Stolen: Dante’s Vow by Natasha Knight
Mara
Noah and I are in an obscure hotel in a long-term stay unit on the outskirts of town. Two soldiers are inside the apartment with us, and more are on the property somewhere.
I look out of the window onto the pool which I can see inside the glassed-in space. People are swimming in this icy winter’s night, the glass foggy in places from the heat and humidity inside.
“Hey,” Noah says from the doorway.
I turn to find him holding a plate of toaster waffles. They smell good but I’m not hungry. “Hey,” I say, returning my attention to the people at the pool as I hear the door close after he enters.
“Breakfast for dinner. You need to eat something.”
“I have enough people telling me what I need to do. What’s best for me. Please don’t turn into one of them.”
He comes to stand at the window beside me. The plate is gone. I guess he set it on the desk. He’s quiet as he looks out onto the distant lights of the city.
I turn to look up at him. He’s about as tall as Dante but built differently, more lean muscle than bulk. And he’s just different. Not as hard as Dante. Not as broken. Even after everything he’s been through.
He turns to smile down at me, and I feel a tenderness for him I don’t feel for anyone else. I think it’s from those first days in captivity. I was so young. And he’d been there, the same age as me, and scared too. Both of us so scared. We’d needed each other.
But then he speaks and ruins it. “He did the right thing,” he says. “I didn’t think he would.”
“No, he didn’t. He’s under some illusion I’ll have a life. That I’m better off without him–”
“You are.”
“I love him.”
“You think you love him,” Noah replies.
“That’s not it.”
“And I get it, honestly.” He walks over to sit on the edge of the bed. “He saved your life. He took a bullet for you. Multiple. And he’s probably one of the few men who’ve been good to you.”
I watch him, curious.
He shakes his head. “And in a way he’s larger than life.” He meets my eyes. “But he’s dangerous, Mara. And men like him, trouble finds them.”
“I don’t care about any of that. It doesn’t matter.”
“You know the history. Who did it. Who betrayed them. You know the guilt he carries because of that. And as little as I like him, I also feel sorry for him. He’s fucked up. I mean really fucked up. You’ll never fix him. You can’t.”
“Do you think I don’t know that he’s broken? And who says I want to fix him?”
“Don’t cry.”
“I’m not.” I wipe the back of my hand across my eyes to catch the few fallen tears. “I don’t want to fix him, Noah. I just want to be with him. He’s the only person I feel…I don’t know…like he knows me. I don’t have to hide or be anything.”
“I know you too. You don’t have to hide with me. Or be anything with me. And Scarlett too. And Cristiano. And your grandmother. There’s a longer list than you’re willing to accept. You just have to give us all a chance. Don’t you think we deserve a chance?”
They do and he’s right. I know. But this thing with Dante, it’s just more. “I love him,” I say finally. “I can’t live without him.” I won’t.
“Don’t say that.”
“It’s true.”
There’s a long moment of silence before he speaks. “I know what you almost did. Going up to those cliffs.”
I look away.
“You have me too, Mara. Always.”
“You can’t fix me, either, you know,” I say without looking at him. “You should live your own life, Noah.”
I put my fingertips to the cool glass of the window, see how the rain is turning to sleet as the temperature cools. Down below are all those people in their bright swimsuits just laughing and living, oblivious even to the fact that it’s winter just beyond the vulnerable divide of the glass wall.
“If you’re not going to eat the waffles,” Noah starts, trailing off. I turn to glance at the plate then at him.
“Did you pour enough syrup on them?” I ask, forcing a smile as I make my way across the room and pick up a section of waffle.
It’s then there’s a popping sound. Then another.
“What—” I start but Noah’s quicker than me. His gaze shifts to the closed bedroom door and in the next instant, simultaneous to the loud crash in the other room he’s on top of me, throwing me to the floor, his full weight on me as I slam down hard. I’m dazed when I hear Noah’s muttered curse. He lifts off me just as the door slams open and from my place on the floor, I see into the fog that’s engulfed the other room and the outlines of the men who were guarding us lying on the floor as that fog begins to creep into the bedroom.
“Cover your nose and mouth!” Noah yells. I’m already coughing, choking on whatever that stuff is.
I roll onto my back to watch Noah lunge for the first man. But the man is twice as big as him, wearing a gas mask and armed. The one behind him, also masked, even bigger.
The man barely glances at me on the floor before Noah crashes into him. I can only watch as he rams his elbow into Noah’s gut before slamming his forearm across his chest, sending him crashing against the wall and knocking the wind out of him.
I barely have time to scream, to tell them to stop, or to pull the Swiss Army knife from my pocket. It all happens so fast. Noah’s down and it’s a miracle he isn’t knocked out by the force of that hit, but he’s coughing, choking.
The second man looks around the room as the first one comes for me, bending to haul me up to my feet by my arm. I sway, the room spinning.
“Hold your breath,” he says. At least I think that’s what he says, over my hacking cough, my panic.
I glance once more at Noah, see his eyes flutter open, see them focus on me as the man throws me over his shoulder like a ragdoll, carrying me off. Out of the apartment where the soldiers who were to guard us lie in heaps. Out into the hallway where more masked, armed men dressed in black from head to toe wait.
The fire alarm is going off. A door opens, a woman almost steps out into the hallway, but is shoved back into her room, the door slammed shut by the man carrying me. We hurry down the stairs and all I can do is hold on to him as he carries me out into the sleet-soaked night. I can finally draw in a deep breath, still choking on whatever that gas was, my throat full, tears streaming down my face.
Outside the men pull off their masks. It doesn’t matter though. I don’t recognize any of them. We slow as an SUV with tinted windows pulls up.
“No!” I kick, pound my fists into his back. I can’t let him put me in that SUV. I’m finished if that happens. But my fight has no impact at all. And soon he slides me off his shoulder as the SUV door opens. I just make out the silhouette of a man in the back seat and I try one more time, scratching at the face of the one who has me. My feet touch down as he curses, and he almost releases me. Almost.
But then the one inside the SUV grabs me by my arm and drags me inside. The door is closed, the SUV moving. He releases me as the locks engage and I push as far from him as possible expecting Felix Pérez. Terrified of seeing Felix Pérez again.
But it’s not him sitting across from me.
It’s not him at all grinning at me, casually checking his watch, the inky green of a tattoo creeping out from beneath his shirt sleeve.