Chapter 13

Chapter 13BellaBy midafternoon we were ready to take a break. We were about to pull into one of the only two nice restaurants in town when Corey zipped his motorcycle right in front of us, forcing us to pull over right before the entrance. He backed his bike up and sat beside us for a minute.Crystal asked, “What in the world is going on, Corey?”I followed the direction he was looking. Coming out of the restaurant were a small group of well-dressed men with slicked back, dark hair. A sick feeling swirled in my stomach. Now that Mr. Lombardo was gone, I couldn’t fathom what they wanted with me, “I recognize a couple of them from when I worked at the Trip Easy. They came into the club a lot.”“I knew it was them,” Corey shot back hotly. “Get the hell outta here, Crystal. Put as much distance between the two of you and these twisted fucks as you can. I’ll cover your ass in case they see you. I don’t know what they’re doing here, but I don’t like it.”Crystal quickly got us back onto the road. Corey was following close behind us, glancing repeatedly over his shoulder. I was too scared to say anything, but Crystal’s hands were steady on the steering wheel. She kept glancing in her rearview mirror to make sure no one was following us.I somehow had the presence of mind to pull out my cell phone and call Forge.“What’s up Bella? Is everything okay?” he asked.“No, not really,” I responded. “We were about to pull in and get a bite to eat at Mulligan’s, but Corey saw mobsters coming out the front door. I recognized them as some of the men who used to come into the club. I don’t remember their names or who they worked for, but I do remember they often sat at the owner’s table.”“Fucking hell. I want you to come straight back to the clubhouse right goddamn now. Are you hearing me, baby?’“Yeah, we’re on our way back right now. We’re being careful, and it does not look like we were followed.”“Good girl. Tell me where you are right now, and we’ll meet you.”“We just passed mile marker thirty-seven, eastbound on highway ninety.”“Stay on the line. We’re leaving out right now and should rendezvous with you within the next thirty minutes.”I continued to hold the phone to my ear. Crystal used all her powers of concentration to make sure we didn’t run off the road or get hit by another car. We couldn’t afford to do anything that might enable those gangsters to catch up with us. We weren’t sure if we’d been spotted but we couldn’t be too careful.“Hang on, Bella. I’ll be there as soon as possible,” Forge said as motorcycles fired up in the background.Eyes glued to the rearview mirror, I saw a black SUV cresting over the hill behind us. “They’re on our tail.” I yelled into the phone.The SUV put on a burst of speed and almost closed the distance between us in a matter of minutes. I watched in horror as Corey abandoned us. Panicking, I screamed into the phone, “They’re gaining on us, and Corey drove off the side of the road. He left us.” I heard Forge start to say something back, his voice sounding distorted—and then the call got disconnected.“Damn it!” I shouted.“He didn’t abandon us. Corey would never do that. Just calm down.” Crystal said calmly and put her foot down on the gas pedal.Just then the sound of gunshots rang out. I twisted around to gaze out the back window and caught a glimpse of Corey speeding up from behind the SUV with a Taurus Judge in his hand. I’d seen firsthand what that hand canon could do when Forge taught me to shoot. I only hoped that Corey was a good shot as he only had five bullets to take down our pursuers. The first bullet shattered the passenger side window and the glass exploded inward, and the next plowed through the head of the man in that seat.When he sped away again, I realized that he was trying to pick them off one at a time. Unfortunately, when Corey sped up the next time, they were prepared for him. Before he made it to the front of the car, the windows came down and multiple weapons started firing at the same time. Corey ducked and managed to avoid getting shot. I watched him drop back again. This time, he shot out both back tires, causing the wheels to explode and the vehicle to careen off the road. He had one bullet left and there was still no sign of the Dark Slayers. They had to be close, I checked my cell phone, but there was still no signal.Another SUV came out of nowhere and seemed hell bent on taking Corey out. I watched as they exchanged gunfire, and then the SUV tried to run Corey off the road. My heart almost stopped as I saw his bike skidding toward the guard rail, and he was thrown over and down the embankment.“This is my fault. Corey’s going to die, and I’m not going to add your death to my conscience as well. Slow the car down and I’ll jump out, it’s me they want.”Crystal glanced at me and then back out the windshield. “Don’t do this, Bella. Just because those mobsters didn’t hurt you the first time, doesn’t mean they won’t do it now. You’ll be totally at their mercy. We have to keep driving. The Slayers can’t be more than a minute or two away.”I glanced behind to see yet another SUV. I reached for the door handle and Crystal screamed for me to stop. “Slow down, Crystal. I have to do this!” I yelled. I had the door halfway open and was ready to jump.As she eased her foot off the accelerator and reluctantly slowed the car down, I didn’t wait to say goodbye. I just jumped and prayed for the best. Even though I tried to roll, I hit the abrasive pavement hard. This clearly wasn’t one of my better ideas. I looked down the road in the direction of Crystal’s vehicle. She was speeding away fast. I felt good that I got her away from the danger I still didn’t quite understand. I took a second to catch my breath and crawled away from the road, before pushing myself up and trying to run. Unfortunately, my leg collapsed, sending me tumbling back down to the ground.The SUV that had been chasing us screeched to stop beside me and two men got out. One of them threw back his head and laughed. He looked familiar. “Ms. Martinez, you’re doing my job for me today.” He stared down at me with cold, dead eyes and stated flatly, “You should have just died.”Then it hit me—he looked like an older version of Diego.