Page 21 of Stealing Her Heart
“Do not fucking move. Stay here, Gianna. I love you,” I whisper, bending to press a kiss to her lips.
“I love you too,” she calls back, letting me close her in the closet.
Taking a shaking breath, I head for the door leading out of her room to the main hall. I hear Dario shout for me. Then Stefan. I rush out to the landing, calling back to them. Before either of them can answer, Ceasar Bianchi rushes to the bottom of the stairs.
“Should have known it was you she ran to. Both my wife’s kids seem to have a soft spot for Capelli’s.”
Narrowing a glare at him, I keep my gun aimed at him. My gaze sweeps left to right fast, too fast for him to make a move. I take a few steps down, but I won’t give up the high ground. Ceasar’s thin lips twist into a sneer as he points a shotgun right at my chest.
“Ah, ah, ah,” Dario’s voice hums with the slightest hint of humor. Moving up behind Ceasar to press his Glock against the man’s head. “Let’s not make a bigger mess than we have to, yeah? Drop the fucking gun.”
“Whatever you fucks think you got going, it won’t be ratified.”
Grinning ear to ear as I keep my gun trained on him, I laugh. “Always a dozen steps behind. It was ratified before I found your favorite slime trying to force himself on Gianna. Your daughter! Your fuckingblood! The one fucking person in this world you ought to be standing behind.”
Ceasar laughs now, hands up after he dropped the gun at his feet. Dario checks him for other weapons, even as shooting continues in other parts of the house. I glance down the hall towards the kitchen. Yeah, that was her mother getting gunned down a moment ago. Pretty sure he was the one who took it out, based on the smirk on his face.
“My blood? Talk about being steps behind. None of my wife’s kids were mine. Still had to take care of them, feed them, pretend to give a shit if they lived or died. Because I made a vow to her. That is what a man does. He keeps his word. He sticks by his vows.”
“A man? If you ever become one, let us know, yeah? Not your daughter. Then whose is she? Is it Scarsi? Is that why you wouldn’t let Anto get close to her?”
Sighing, he nods his head.Well shit.That will please my princess. At least her father is not a worthless piece of shit. All the good he ever did was take care of her mother for us. One less body on my hands.
It goes quiet in the house, as my guys call out to me. Clear. Room clear. Enemies taken down. Smiling at Ceasar, I shake my head. He could not handle his business even on his own turf, in his own fucking house.
“Gianna would hate you, if you do this. I may not have been her daddy, but I was her father. How could she forgive you?”
“Ceasar, I got the greenlight from your daughter. Gave her blessing. How will she forgive me? I suppose by becoming my wife and giving me children. Because I fucking love her. I would die for her. Or kill for her,” I add nonchalantly as I pull the gun back up, pressing it to his forehead.
There is always a moment when you kill someone. A moment when they think it won’t happen. When they hold their breath and wait for the nightmare to pass. In the blink of an eye, it passes. They know it is coming. There is no stopping fate. It was decided long before I took a gun in my hands and long before I wound up right here, right now with Ceasar.
Squeezing the trigger, I relish the smell of gunpowder. Damn, I love that shit. I pull the trigger once more. Double tap, never leave them with a chance. Ceasar manages to blink before the life flickers out of his eyes. He falls to the floor with a thud as Dario and I step out of the way of his body.
“I should not have worn this suit today. I just fucking got it,” Dario sighs, brushing blood splatter off the navy-blue suit. Yeah, too bad. I liked that one too.
Chuckling, I start to holster my gun as I turn back to the stairs. Before I can move, I hear three fast pops. I duck but it is too late. Dario grunts as he gets hit, his new suit exploding at his thigh. I curse because, damn, he can’t catch a break. Then pain blossoms in my shoulder before I feel wetness soaking through my own suit.
Someone is screaming. More pops fill the room and I lift my head from where it hit the floor next to Ceasar. Santino. Dario is storming towards him, pulling the trigger on his gun until it clicks. He empties an entire clip into the guy. Santino stumbles back before he makes a strange wailing sound, then he folds to the ground in a heap.
“No! No! Nooo! Gabriel. No, no, you can’t. Baby, please,” Gianna’s voice is faint, as if she is in a tunnel. I blink to clear my vision, but I can’t. Everything is cloudy. My fucking chest is burning. Determined to tell Gianna everything is fine, that everything is over, I lift my head.
“Oh, shit,” I mutter, wincing as pain sluices down my left side.
“Dario. We have to go. We have to get him to a doctor,” Gianna shouts, slipping me into her lap with some kind of super strength.
Smiling up at her as her pretty eyes find mine, I nod. Good girl. Not to a hospital, just to a doctor. Our own doctor. That’s my princess. I tell her how good she is at being a queen. That we can rule this kingdom together.
Something else is more important. “I love you, Gianna. Love you forever and ever, I promise you. Till we stop breathing.”
And then, I promptly stop breathing.
Chapter Twelve
Giana
Time is the thief of happiness.
Watching a clock ticking, seeming to skip faster than it should, I am shaking. I cannot stop the shivering of my body. I am cold. It’s sunny and warm out but I cannot get warm. Wiggling my frozen toes in my shoes, I sniff back another panic attack. They’ve been coming every ten minutes or so. Faster if you go by that racing fucking clock on the wall.
