Nicolai

We barely made it out of the cathedral before sirens began to blare in the distance. Who knows if they were coming in our direction, but I have a feeling they were.

It doesn't matter; we're gone now, heading out of the city.

I want so much to hold her, to kiss her, to tell her everything is going to be okay. To just take time to be with her in all the ways I've wanted for weeks while we've been separated, but there isn't time. We have to get to the safe place that's waiting for us before people realize what happened.

And they will. I know I wiped the prints, but surely it's going to be obvious that when Jason is dead, and Sutton has disappeared that she had something to do with it.

Unless everyone actually believes she wanted to marry him. And then that's a whole other—

"Where are we going, Nicolai?" Sutton asks after about an hour, interrupting my train of thought, which is honestly probably a good thing. She's wringing her hands in her lap, her gigantic dress spilling over onto the console, almost covering my hand on the gearshift.

I glance at her and reach over to take her hand. She immediately intertwines her fingers with mine and I can almost feel the fear radiating from her skin.

"We just need to get out of the city for a little bit, let the dust settle for a minute. Then we'll go back."

She nods. "I'm so sorry, Nicolai."

"For what, mala tigrica? You did nothing wrong."

"You had to kill him. For me. You had to take someone's life," she whispers.

"Baby, Jason Kincaid isn't the first person I've killed," I say carefully, hoping like hell she doesn't recoil from me. "I thought you knew that."

"No, I did. I do know that. But those were all for work. Things you had to do."

I raise a brow. "You think I didn't have to do what I did back there?"

"I—"

"Sutton, I could not let you marry that man. For more reasons than one, but I had to do what I had to do. Not to mention, he was hurting you. He was strangling you. You were signaling to me that you couldn't breathe, were you not?" I ask, glancing at her again before putting my eyes back on the road.

"Yes. He was choking me. He had already slapped me, and—"

My head whips in her direction and I nearly run off into the shoulder of the road. "He did what?"

"He hit me. In the face. Called me a whore, a bitch... I tried to get away but he was too fast for me. That's when he pushed me against the wall and started choking me. Then you got there, thank God," she says, squeezing my hand.

"Fuck, I wish I'd gotten there sooner," I say, hating that she had to suffer at all.

"No, I'm glad it happened."

"What? How can you say that?"

"Because I got to see his true colors and now I'm not sorry he's dead. I hate to say that, but it's true."

I have to ask her the question that's been burning in my mind since I busted in to beat Jason's ass and saw her in the room with him. "Sutton, what were you doing in there in the first place?"

"I was telling him I wasn't going to marry him," she says like it's the most obvious thing in the world.

"You were? You were going to run before I even came in?"

She nods. "Of course. There was no way I was tying myself to that man for the rest of my life. Not when I love you," she says, lifting my hand to her mouth and kissing my knuckles.

Even amidst everything that's happening, the shitstorm that's brewing around us, my fucking heart soars. "Fuck. Sutton, you don't know how happy that makes me."

"I was going to find you as soon as I left, but he wasn't making it easy."

"What were you going to do about your dad, though? I know you wanted to do right by him no matter what and that's why you went along with it for as long as you did."

She scoffs. "I couldn't stop thinking about the fact that he lied about my mom. I overheard him and Jason talking the night before, and they both knew. And there was something else they were hiding from me too, but it didn't make any sense. My dad asked if I knew about the Ring and Jason said something like, 'No and she can't ever find out.' I don't get it. I work for the Ring. I've been a part of it my whole life." She shrugs and leans her head back against the headrest. "Whatever. They—my dad—can find another way to get out of trouble. Not my problem."

The Ring. They were talking about the fentanyl ring. I have to tell her, but not while we're driving. She's going to need me to hold her. We're almost to our destination and I can tell her then.

"They had a lot of secrets, I fear," is all I say.

"I'm sure they did. Why were you there?"

"To try one more time to get you back." It isn't a lie. But I can't explain everything until we're out of this car.

She lays her head on my shoulder. "Well, you got me."

I kiss the side of her head. "Forever, mala tigrica."

***

Sutton fell asleep a few minutes after we finished talking and thirty minutes later, I'm parking my car in front of our destination.

Anthony Banks' new house.

Before I left the park earlier, Anthony put a piece of paper into my hand and written on it was his address and phone number. He knew we'd need a place to go afterward if I did end up having to kill Jason to get her out of there, and he wanted to be able to help us as much as he could.

He swears that no one has any idea where he lives now, not even Dom, who he has spoken with since leaving, but only a couple times. I know I can trust Anthony, considering all the information he gave me at the park.

I reach over and run my fingers through Sutton's hair and ghost my lips across her forehead. "Sutton, baby, wake up. We're here."

She stirs and when her eyelids flutter open and her gaze focuses on me, I swear to god I almost cry. To know that she's here with me and she never has to go back to that asshole again just makes me so fucking ecstatic.

"Where are we?"

"Anthony's."

She sits up straight, her face brightening. "My uncle Anthony?"

"Yes. He's not home yet though; he had some business in Jersey to take care of first."

"But no one has heard from him in months."

"Not until now," I say. "Come on, I'll explain inside. Let's get you out of the car. We kind of shoved you in here with this dress on."

She laughs. "God, I don't have any other clothes."

I cock my head to the side. "What do you take me for? Of course you do."

"I do?"

Jumping out of the car, I run around to her side and open the door, holding my hand out for her to take.

"I packed you a bag just in case I got to have you again. I knew you'd probably want to burn this monstrosity."

She gets to her feet and throws her arms around my neck. "What did I do to deserve you?"

"Please. It's me who doesn't deserve you, but you love me anyway."

"Not true, but I really, really do."

"And I love you," I whisper, leaning down so I can kiss her properly for the first time since our reunion.

She opens to me, and I take the opportunity to deepen the kiss, sliding my hands down her waist and pulling her flush against me. She smells so good, like sweet vanilla and jasmine, exactly how I remember.

"Nicolai," she whines. "When can we go upstairs?"

I smile against her mouth. "I don't know if that's a good idea right now. You've just been through something traumatic. You're pretty vulnerable."

She slides her hands down to my ass and presses me harder against her. "I can feel your erection through this mountain of tulle. I'm pretty sure you think it's a fantastic idea."

"You're bad."

"I know... but it's been too long, and I am feeling really, really needy," she says, running one of her hands around my side, up my ribcage and to my chest. "Please."

"Fuck, you know I can't deny you. But we do have some more things to talk about. Do you want to do that before or after? Your choice, mala tigrica."

She thinks for a moment. "Let's go with after. Everything sounds better in the afterglow," she says.

"Can't argue with that. Plus I really need that dress off of you and into the firepit."

"Don't forget the veil," Sutton says, patting the top of her head. "Oh, fuck."

"What?" I say as we walk up the stairs to Anthony's front door.

"My veil. It fell off."

"Okay, who cares? One less thing to burn."

"No, Nicolai. You don't understand. It fell off in the room where we left Jason's body. I tossed it aside because it was in my way when he was fighting me. I never picked it back up. It must still be there."

Oh, fuck.