“Hello, Mr. Russo. What do you want with me?”“You clever little bitch. Put her in the fuckin’ car, Bruno.”Bruno jerked me up by my arm, slung me into the SUV, and slammed the door. I scrambled across the seat, but by the time I reached for the handle, the door flew open, and the older man shoved me backwards with his hand around my throat and climbed in beside me. There was a click as the central locking engaged, and once again I was at the mercy of mobsters.It took me a minute to get my breath. “What do you want with me? Clearly not songs, or you wouldn’t have choked me just now.”The older man rolled his eyes. “Don’t be so dramatic.”This arrogant asshole was pissing me off. “You didn’t answer my question,” I gritted out through clenched teeth as pain screeched from multiple points in my body. “What the hell do you want with me?”“That’s for me to know and you to find out, assuming you manage to live long enough to work it all out,” he stated as he tapped the side of his temple with his index finger.This man liked to play games. That’s cool, I could play some fucking games if that’s what he wanted. I was gearing up to hassle him some more, when his phone rang.“I hope you managed to find what you were looking for,” a man’s voice said when he answered the video call. A familiar voice.His face lit up with a wide grin. “I did.” He turned the phone around to show Marco my beat-up body in bloody, torn clothing.I looked at the screen and saw my boss staring back at me. To think I’d spared his life, I should have known that he was involved in all this. Had he discovered that his father was missing? Was this why he wanted revenge?But then I had an awful realization, if Mr. Russo had captured me, were the Russos working with Mr. Lombardo and Mr. Morelli all along? Were Forge and his club brothers in danger?“My God, what did you do to her?” Marco asked.Mr. Russo replied blandly, “Nothing yet, silly bitch tried to jump out of a moving car.”“Remember, the insurance policy has her insured for two million dollars. We gotta keep her in one piece. Nothing suspicious,” my traitorous former boss said. Clearly, I should be grateful he wanted me healthy—until the time came to get rid of me, that is.“About that insurance police, now that your father and his business associate no longer…” Mr. Russo paused, as if searching for the words, “…no longer have a vested interest in our songbird. I trust as your new Don, a significant proportion of the proceeds will transfer to me. I’ve saved you a lot of trouble clearing up your father and his associate’s mess, and possession is nine-tenths of the law as they say. Capisce?”“Capisce, Don Russo,” Marco said in a frankly subservient manner.Don Russo? What on earth had happened in the hours since Crystal and I left the Dark Slayers clubhouse to go shopping? And why had Mr. Lombardo taken out a life insurance policy on me? It didn’t make any sense.When the old man hung up, he commented casually, “I can tell the little cogs in your brain are turning. My associate let the reason for your abduction slip, but now you’re trying to figure out the why of it, aren’t you?”“Maybe.”“Well, his last little songbird got drunk and fell off the second story balcony. She landed on a parking meter. Her policy was only worth a million dollars.”I felt sick as the pieces clicked into place. “Mr. Lombardo didn’t just abuse his lovers. He took out insurance policies on them first. He killed them and collected the money.”“Don’t look so shocked, little Bella. Insurance scams are some of the oldest money grabs in the world.” He made a tsking sound. “You didn’t really think this was all about wanting you to sing songs, did you?”I leaned back in the seat and let the soft leather upholstery cradle my broken body. “Why…why did he wait so long? Why didn’t he just kill me right away?”“Most policies have a waiting period from anywhere between a year to five years. Your policy has a two-year waiting period. Poor Tony almost made it to the deadline.”“I was just a convenient target,” I said listlessly.“Don’t underestimate yourself, Bella. You were a virtual goldmine.”These people were batshit crazy. There really could be no other explanation for what I was hearing. Corey gave his life protecting me, all because these fuckers wanted to kill me and collect on a two-million-dollar insurance policy. I laughed when I realized I still had three months left on the waiting period. They had two choices, wait it out or kill me now and lose out big time.“What the fuck is wrong with you, girl?” Mr. Russo asked irritably.That made me laugh harder. Knowing they couldn’t kill me yet was weirdly empowering, somewhere in my mind I did wonder how they would keep me for three months, but there would be an autopsy so they couldn’t torture me or do anything that would appear suspicious. I lunged across the car and stared clawing at his face with my good hand. I was no match for him though. He flung me back into my seat with one thrust of his hand against my throat.I bit my tongue and tasted blood. Coughing I spat at his feet because I hated this man with the fire of a thousand suns.He stared down at his shiny black dress shoes for a minute before snarling, “You’re acting like a woman who doesn’t want to make it out of here alive.”“I don’t expect to make it out alive. But you’re forgetting that I’ve still get three months to go on the waiting period.”“You smart bitch. You actually think that will keep me carving your stupid ass up?”“Yes. If my body looks like it’s been tortured, it’ll take years of investigating before the insurance company pays out. You’d be stupid to touch me again. If you keep me, then this songbird will be going back into a gilded cage for three months.”He pulled his wool overcoat together over his chest. “Been watching murder mysteries, have we?”I didn’t bother to reply. I just relaxed against the seat and stared at him with hate-filled eyes.