The Dangerous Man Beneath My Bed

chapter 10

DOMINIC

The morning light filtered into the apartment, grey and unforgiving. It didn't feel like a new day; it felt like a countdown.

I hadn't slept. I sat in an armchair facing the bedroom door, my Sig Sauer resting on my thigh, the metal cool against my palm through the fabric of my trousers. The air in the apartment was stale, thick with the scent of our desperate coupling the night before and the lingering, coppery ghost of the cello I’d murdered.

Naomi was awake. I heard the soft pad of her bare feet on the hardwood. She emerged from the bedroom, wrapped in a silk robe I’d allowed her to keep, clutching the lapels tight to her throat. She looked wrecked. Her eyes were bruised shadows in her face, and she moved with a stiff, cautious gait that testified to the brutality of my possession hours earlier.

She stopped when she saw me, flinching at the sight of the gun.

"Coffee?" she asked, her voice a brittle rasp. It was an absurd attempt at normalcy, a desperate trying-on of a domestic mask that didn't fit anymore.

"No." My voice was flat, devoid of the faux-gentleness I’d used in the tub. That game was over. "Stay away from the windows."

She froze, her eyes widening. "Why? Dominic, what’s happening?"

"The world is catching up, Naomi. The bubble is popping."

Before she could ask another question, the universe answered for me.

The sound wasn't subtle. It wasn't a polite knock. It was the distinct, thunderous boom of a breaching shotgun taking out the reinforced lock of the building’s main lobby door three floors down.

It reverberated through the floorboards, shaking the coffee cups on the counter.

Naomi screamed, a short, sharp sound of pure terror, her hands flying to her mouth.

I was moving before the second boom echoed up the stairwell. I was across the room in two strides, grabbing her arm. Her skin was clammy with instant sweat.

"Time to go," I snarled, holstering the weapon and dragging her toward the kitchen.

"Go? Go where? My shoes, I need—"

"You need nothing. Everything here is dead." I didn't stop. I hauled her past the living area, past the splintered remains of her cello lying like bleached bones on the rug. She stumbled, looking back at it, a sob tearing from her throat.

"Don't look at it," I commanded, jerking her forward. "It's firewood. Forget it."

We weren't taking the front door. Sal—or whoever he’d sent—would be coming up the main stairs, expecting a siege. They wanted to trap us inside the kill box I’d foolishly created.

I kicked open the door to the small utility closet in the kitchen that housed the stacked washer and dryer. Behind it was a maintenance panel. I’d loosened the screws weeks ago, during my initial reconnaissance, before I’d ever touched her. Just in case.

I shoved the dryer aside with a grunt of effort, revealing the rusted metal hatch.

"Through here," I ordered, pulling it open. It revealed a narrow, dusty service ladder dropping into darkness. The spine of the building.

Naomi stared into the black hole, shaking her head frantically. "No. Dominic, please, I can't—"

I didn't have time for her fear. Below us, I heard heavy boots thudding on the second-floor landing. Shouting. They were fast.

I grabbed the back of her neck, my fingers digging into her hairline, forcing her to look at me. "Listen to me. The men downstairs aren't here for your father anymore. They're here to peel the skin off your body while I watch. You go down that hole, or you die screaming in this kitchen. Choose. Now."

The brutal truth hit her like a physical blow. The defiance drained out of her, replaced by abject, animal terror. She nodded jerkily.

I pushed her toward the opening. She scrambled onto the ladder, silk robe hitching up her thighs, bare feet slipping on the cold metal rungs. I followed instantly, pulling the hatch closed above us, plunging us into near-total darkness.

We descended rapidly, the air thick with dust and the smell of old grease. We hit the basement level. I didn't use my flashlight. I knew this route by touch. I dragged her through the maze of boilers and storage cages toward the underground garage exit.

I burst through the heavy fire door, pulling Naomi out into the harsh fluorescent glare of the parking structure. The air smelled of gasoline and damp concrete.

My car, a black Audi RS7, sat in its reserved spot, sleek and predatory. It was armored. It was fast. It was freedom.

I let go of her arm to unlock the car. "Get in."

As I reached for the door handle, movement in my peripheral vision triggered my instincts. A dark sedan swerved around the corner of the ramp, tires screeching on the concrete.

Two men bailed out before it even fully stopped. They weren't Sal’s made men. They were contractors. Hired muscle. Sloppy, but dangerous.

They raised their weapons.

I didn't think. I reacted. I shoved Naomi down behind the engine block of the Audi, drawing my Sig in the same fluid motion.

I fired. Three shots. Controlled chaos.

The first round took the driver in the throat. He dropped without a sound. The second man scrambled for cover behind a concrete pillar, returning fire wildly. A bullet sparked off the roof of my car, inches from where Naomi was huddled.

She didn't scream this time. She was silent, curled into a ball, hands over her ears.

I moved around the back of the car, flanking the pillar. The hired gun popped out, trying to get a bead on me. Too slow. I put two rounds center mass. He crumpled.

Silence slammed back into the garage, heavier than before, broken only by the hiss of a punctured radiator and Naomi’s frantic, shallow breathing.

I walked over to the bodies to confirm the kills. Dead. I didn't recognize them, which meant Sal was outsourcing his dirty work to keep his hands clean.

I holstered my weapon and walked back to Naomi. I hauled her to her feet. She was trembling violently, dirt smeared on her knees and the expensive silk of her robe. Her eyes were wide, fixated on the dead men twenty feet away.

"Look at them," I said, my voice cold iron.

She didn't want to, but she couldn't look away.

"That's the outside world, Naomi. That’s what came knocking on your door. Do you still want them to rescue you?"

She slowly turned her head to look at me. I was covered in sweat and dust, gun still hot at my hip, the architect of the ruin of her life. A monster.

But as she looked from the c*****e on the concrete back to me, something shifted in her gaze. The terror remained, but the resistance died. She realized the awful truth I had known for weeks.

"No," she whispered, the word barely audible.

I opened the passenger door and shoved her inside. I slid into the driver's seat and fired the engine. The V8 roared to life, the sound echoing off the concrete walls like a beast waking up.

I tore out of the garage, tires smoking, leaving the bodies and her old life in the rearview mirror. We hit the street, merging into the uncaring traffic of the city. I didn't slow down. I headed for the highway, for the darkness beyond the city lights.

She sat rigid beside me, staring straight ahead, barefoot and dressed in a robe, stripped of everything that used to define her. She was no longer a cellist. She was no longer a citizen.

She was just mine. And God help us both, she was finally starting to accept it.