Page 41 of I Married a Mob Boss
My heart squeezes painfully. “I’m not asking you to sit back and watch me fail. I just want you to give me a chance to make my own decisions. Please don’t make me feel guilty for finally living my life how I want. I don’t want to be the safe friend anymore. I want to live, Lacey. Please let me live.”
Most of my statement is to keep Lacey safe—if she believes I'm here of my own free will, she will drop this—but part of it comes from deep within my soul. I've always been the safe friend. I never went to college parties, never stepped over the line that balances precariously between tipsy and drunk, and I never did anything that had an edge of danger or adventure attached to it. Although I wouldn't recommend waking up married to a mob boss with no recollection of your time together. My heart has never beaten so fast.
“Lacey?” I mutter into the phone when I'm greeted with nothing but silence. “Are you still there?”
“Yes,” she replies, her voice jittery and weak.
“Please don’t hate me,” I mumble, sickened by the thought my dramatic statement hurt her feelings.
A door sliding open sounds down the line, closely followed by the faint hum of the heavy flow of traffic that always impedes the streets of Ravenshoe. She must have stepped out onto the patio attached to the living room of our apartment.
“I'd never hate you, Care Blaire. I just want to make sure you're safe.”
Even though she can’t see me, I nod. “I am.”
A length of silence stretches between us, crammed with stifling heaviness. If it wasn’t for Lacey’s panicked breaths sounding down the line, I would have assumed she had hung up on me.
“Why did it have to be a suit-wearing thug whofinallycracked your shell?" Lacey jests a short time later, her tone not as pained as it was. "I've been chipping away at it for years, but I didn't even cause a hairline crack. You spent a day with him, and all your insecurities crumbled."
Rico must have heard her statement, as he stiffened at the suit-wearing thug part and tightened his grip around my torso during her last sentence.
“Promise me you're safe,” Lacey pleads into the phone. “If you can, I’ll tell the two detectives sitting in our living room that this was all a big misunderstanding. And don’t even think about lying to me, Blaire. Even over the phone, I’ll tell.”
A smile stretches across my face. What she's saying is true. She knows me better than anyone.
Exhaling a deep breath, I spin on my heels the best I can in the protective cocoon Rico has wrapped around me. When I lift my eyes to Rico’s face, my breathing sharpens. The same pair of beautiful eyes from my memories stare down at me. Gone is the haunted, bleak look his eyes generally wear, replaced with the eyes of a small boy lost in a world full of monsters.
I freeze as another lost memory is found. . .
“I’m not a good man, Blaire. I've done terrible, horrible things. Way more than I can count. I don’t deserve a woman like you. I don’t deserve an angel.”
I peer into Rico’s eyes, seeing nothing but remorse reflecting back at me. We both know his words are true, but when I look deeper, past the guilt blackening his eyes, all I see is a little boy who grew up unloved. He's flawed and damaged, but has one of the most beautiful souls I’ve ever seen. He just needs to be shown how to look past the blackness. To be taught how to love.
“I’m not here to save you, Enrique. We are here to save each other. . .”
Now some of my decisions last week make sense. Rico wasn't a man I feared; he was the man I swore to protect. The vulnerability that flashed in his eyes the thirty seconds following my tumble into his lap had me pledging I'd stop at nothing until he walked through the darkness unscathed. He truly did capture my soul in less than a minute.
I turn my attention back to the phone pressed up against my ear before locking my eyes with Rico.
“I'm safe. I promise you. I’m the safest I’ve ever been,” I declare to both Lacey and Rico.
When a broad grin etches on Rico’s face, I’m tempted to add:physically; not mentally.
Chapter 20
“Are you ready?”
After running my hands down the front of my floral cotton dress, I nod. My heart is thrashing against my chest, and nervous sweat is slicking my skin, but I am ready nonetheless.
“Remember what I told you, Kitten; stay by my side at all times and don’t trust anybody.”
From the way Rico's words are laced with warning, anyone would swear we are about to meet Jack the Ripper, not have brunch with his family.
As I prepared for brunch, Rico gave me a brief rundown on how things in the Popov compound generally work. Usually, the women of the house serve the men, but since I hold the prestigious role of Rico's wife, I’ll be seated beside him during brunch. Although shocked at the inequality of women in this faction, I’m not completely blindsided by it. The fact Rico's father sold his daughter on the black market is all the evidence I require that the Popov clan is a group of callous and cold-hearted men. No further explanation needed.
After applying a dusting of blush to my already rosy cheeks, Rico wraps his hand over mine and exits our bedroom. Things between us have been oddly normal the past five days. Our routine hasn’t altered from the day I arrived. I spend my days holed up in our room like a prisoner in a minimum-security prison, reading and playing card games with Maya, while Rico “works.”
It doesn’t matter if I go for a shower at eleven AM or ten PM, Rico is always waiting in the high-backed chair to apply cream to his name inked on my hip. When his “working” day is over, he showers, then we spend the rest of our night together in bed, where thankfully, Rico’s protective cocoon keeps my nightmares to a bare minimum. We are like an everyday couple, our coexistence melding together surprisingly quick.
