in the business, we’re taking a long honeymoon. Anywhere you want, for as long as you want.”
“You can’t be away for that long,” I argue.
“I’m the boss, I can do whatever the fuck I want.”
I roll my eyes and lean into his hand. “I think I want to go back to work.”
He frowns.
“Not right away. Maybe after the honeymoon. But I don’t want to just be your wife and the mother of our kids if we have any. I want to have my own identity.”
He nods. “I have a friend at the University of Washington. I’ll talk to them to see if they’re looking for a librarian.”
Tears well in my eyes again as I choke on a rough sob. I misjudged Cruz. I allowed my preconceived ideas about men in the Mafia to cloud my judgment, but my husband is nothing like them, or at least not with me.
Cruz may be a lethal mob boss to the rest of the world, but to me, he’s anything but.
A steady beep pulls me from my restful sleep, and I crack open an eye to find a sterile white ceiling.
Hospital.
“Lexi, you can’t stay all night. The hospital has rules,” Mary says calmly.
“Cruz is staying.”
“Cruz is Riley’s husband.”
“And I’m her sister.”
She sighs, and I tilt my head to the side in time to see her run a hand down her face. “Your brother will be back shortly, and they have some things to work through. Things that Cruz won’t want his little sister being a part of.”
Lexi huffs, which makes Colten snicker.
He’s so quiet it took me a minute to realize he was here.
“You’ll stay with her until Cruz is back?” Mary asks.
“Of course, Ms. De Luca.”
Mary shakes her head. “Colten, I’ve known you since you were knee high to a grasshopper. I think we can drop the Ms. De Luca nonsense.”
“If you say so, Mary.” He smirks.
“You kids are going to be the death of me, I swear,” she mutters on her way out of the room, leaving me alone with Colten.
“You’re awake,” he says.
I nod and carefully shift to sit up. “Where’s Cruz?”
“He very begrudgingly had to go take care of a little business.”
I frown, but none of the resentment I expect comes. Part of the reason I never wanted to be a Mafia wife was because I couldn’t stand the idea of always coming last, but there isn’t a single part of me that thinks Cruz would leave me unless he absolutely had to.
“You don’t have to stay if you’d rather go home with Lexi,” I say.
His brows raise. “What makes you think I’d want to do that?”
I roll my eyes. “I hate to break this to you, bud, but I knew the moment I saw the two of you together that you were obsessed with her. It’s super obvious.”
He huffs, but doesn’t reply immediately, to the point I think he might not at all. “She’s too good for me.”
I shake my head. “Men,” I mutter. “Look, Colten. I know we don’t know each other very well, and you can ignore everything I’m about to say if you want, but I think you need to hear this.
If you would treat her right and put her first, if you would fight for her and protect her, if you would burn down the world for her and show up every day for her, then you deserve her. ”
“It’s not that simple.”
“Isn’t it?” I raise a brow.
Colten shakes his head, but before he gets a chance to respond, Cruz strides in wearing a crisp black suit with his hair perfectly styled. How does he look so hot when he just jumped into a freezing cold ravine to save me?
I’m sure I look like death warmed over.
“You’re awake.” His body visibly relaxes at the sight of my eyes open, and I don’t even try to smother the smile that tugs at my lips. “How are you feeling?”
“Better now you’re here, but I’m okay. Sore and exhausted, but okay.”
He drops the box under his arm onto the rolling table before leaning over the bed and pressing a kiss to my forehead. “I’m sorry I wasn’t here when you woke up.”
“It’s fine, Cruz,” I assure him. “You’re here now.”
Colten says a quiet goodbye before heading out the door, probably off to follow Lexi and Mary back to the house.
“What happened to Monica?” I ask.
He scrubs a hand down his face. “We haven’t decided how to handle her betrayal yet. She’s not technically part of the De Luca organization, which means we can’t hand down the same punishment we would if, say, Colten did what she did, but I’m also not confident I want her to keep breathing.”
“What about Dennis and Vernon?”
“We got them. We’ll talk about it later, but everything is going to be better now. I promise.”
The inquisitive part of me wants to ask questions, to find out everything that’s happened since he left the house the morning I was taken, but right now I’m happy to just be with my husband.
“What’s in the box?”
A grin appears on his face, and he quickly passes it to me with too much mischief in his eyes.
I unfold the cardboard and peek inside, but nothing could have prepared me for what I’m staring down at.
“Cruz, why am I holding a box of hands?”
“One from everyone who played a part in your being hurt.”
A giggle falls from my mouth, and once it starts, I can’t stop.
Because I spent so many years thinking I didn’t want this life, but who doesn’t want a morally gray man to gift you the hands of anyone who wrongs you?