Chapter 3
Sadie sat on the edge of her lumpy mattress with her teeth clenched so hard her jaw hurt.
Her tiny apartment smelled faintly of cooking grease and bleach.
Rain struck the single window.
She had removed the gauze from her hands. Her palms and fingers were mottled red, blistered and weeping.
Flexing them hurt.
Breathing hurt.
Her throat felt as though it had been lined with sandpaper.
She had gone to work anyway.
She lasted exactly 4 hours before dropping a tray of coffee mugs because her hands shook too badly to hold the ceramic.
Her manager sent her home without pay.
Now she smeared cheap burn cream over the blisters while tears of frustration gathered in her eyes.
She was going to be evicted.
She could not work like this.
She could not afford rent.
Running into the brownstone had cost her everything.
Knock. Knock. Knock.
Sadie froze.
It was not the frantic pounding of her landlord or the polite knock of a neighbor.
The sound came again.
“Who is it?”
“Sadie Brooks.”
A deep voice came through the door.
“Open the door.”
Panic surged through her.
Sadie stood and backed toward the kitchen counter, where a block of cheap knives rested.
“I’m calling the police.”
“No, you aren’t.”
The voice remained calm.
“Open the door, Miss Brooks, or we will take it off the hinges. I prefer not to break things if I don’t have to.”
It did not sound like a threat.
It sounded like a promise.
Sadie slowly approached the door, unlocked the deadbolt, left the chain attached, and opened it several inches.
2 enormous men in expensive dark suits filled the hallway.
The man in front had a thick neck and flattened nose.
“Miss Brooks.”
“Who are you? What do you want?”
“My employer would like to speak with you.”
“I don’t know your employer. Tell him to go to hell.”
Sadie attempted to close the door.
The man placed one leather-gloved hand against it.
The door stopped.
“Miss Brooks,” he said, his voice softening slightly. “You pulled a woman out of a fire on Fourth and Elm last night. You saved her life. The man I work for is her son. He insists on thanking you personally.”
Sadie stopped pushing.
“I don’t want a reward. I don’t want anything. Tell him we’re even. Just leave me alone.”
“It’s not a request.”
He pushed.
The chain groaned.
Its screws tore from the cheap drywall with a sharp snap.
Sadie backed into the kitchen counter.
“You can’t do this.”
“Grab a coat.”
10 minutes later, Sadie sat rigidly in the back of a black SUV, her blistered hands resting in her lap.
The man with the flattened nose sat in the front passenger seat.
His name was Carmine.
They drove north, away from her neighborhood and toward the estates.
Toward money.
Heavy iron gates opened silently.
Beyond them stood a massive modern fortress of glass, steel, and dark stone.
Security cameras watched from the shadows.
Men in dark jackets guarded the entrances.
Carmine opened her door.
“Inside.”
Sadie stepped into the cold and pulled her thin coat tighter around herself.
Her hair was greasy. Her clothes were cheap. She smelled of old smoke and burn cream.
Inside, marble floors echoed beneath her worn sneakers.
The house did not feel like a home.
It felt like a vault.
Carmine opened heavy double doors at the end of a long hallway.
Sadie entered an enormous study lined with books. A fire burned in a massive stone hearth.
A man stood at a mahogany wet bar with his back toward her, pouring amber liquid into crystal.
“Sit.”
His voice was low and smooth, carrying an authority that made Sadie’s stomach tighten.
She remained standing.
Dominic Castile turned.
He was younger than she expected, perhaps in his early 30s.
His eyes looked ancient.
Dark.
Cold.
Calculating.
His gaze moved from the scuffs on her shoes to the circles beneath her eyes before settling on her hands.
He set down his glass and approached.
“Show me your hands.”
“I’m fine. Your men essentially kidnapped me. I want to know why.”
Dominic reached for her right wrist.
Sadie flinched.
His grip was gentle but immovable.
He turned her palm upward and examined the angry blisters and crude bandaging.
“You didn’t go to a hospital.”
“I couldn’t afford it.”
He released her.
“Why did you go in?”
“Because someone was screaming.”
Her anger finally broke through her fear.
“Because I’m not a sociopath who walks away when an old woman is burning to death. Now, if you’re done analyzing me, I want to go home.”
“You can’t.”
Sadie stared at him.
“Excuse me?”
“The fire at my mother’s house was not an accident, Miss Brooks. It was a message from people who want me dead. They wanted her to burn. You took that from them.”
Sadie’s breath caught.
“I didn’t know who she was.”
“It doesn’t matter what you knew. The Moretti family knows the hit failed. They’ll investigate why. When they learn that a civilian waitress dragged my mother from the flames, they won’t send you a thank-you card. They will consider you a loose end. A witness to their failure.”
Dominic’s expression did not change.
“They will come to that miserable apartment of yours and kill you.”
“You’re lying.”
Sadie’s voice had fallen to a whisper.
“I’m nobody.”
“In my world, nobody is nobody. You interfered with a mob execution. You have a target on your back.”
“Then I’m warned. I’ll leave town.”
“With what money? You have $64 in your checking account. Your rent is 3 weeks past due. Where will you go?”
Humiliation tightened Sadie’s throat.
“That’s none of your business.”
Dominic stepped closer.
“You saved my mother. In my family, a debt like that is absolute. I do not let those who bleed for me stand alone. I do not let them die in the gutter.”
His thumb brushed lightly across the unburned skin of her forearm.
“You aren’t going back to that apartment. You aren’t going back to the diner. You are staying here, behind my walls, where no one can touch you.”
“You can’t just keep me here. I have a life.”
“You had a life.”
His gaze dropped briefly to her mouth before returning to her eyes.
“That life ended the second you kicked open a burning door. The people hunting you won’t hesitate, Sadie. I won’t let them have you.”
Dominic turned toward the doors.
“Carmine will show you to your room. A doctor will be here in 10 minutes to properly treat your burns.”
At the doorway, he looked back.
“Don’t try to run.”
May you like
Something fiercely possessive showed beneath the coldness in his eyes.
“You belong here now.”
