Frankie, my fake husband in Italy, once again donned the faux boyfriend role as we signed into the reception and were taken on a tour of the extensive building with all its amenities.
“You would have to sign an NDA if you wanted to go through with the application,” the guide was explaining as we moved by the viewing windows overlooking the handgun bays. “We have many important members who value their privacy.”
“Of course,” I demurred. “We feel the same way.”
Ric had called half an hour after our meeting to tell me Dennis could be found at the WGC every Tuesday and Thursday evening for a few practice rounds and a follow-up pint with friends at the bar across the street.
Still, the sight of him after so long, knowing that he was going to use Dante as a means to his own ends, lit me up with fury like a fucking Christmas tree.
“Would it be possible at all to try one of the bays while we’re here?” I asked sweetly, clutching Frankie’s hand. “My husband is such a crack shot, but sometimes the bays are so narrow, he can barely move his arms!”
The woman nodded sagely. “I completely understand. If you’ll wait here, I’ll grab a key. I have the copy of your gun license, should I grab the gun you checked in or will you need to borrow one?”
“The one we checked in.”
She scuttled away.
Immediately, I strode across the hall to the bay I spotted Dennis behind, recognizable for his thick brown hair and customary blue suit even in his protective earwear and glasses.
I rang the doorbell and waited.
He turned, frowning, his mouth already open to reprimand whoever was bothering him, but his eyes widened when he saw me through the small, square window in the door.
After a moment of deliberation, he took off his earmuffs and opened the door for us.
“Hello Dennis,” I said coolly as Frankie followed me and lingered near the closed door.
“Ms. Lombardi,” he returned smoothly, as if we met here all the time. “You’re looking remarkably well given your client is behind bars.”
I laughed lightly as I surveyed the four guns he had laid out on the table. Three handguns and a pistol. I picked up the smallest, a 9mm Glock, and tested the weight in my hands.
“He’s no longer my client.”
Dennis’ eyebrows raised into his thick hairline. “Oh? Have you finally realized the error of your ways? Don’t tell me you’ve come to beg my forgiveness.”
“Dante Salvatore isn’t my client anymore, because he is now my husband,” I explained calmly as I raised the gun and aimed at the target down the range. “And I didn’t come to beg forgiveness from a hypocritical stronzo, I came to warn you.”
I sucked in a quiet breath and pulled the trigger.
Bang!
“…If you keep coming for my husband…”
Bang!
“…I’ll come for you…”
Bang! Bang!
“…And if you thought my father could be cruel, you should see what kind of monster he made of his daughter.”
Bang!
The paper outline of a human was riddled with puncture wounds, most of them concentrated around the head because I’d become a shockingly good shot. The gun smoked lightly in my hands as I emptied the chamber and clicked the safety.
When I turned to Dennis he was oddly bemused, his expression torn between disbelief, anger, and not a little arousal.
“You think you can come in here and threaten me?” he asked with an incredulous huff of laughter. “Sweetheart, I’m the man around here. There is nothing I’m not protected from. You think I’m scared of little Red playing at being the Big Bad Wolf?”
“I think you’re underestimating me because I’m a woman and you’re an entitled, greedy, lazy sinner who thinks he deserves to win simply because he’d a man.” I stepped closer, the gun still in my hand.
I could see in Dennis’s eyes that he wanted to move away from me, that there was something in my feral eyes that scared him, but he resisted. My heels made me slightly taller than him, so I leaned down and in until my red lips were almost pressed to the corner of his mouth.
“I could have been civilized, O’Malley. I could have played fair, but if you want to fight dirty, I’m more than happy to comply. I’m going to beat you at your own game. I hope your loss is so difficult to swallow you choke on it and save me the trouble of killing you myself.”
I pulled away smoothly, turning and adjusting my large purse on my shoulder as I moved toward the door. Frankie followed, more shadow than man.
“This accomplished nothing but tipping your hat, Ms. Lombardi,” Dennis called to me as Frankie opened the door and I made to follow him out. “You should watch yourself before you end up dead just like your father. Did you know they found him in a house in Brooklyn, shot to death like the criminal he was?”
I laughed lightly, pausing for a moment to say, “You are the company you keep, Dennis. I’d be careful you don’t end up just like your childhood best friend.”
Frankie closed the door quickly behind me and moved swiftly down the hall before the guide could come back and potentially get interrogated by Dennis. We intercepted her at the reception and politely decline the practice bay before collecting our things and leaving.
It was only when we were safely ensconced in Dante’s Ferrari that I let out a triumph, angst-edged laugh.
When I turned my head against the seat to look at Frankie, he was smiling.
“Did you get it?” I asked breathlessly.
He nodded.
“So did I.” I pulled my purse into my lap and pulled Dennis’s hand gun from its depths. “I can’t believe that worked.”
“High risk, high reward as the Boss always says. He’d be proud of you.”
I sighed, “Let’s hope he can tell me that in person sooner rather than later.”
“Proud of you too,” he said, shooting me a sidelong look. “All of us are. It’s been damn interesting to watch you come into your own the last few months. You should know, the men love you because of you, not because you’re D’s wife. They started to fall when you hated him.” He laughed. “I think for Addie and Marco it happened the moment you refused to move into the apartment. They’d never seen anyone but Tore or me stand up to him before.”
It seemed that everyone knew my chest was hollow because Dante had taken my heart with him when he turned himself in and they were consciously and consistently filling up the empty cavity with love of their own.
It made me realize how lucky I was and even how lucky I’d always been.
It was amazing how bitterness could blind you to everything else.
As I sat there with Frankie on the way to the apartment to spend Christmas Eve without Dante, I resolved not forget how much I had to be grateful for every single day. Even if he didn’t come back to me for ages, I had so much more to be happy for and it was Dante who had taught me that.
Twenty-Five
Elena
It was strange to be in the Smith Jameson apartment without Dante. Suddenly, the stark black and white color scheme seemed mundane and lifeless without his vivacious spirit to liven the rooms. The guys seemed to sense I was melancholy and needed space, so they drifted off to where ever they went and left me in the living room staring vacantly out the closed patio doors.