Chapter 6 - THE DOOR WAS OPEN
The house smelled of bleach and ozone.
3 days had passed since the breach.
The shattered glass had been replaced.
The blood had been scrubbed from the concrete.
The compound had returned to silence.
But the silence no longer felt like the suffocating stillness of a prison.
It felt like the eye of a hurricane.
Rose stood beside the window in the mahogany office and looked toward the tree line.
The setting sun cast long, bleeding shadows over the manicured lawn.
The double doors opened behind her.
Gabriel entered.
He walked with a slight limp.
A bullet had grazed his left hip during the final exchange of gunfire in the foyer.
He wore dark gray trousers and a sweater.
Fatigue had tightened the sharp lines of his face.
He did not move toward his desk.
Instead, he crossed to the small side table and poured 2 glasses of scotch.
Gabriel carried one to Rose.
She accepted it.
Their fingers touched.
“Drink.”
Rose took a sip.
The amber liquor burned down her throat and grounded her.
Gabriel reached inside his pocket and withdrew a thick, sealed manila envelope.
He extended it toward her.
“What is this?”
Rose did not take it.
“A new passport. A bank account routed through a shell corporation in Switzerland containing $5 million. And a ticket to Geneva tomorrow morning.”
His voice was completely flat.
Rose stared at the envelope.
Something painful moved inside her chest.
“Why?”
“Richard is dead.”
The words fell heavily into the room.
Rose did not gasp.
She did not cry.
She simply stared at Gabriel’s collarbone while her mind absorbed them.
“The Castellos discovered he was working against them,” Gabriel continued, his eyes fixed beyond the window. “They didn’t come here only to send a message. They attacked him in his downtown office 1 hour before they breached my gates.”
Gabriel paused.
“They burned him alive.”
Rose closed her eyes.
Grief arrived tangled with something else.
Relief.
The man who had sold her, who had traded her life for shipping routes and his own survival, was gone.
“The debt is nullified,” Gabriel said. “The leverage is gone. You’re no longer collateral.”
He pushed the envelope closer.
“Rose, there is no strategic reason for you to remain here. The contract is void. Take it. Cole will drive you to the airstrip in the morning.”
He held the envelope between them.
“You have your freedom.”
Rose stared at it.
It was everything she had wanted when she climbed through the 3rd-floor window.
A clean beginning.
An exit.
No syndicates.
No violence.
No cages.
Then she looked at Gabriel.
He was not looking at her.
His gaze remained fixed outside.
His jaw was clenched so tightly that the muscle moved beneath the skin.
His knuckles were white around the glass.
Gabriel was a man accustomed to taking whatever he wanted.
And now he was forcing himself to open the door and allow her to leave.
He was not only the monster she had believed him to be.
He was also the only person who had ever given her the exact, brutal truth.
He had caught her when she fell.
He had placed his body between her and a bullet.
Rose slowly raised her hand.
She did not take the envelope.
Instead, she placed her palm over Gabriel’s hand and pushed it gently back toward his chest.
Gabriel froze.
For the first time, he turned fully toward her.
His dark eyes widened with naked surprise.
“You let me run once,” Rose said.
Her voice was steady.
“I didn’t get very far.”
“It’s cold out there, Rose.”
Gabriel’s voice had become rough.
“If you stay now, it isn’t a contract. It isn’t a transaction. I will pull you completely into this life.”
He looked directly at her.
“I will never let you leave.”
“I know.”
Rose stepped closer.
The distance between them disappeared.
She could smell clean soap, gun oil, and scotch.
“I’m done running.”
Gabriel stared at her through 1 long, suspended second.
Then the envelope fell from his hand.
His free hand closed around the back of Rose’s neck, his fingers tangling roughly into her hair.
He pulled her against him.
His mouth met hers.
The kiss was not gentle.
It was desperate, bruising, and possessive.
The collision of 2 people who had survived darkness by learning how to see inside it.
Rose’s glass slipped from her hand.
It shattered against the floor.
Scotch spread across their shoes.
Rose wrapped both arms around Gabriel’s shoulders.
She held him as tightly as she had held his belt while following him through the darkness during the attack.
May you like
She was no longer a hostage.
She was exactly where she had chosen to be.
