The Mafia's Racer Bride

Chapter 6

Kelsey Schmidt

“Marry you?”

I can’t believe the words coming out of his mouth. The age gap between us is massive, literally twelve years, and he expects me to just jump into marriage with him because he wants to shield me from my father’s cruelty and the terrifying hands of the Gambino family.

“You heard me right, Kelsey,” he says, his voice cutting through the noise in my head like a sharp blade. “Marry me, and there won’t be a war. The syndicate has boundaries, and an East Coast family can't touch a West Coast king's wife.”

Should I trust him? If I marry him, I’ll never truly be free. I’ll just be trading one suffocating cage for another, bound to a different kind of master. But the upside is staggering because my father is completely out of my life, and there will be no Gambinos waiting in the dark shadows of the underworld to harvest me for the black market.

But what about my dream? What about driving? There are a million catastrophic problems I need to handle, but my exhausted brain can’t process them all at once. For now, I’m safe from the immediate slaughter, and right that second, that’s all that matters.

I stay completely quiet, turning my head to watch the relentless sheets of rain streak down the tinted car window, though I can still feel his heavy, burning eyes on me, watching me like a hawk, assessing its prey.

I lose track of time in the quiet hum of the black sedan, the rhythmic wiper blades acting like a metronome for my racing thoughts, but eventually, the car smoothly pulls to a stop in a secure underground parking garage beneath one of the most prominent, expensive high-rises in Downtown Portland.

Marco opens the door for me, and I slowly step out onto the cold concrete. My knees throb with a dull, sickening pain, reminding me of every blow. My father never cared if I had another race in a week or two because he would beat me whenever the rage struck him.

“Move, Marco,” Anthony orders, his tone dropping an octave.

Marco steps back instantly as Anthony sweeps me up effortlessly into his arms, carrying me bridal-style toward the private elevator bank.

“I can walk, Anthony…” I murmur, mortified, the heat rushing to my cheeks.

“It’s obvious you can barely stand, and you weigh like nothing,” he interrupts, his tone non-negotiable and heavy with authority.

I slowly wrap my arms around his neck, resigning myself to the fact that arguing with him is entirely pointless. He’s right that I weigh next to nothing. My father routinely starved me for days at a time whenever he lost a lot of money from underground casinos, and whenever the madness took over him. I even had to ask for permission like a servant before I was allowed to eat a scrap of food in my own house.

I tried to hide some cheap snacks in the dark corners of my bedroom, but when Dottie found out about my pathetic stash, she immediately ran and told my father, and he punched and kicked my stomach multiple times in one brutal span until I was coughing up bile.

“This is going to be your house now,” Anthony interrupts the dark echo of my thoughts.

The private elevator opens directly into a breathtaking penthouse that looks like it belongs in a magazine. A massive, sprawling living room greets me, impeccably clean with a floor so perfectly polished it practically acts like a mirror, reflecting the glittering city lights outside.

“Take a shower,” Anthony instructs gently as he carries me further inside, his arms surprisingly warm. “A doctor is on the way.”

“A doctor?” My breath hitches in my throat, panic flaring.

We enter a sprawling master bedroom featuring a massive king-sized bed and an entire wall of floor-to-ceiling glass overlooking the dizzying, glittering skyline of downtown Portland.

“I need you to see a doctor. Your face has bruised,” he reminds me of the vicious slap from my stepmother, setting me down softly on the edge of the plush mattress. He points toward an open doorway. “Take a shower, and I’ll have some clothes waiting for you.”

I give him a quiet nod, walking past the threshold and into a bathroom that smells overwhelmingly of him. Crisp cedar, dark musk, and an underlying scent of raw danger. I strip off my ruined clothes right in front of a massive backlit vanity mirror. My long, dark, honey blonde hair is a matted bird's nest, and there is dried blood crusting on the side of my split lips.

