Page 54 of Taken By the Underboss

Sienna looked stunned.” What do you mean you can't do this? I'm supposed to be going home. The airport's right up there.”

“I can't let you go.” I looked at her with pleading eyes. “Please don't go.”

“Alessandro, please don't do this. I have to go. This is not the place for me.”

“No. I grabbed her by the back of the head and pulled her to me, my lips crashing into hers in a passionate, desperate, claiming kiss that said that I was never going to let her go. I was never going to have her taken away from me by my hand or by anyone else's.

She melted into the kiss for a moment before regaining her senses and shoving me back. “Alessandro, what are you doing?”

“I can't lose you.” I met her eyes with an intensity like nothing I'd ever felt before, hoping that she would understand without me saying the words.

“I care about you too, but you have to let me go. My father is waiting for me at the airport. We need to go home.”

"No," I said definitively, pulling the car back out while doing a large U-turn to head back to the compound. I had to talk to Teo. There had to be another way.

"Alessandro," she yelled. "Stop. What are you doing?"

"I can't do this. I'm taking you back to the compound."

"Alessandro, you have to let me go. I've made my decision."

"No. You don't understand the decision you're making. You're not understanding, or you wouldn't have made that choice." I pressed the gas pedal to the floorboard, pushing my car to the limit. I was desperate to get her back to the compound, though I didn't know how I would explain it to Teo.

"Alessandro, stop the car. Take me to the airport. You're acting crazy.” With Sienna screaming in my ear, I couldn't think of what to do next.

“Be quiet. I need to think.”

“Think about what? I don't understand what's going on. I know you care about me. I care about you too but that doesn't change anything. I'm not made for the mafia, and I just want to go home.

I slammed on brakes in the middle of the road and was grateful that there were no cars around that might have crashed into the back of me. I looked at her. I couldn't tell her what I almost did, what I was supposed to do. I just needed quiet so I could figure out how I was going to save her life.

“Shut your mouth,” I growled at her. “If you say one more word I'm going to put you in the trunk.”

She gasped as her mouth dropped open. “You wouldn’t dare.”

I lifted my brow challengingly and pulled over on the side of the road again. That time, I didn’t say a word as I rounded the car, opened her door, dragged her out by her bicep and toward the back of the trunk.

“Alex, stop. What are you doing? You aren’t actually going to...Alex, please, stop.”

Ignoring her pleas, I used the key fob to pop the trunk and forced her toward it, but she fought me the whole time, kicking, screaming, and clawing.My little micetta.

“Get in,” I barked.

“No.”

I forced her into the trunk and slammed the lid before she had time to fight to get out. She screamed and yelled but I called out, loud enough for her to hear. “Quiet, or I will tape your mouth shut before closing you back in there. And don’t dare tempt me because you know I’ll do it.”

Silence.

Finally, she was taking my threats seriously. I’d been too easy on her in the past and that was going to have to change if I was going to find a way to convince Teo that I could make her compliant.

I drove down the road and with the quiet, I was finally able to think, which wasn’t necessarily a good thing, because it helped me see that I was digging myself into a hole I wasn’t going to get out of if I kept going, a hole that might become my grave.

I drove down the road a little slower than the last time. I was anxious to get back to Teo, but I needed to think of what I was going to say. I needed to figure out a way to save Sienna's life.

I pulled through the gate to the compound, giving a nod to the men at the newly built guards’ house before parking my car near the front of the house. I climbed out and cautiously popped the trunk to find Sienna lying there looking up at me in horror. Even before when I’d kidnapped her, I’d always been rather easy on her all things considered but if I was going to keep her alive, I was going to have to do some things that she wasn’t going to like.

“Don’t try anything,” I practically growled the words to her as I hauled her out of the trunk, leading her into the house with a firm grip on the back of her neck.

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