Chapter 6

Our drive ends at a waterfront apartment in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. Standing amid the industrial landscape is a towering luxury complex covered in open brickwork and floor-to-ceiling windows. This building looks a tad more luxurious than I would expect for a mob hideout. This looks more like the type of place Nick's finance-bro-alter-ego would bring back his dates after partying at the Soho House and dinner at Carbone.

"You might want to shimmy out of that dress before we pull into that parking lot," Nick advises me without taking his eyes off the road. "There are eyes everywhere around here, and a woman in a wedding dress might attract the wrong type of gossip."

"What? You have a hidden girlfriend somewhere who will complain?" I snark back, but I angrily unzipped the gown. Most brides probably don't opt for a side zipper. I had picked one because I didn't trust my nonexistent bridesmaids to help me get in and out of the gown to use the bathroom. Now, I was grateful to wiggle out of the gown finally. There, my discarded wedding dress lay in a ball of chiffon and lace balled up in the footwell of Nick's car, kind of like my dreams of how this day should have gone.

Nick has a parking spot close to the elevators. I'm surprised he didn't use the valet, but then again, I suppose he was trying to avoid being seen. As soon as Nick turned the engine off and opened the car door a crack, I saw that his precautions were futile. A large dirty hand slams against the car door shut. The hand turns into a gun, and before I can register what is happening, the car's window is transformed into a cobweb of glass shards. The reinforced glass stops the first wave of bullets, but it wouldn't stop many more.

Snap! Snap!

More bullets lodge into the glass. It breaks.

"Get down!" Nick yells and returns fire through a hole in the glass. I don't even see who was shooting who. The shots Nick fires in return seem to have hit their target. The shooting momentarily stops.

"Holy shit!" I scream over and over. I can hear myself because the parking lot is silent now. There are no more gunshots. Nick doesn't speak. He's bleeding from his right arm. His blood had splattered across the front of my slip dress. For a moment, I can't tell if I am hit too. I am so shocked that I feel like I can't catch my breath.

I need to get out of here. With one shaky hand, I open the car door and stumble out into the parking lot. I think about running, but my knees have turned into rubber.

A gun.

I see one of Nick's guns sitting on the armrest between us. I know that I should grab that gun before fleeing the scene. Who knows how many of these goons are around here? All the same, I can't bring myself to touch it. I can't bring myself to kill, even if it means saving my own life.

"Sweetheart," Nick chokes out and steps out of the car. He's holding his right arm, but the blood is dripping down his fingers and onto the concrete floor. He's a wounded animal; now is my window of opportunity to run. "You won't make it far on foot. Not in those shoes."

"But at least I won't die here with you," I stammer.

"The smart aleck who tried to knock me off in my own parking lot is dead," Nick spits his words in the direction of the two feet I see poking out from the shadows of a nearby Honda. "There isn't anyone else here. Let's go up to my apartment."

I shook my head and took a step back.

"I'm not going anywhere with you."

"Suit yourself. Run if you want. My men will be here any second. They'll bring you back before you reach the nearest Uber drop-off area. Oh, oops, you don't have your phone, do you?"

I curse under my breath. Yes, I left my phone inside the car. Even if I had it, where would I go? He knows where I live. He knows where my entire family lives. I would have to leave the country to get out of his clutches.

"Are you sure there aren't any more goons?"

"I pinky swear," Nick chuckles and winks at me. "And look, I'll throw myself in front of you again if they come back. Deal?"

I sigh in resignation and walk back to the car. My phone is wedged between the armrest and the passenger side seat. I get on my belly and fish the phone out from its snug hiding spot. My dress is wet, but I'm not hurt. I suppose I would have felt it by now if I had been shot.

"Are you okay?" Nick asks me as I slam the car door shut and join him by the elevators. He had taken the time to rip off a piece of the lining of his blazer and create a makeshift tourniquet around his upper arm.

"I-I think so. I think most of this blood is yours," I say, glancing down at the front of my dress. As the elevator doors open, I'm relieved that it's empty. I look all set to play Carrie in a school play. "What are you going to do? Do you need to go to a hospital?"

"Oh, you're hilarious, you know that?" Nick laughed and placed a cigarette in his mouth. He struggled to light it with his one good hand. "A mobster who goes to the hospital isn't long for this job."

"If you're expecting some help from me, I just want to let you know I won't be liable for anything that happens to you. I-I'm a bit out of practice, and I've never removed any bullets from the arms of criminals before."

"Liable, really?" Nick sighs and takes a long, deep drag of his cigarette once it is lit. I suppose he didn't care about setting off the fire alarms inside the elevator, either. "Don't worry, sweetheart. This isn't the first time I've been shot. I normally pour some whisky into the hole and slap a bandaid over it."

"And that's it?"

"Well, then I finish off the bottle of whisky."

"Oh good, at least your body can absorb that extra zinc and copper," I retorted with a roll of my eyes. "I was worried I would have to give you a banana bag for all that drinking."

"You're more annoying than the girls I usually bring home," Nick groaned at my sad attempt at a medical joke. "And no, I don't have any girlfriends lurking around here. Rest easy, Mrs. Madigan. I can promise that idiot who tried to kill me definitely isn't a jilted ex-lover."