I step into the glass shower stall, letting the scalding hot water wash away the filth, the sweat, and the terror of the night. I don’t cry when the water hits my raw wounds. I just close my eyes, letting the thick steam surround me like a shield, anchoring myself to a single, powerful truth.

He can’t hurt me anymore. My father can’t control me, can’t starve me, and can’t sell me.

I’m free.

When I finally step out, the bathroom mirror is completely fogged over, hiding my reflection, which is a massive blessing, because I have no desire to look at how broken and ugly my skin appears beneath the surface.

I wrap myself tightly in a fluffy white towel and push the door open. To my utter surprise, Anthony is sitting on the edge of the bed right next to a neat pile of fresh clothes.

His jaw clenches instantly, a hard muscle ticking, as his dark eyes sweep over my exposed body. That’s when my stomach drops into a free fall. In the thick steam of the shower, all the heavy foundation and concealer I usually used to hide my father’s handprints have completely washed away.

I look down at my arms, fully exposed by the short towel, covered in a sickening patchwork of deep purple, yellow, and green bruises accumulated over years of relentless abuse.

“Did your father do that?” he asks, his voice dangerously soft, practically vibrating with a lethal, frozen frost.

He stands up and walks slowly toward me until his towering height completely shadows my small frame. I look up, trapped by the pitch-black abyss of his fierce gaze.

I don’t have to answer because the heavy silence is a complete admission, but he understands the dark horror of it better than anyone alive.

“I should have taken you away a long time ago, Kelsey,” he whispers, so quietly I almost miss it beneath the hum of the city outside.

He isn't late. In the twisted, broken timeline of my life, he arrived right on time. Right when I needed him the most.

“I’m going to change,” I murmur, ducking my head to break the unbearable weight of the tension.

I scoop up the clothes from the bed and practically bolt back into the bathroom. I slip into one of his crisp black button-down dress shirts and a pair of his loose boxer briefs. The shirt swallows me whole, falling all the way to my knees, making me look impossibly small against his massive, masculine wardrobe.

When I walk back out into the bedroom, Anthony is gone. I head downstairs to the main living area, where a middle-aged doctor stands nervously by the couch, looking utterly bewildered and panicked, while Anthony sits calmly nearby like a king on a throne.

The doctor looks in my direction, and his eyes widen in shock. “Schmidt! My daughter really likes you! She has your poster on her wall!” the doctor babbles nervously, trying to break the ice with a frantic, trembling smile.

“Marco,” Anthony says coldly, not even blinking.

Marco steps directly into the doctor’s line of sight, blocking him completely. “You will keep your mouth shut about who your patient is tonight. Say a single word to anyone about this place or who you saw, and you know exactly what will happen to you.”

“Y-Yes, of course, I swear...” the doctor stammers, his face draining of all color until he looks ghost-white.

“Now, start doing your job,” Marco commands, stepping back like a silent statue.

Anthony taps the empty space on the couch right beside him, a silent directive. It isn't a request. It’s an absolute command.

I walk over and sit down next to him, feeling the heat radiating from his body. The doctor nervously steps forward, gently examining the ugly bruises mapping my arms and collarbones while the room falls into a heavy, suffocating silence.

After a thorough, agonizing check, the doctor announces in a shaky breath that, thankfully, nothing is broken. Marco immediately escorts him out of the penthouse without a word, leaving Anthony and me alone once again in the cavernous, quiet living room.

“Why did you not call me?” he asks coldly, breaking the stillness.

Is he waiting for me to beg for his help? All this time, did he really want me to call him? Because at first, I thought that’s what he just always said out of empty obligation, because he felt deeply indebted to my grandfather. I was also terrified to call him because everyone knows what he’s actually doing for a living.

Everyone on the West Coast knows exactly what his underworld business is.

“Kelsey, look at me.”

I slowly look up to meet his piercing dark brown eyes. He doesn't look mad at all. But he's staring at me with a terrifyingly blank expression, so I don’t even know what he’s thinking behind those walls.

“You will tell me if you need help. That’s not negotiable.”