Chapter 69 My return
Dante POV
I laid low until the following evening. When the night was at its deepest, I got into a taxi and headed back to my apartment. I didn’t catch sight of any of the men. They must have assumed I got away and gave up. When I finally arrived at my place, I took the elevator to my floor. The doors opened, and I found Isabella standing right in the entryway, her eyes red and puffy from not sleeping. She was still in the same clothes she’d been wearing when I’d left. The second she laid eyes on me, her hands moved through her hair, and she breathed a sigh of relief so loud it could reach
through solid glass. “You fucking asshole. You told me you would be back by the afternoon at the latest. It’s almost midnight. You didn’t call, you didn’t text, nothing. How could you”
“I’m here.” I cupped her cheeks and kissed her, caring more about that mouth than the gunshot wound in my bicep. My fingers dug into her hair even though they were dirty and smelled like metal from the gun. My lips moved with hers, bringing her down to a sense of calm. “Baby, I always keep my promises.”
She pulled away from my lips and looked at me, still angry but not as much as before. “What happened? Why are you home so late? Did something go wrong?”
I got hard watching the concern spread across her face. She couldn’t downplay her worry in the moment, not when she was so relieved I was back. If this were a different situation, she would have hidden her true feelings as much as possible. But right now, she simply couldn’t do it. “Stop smiling like that. This isn’t funny.”
“I’m laughing.”
“But you’re grinning like there’s something humorous about this situation.” Her green eyes flashed with ferocity. “You went to kill someone, and when you didn’t come back…I thought you might never come back.”
“And wouldn’t that be a good thing?”
She shut her mouth, the shame creeping across her face. If I died, her family would be safe. But she couldn’t stop herself from wanting me to be alive, from wanting me to be safe. Her emotions were ripping apart in two
very different directions. She still struggled to make sense of them. Just as I did. I pulled my sweater over my head and dropped it on the
ground. It was soaked in too much blood, so now it was ruined. When her eyes saw the blood on my arm and the t-shirt wrapped around the wound, she covered her mouth with both hands. “Jesus…”
“I need your help again. You know what to do.”
“We need to take you to a hospital, that's what we are doing right?”
“No.” I opened the cabinet and pulled out the first aid kit. It was packed with everything I needed, because this wasn’t my first time getting shot. I sat on the couch and opened the kit. I pulled the t-shirt off before I poured vodka over the wound and It burned like a bitch. “Dante…” Isabella sat beside me, pain in her eyes. “We should get you to a doctor.”
“I said no.”
“I have no medical training. You’ve lost so much blood ”
“I’ve lost more before.” I handed her the tweezers. “You should be a pro at this by now.”
She gave up the argument when she knew I wouldn’t be changing my mind. She grabbed my elbow and then dug the metal into my wound. She found the small bullet after a few seconds then carefully removed it. It hurt more than the vodka, but I didn’t show a hint of my discomfort. She set the bullet on the table, covered in blood. “What happened?” She
poured more alcohol over the wound then grabbed the needle and thread. “I took out a few of his men, and it was going like I thought it would but he had backup I didn’t know about. I was outnumbered, and I didn’t have
enough rounds to compete. So I tossed a grenade and ran for it. I got shot before I made it to the alleyway.”
She concentrated on threading my wound closed, but she couldn’t mask her terror. “So you didn’t kill him and you will yet go again?”
I hated admitting the truth out loud. I hated admitting I failed. “No.”
“I’m sorry…” She kept threading, getting half the wound closed in a few minutes. “What now?”
“I’ll have to keep a low profile for a while before I try again.”
Her hands stopped working. “You’re kidding me, right?”
I stared straight ahead, ignoring her pissed look. “You know I have to kill him.”
“Well, obviously, you can’t. You’re just going to get yourself killed.” She raised her voice, yelling at me as she held the needle and thread. “That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard. I’ve never met a man more stubborn”
I kissed her because it was the only way I could shut her up and It worked like always. I pulled away and gave her an authoritative look with my eyes. “I know I am. And you’re probably right, it will get me killed. But it’s my decision. Now stitch me up, and let’s move on.”
She stared at me like she might say something, but then she thought the better of it and finished the job. “The times when my parents are the angriest at me is when I put myself in dangerous situations. I snuck out one night when I was sixteen and went driving with some friends. When my father found out…” She shook her head. “I can’t remember the last time I’d seen him that angry. There were no boys involved and we weren’t drinking and driving, but he was furious that I was out alone with a bunch of girls in the middle of the night in Milan.”
“Why are you telling me this?”
“Because it’s every parents’ worst nightmare for their child to put themselves in danger. She did the best she could to protect you and raise you, to give you a better life than she had and you’re doing a piss-poor job of showing your gratitude.”