Page 19 of Blood Vows

“We need to go,” he ordered.

“What happened?” He picked up the safe-deposit key from where she placed it on the nightstand.

“Another body was found,” he said.

Her stomach dropped. “With Camorra carved into it?”

“No.” Something about the way he said it made her blood run cold.

“What was carved into it?” she asked.

Dante looked directly at her. “Romano.”

Elena stopped breathing, and Dante stepped closer. “And this one came with a message.”

“What message?” she asked. His jaw tightened, and her entire body went cold before he even answered.

Dante's voice was barely above a growl. “Bring us Elena.”

Dante

Dante had seen fear wear a thousand faces. Men pissed themselves, women screamed, and soldiers went silent. But Elena Romano simply stopped moving, and that bothered him most. She stood in the middle of her destroyed bedroom, staring at him like the words hadn’t landed yet.

Bring us Elena

Dante hated the message. He hated the fact that someone had carved the name Romano into another dead body. And even more, he hated that they had named her. Which meant this wasn’t just about the Camorras anymore. Someone wanted Elena at the center of whatever war they were trying to start, and Dante had no intention of handing her over.

“Get your coat,” he said.

Elena blinked up at him. “What?”

“Get your coat,” he repeated.

“I heard you,” she said.

“Then move,” he ordered.

Her eyes narrowed slightly, some of the shock burning off. “Where are we going?”

“To Luca’s,” he said.

“You said that before,” she reminded.

“This time, we’re actually going there.” She folded her arms, then winced when the motion pulled at the graze on her shoulder. Dante noticed. He noticed every fucking thing about her now, and that was becoming a problem.

“You need that looked at,” he said.

“It’s fine,” she lied. It had to hurt like hell, but there was no way that she’d admit that to him. She was so fucking stubborn.

“It’s bleeding through,” he said.

“It’s barely bleeding,” she countered.

“Elena,” he growled. Her mouth tightened, and she defiantly stared him down. She was too fucking brave for someone who had just been explicitly requested by people carving messages into corpses.

Dante stepped closer. “You can argue with me in the car.”

“I can argue with you right here,” she insisted.