Page 47 of I Would Die For You

“Capizco.”

“Leave the visa thing to me.Vai, vai.”

He cuts the call, and I put the phone down. Kaya is staring at me with too-big eyes, her lower lip slack and wobbling a little. She’s back to trembling all over. It starts small, then builds until it overtakes her.

Pulling her into my arms, I clench her tight and press kisses to her head.

“We’ve got this,” I murmur like a soothing mantra. “Trust me,ama.”

My mind is running through ways I can deal with this situation. There’s no way around it—I need help. I’m calling my cousin next.

“Everything okay?” he asks.

“Far from it.” I run through what happened, Val silent as he lets me finish. “I have a body I need to get rid of. How do I do that here?”

The trailer, I can deal with, and her father’s corpse along with it. It’s the other guy that’s worrying me.

Valentino sighs. “There’s someone who can take care of this. Let me call him. Stay put. I’ll get back to you within the hour.”

Kaya has stopped trembling now. Pulling away, I notice a speck of red on her pale pink sweater. That’s going to be noticeable. Right, we need to get this production on the road. I’m wearing navy, so any blood will be concealed by the color. One less problem to deal with.

I stand, pulling her to her feet.

“Take your clothes off.”

She blinks once, twice.

“I’m not getting kinky. Your clothes have blood on them. We need to get you cleaned up. Can you walk to the bathroom?”

She glances to the side, dry-retching a bit at the sight of the blood on the floor.

“Skirt that puddle, get in the shower, wash everywhere. Can you do that?”

I can see the moment when she checks out and surrenders control to me. It’s overwhelming, I get it, but we don’t have a choice here. I help her strip off, then hold her hand so she can walk gingerly to the bathroom. When the shower starts, I turn to the trailer and assess what I have to work with. It’s rudimentary, but I’ve trained for this.

My phone vibrates. It’s Valentino.

“Sent you GPS coordinates. This will be on your route to the airport. A car will be waiting for you there for a dead drop. Give them the body, go on your way. There’ll be a plane ready to take you to Vegas.”

“Grazie, brother.”

It’s been at least half an hour since the guy was stabbed. Livor mortis will have set in, his blood no longer pumping. I take the risk of pulling the knife from his neck. A small trickle of blood gushes out, landing next to where Kaya vomited on the floor. I wipe the knife clean to get rid of her prints on it, then go search for something I can wrap the body in.

Kaya’s finished showering, her naked form dripping wet in the small corridor. Taking her hand, I have her step back to me again. Picking her in my arms, I take her out to the car. A thorough digging in her luggage reveals a pair of jeans, underwear, and another pale cashmere sweater I hand to her in the vehicle. Were we to be picked by any camera on the way, it’d show her in pretty much the same clothes she arrived here in.

The body makes it into the trunk next. Then I’m setting up the trailer and exiting with a soft click of the latch. What I’ve planned will take care of the body and every other bodily fluid in there, damaging all traces for any CSI on the scene.

Kaya’s huddled in the passenger seat. Her hair is still tangled. I find a brush in her bag and smooth it out—it won’t do for her to appear disheveled. Out of it, yeah—she could’ve imbibed a bit too much, no one will know that. But anything else could be a red flag.

At the location Valentino sent me, a dark SUV is indeed waiting. Without a word, the package is exchanged, the knife handed separately. We’re back on the road less than five minutes later as if nothing’s happened. And once at the airport, we’re met by a smiling woman who ushers us out to a small plane waiting to take us to Vegas.

In the dead space under a security camera, I take my phone out and tap the screen. There, done. Portland has been taken care of. Now on to the next leg.

Chapter 15 Stefano

IwouldlovetosayI remember what getting married felt like. That’s the problem with being hyper-focused. Being so in the moment with tunnel vision makes you miss the rest of the cues, all the things necessary to build a memory. My senses are so hyper-aware, they register and blip out, never latching onto anything.

I know we rolled into Vegas in the dead of night. We obtained a license at the Clark County office—it’s packed even at this time. Guess Vegas is the actual city that never sleeps. We stumbled into the first chapel we could find, and then we were married. Done, dusted, executed.

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