Such a neat, refined work she did with her escape from the house that I couldn't even be angry anymore with my watch guy whom I found preoccupied with fixing the shitty tap that he didn't even realize she was gone.

If something makes me angry is the fact that I don't where she is. She could be anywhere in this city and it would take us the entire night to find her. Unless she ran away to her dad. I would never find her if she did.

But before giving up, I'm going to try anything to find her and I fish the phone out of my pocket to call Fabio and ruin his night but guess what?

He calls me first.

"Fabio, abbiamo bisogno di una squadra di ricerca. Mia è scappata," I tell him with no other introductions. (Fabio, we need a search team. Mia has escaped).

But instead of his usual "sure Raffa", Fabio replies with a healthy burst of laughter, bubbling something that sure is not any language of this Earth and I understand that he couldn't have reacted this way unless there was no need for a search team.

Mia is there!

I run out of the house while reaching my hand to the driver asking for car keys which land almost immediately into my palm, allowing me to not stop until I'm well seated in the driver's chair and I put the car in motion, telling Fabio to do anything to keep her there.

I don't see the cars passing by me, although I'm sure at this hour the city must be full of cars and people. It's like I'm all alone on the streets and thus I adjust my driving to the madness nesting in my brain and push the speed paddle to the floor, still ordering Fabio on the phone.

"Keep your eyes on her. Don't let her leave."

I finally see the club I've just left and hit the brakes hard when I reach the gates.

The bouncers turn themselves toward me and jump both, one to quickly take the car keys and park it, the other one to open the door for me.

"Don Raffa," he greets me when I walk in but the only person I want to see right now is Fabio.

And I hope he's smart enough to directly show me the exact place where she is now.

I can see Fabio standing alone at the bar but our eyes meet the second I show up and he signs me to the other side of the club.

I move straight in that direction, hardly making my way between people dancing and raising my head to find her.

And I finally do find her, standing next to the counter while the bartender holds her hand and speaks smiling.

Motherfucker is holding her hand!

Before I realize and pushing nervously people out of my way I finally reach next to them and decide to wait and see how far the motherfucker will go with my girl.

Luckily, not far, and because he wouldn't want it, fucking French idiot look quite invested with my girl, but because Mia sets some boundaries which he happily isn't crossing.

I would lie if I told you that she didn't fill my chest with joy, recognition, respect, and above all, a feeling of attachment and need, need to have her, no matter what.

She finally turns around after throwing the entire glass down the throat and before she knows it, her eyes land on me.

The amount of sincerity this woman has in her expression will be the end of me. She literary freezes in front of me, trying to speak, but each time she opens her mouth, I make a step toward her.

The closer I get, the harder is for me to keep control and act decent. The closer I walk, the stronger I feel her perfume tickling my nostrils and creating a void in my brain that I hardly manage to beat and think straight.

Having the French motherfucker (whom by the way, I'm going to take care of) touching my girl brought me to a whole new level of anger, one that I couldn't express nor avoid, but strangely enough, her presence and the fear of chasing her away gave me strength enough to refrain my rage and all I could do was wrapping an arm around her waist and bury my nose to the root of her neck and sniff the perfume of her skin.

Intoxicating! Absolutely addictive! I never want to be anywhere else but here.

"Andiamo," I order her in a hoarse tone, incapable to be commanding in any way. (Let's go).

She sighs and shivers and that throws me over the moon and sentences me to want her right now, right here.

I grab her hand and pull her after me through the mass of people in the club and I hardly hear her talking.

"Dove?" she giggles. (Where).

"Stiamo andando a casa," I tell her, to fuck you all the way to the moon, I wished I could complete it but kept it for myself. (We're going home).

"Ma non voglio tornare a casa," she replies jerking her hand out of my grip and hitting the floor with her leg like the spoiled brat she is. (But I don't want to go home).

I turn around and stare back at her, watcher her standing in front of me with one hand pinned to her waist and pouted lips, trying to look angry.

It's only now that I realize I can't risk her. I can't risk her life by keeping her with me while the Moroccans are on my tail and I haven't found out yet who sold me to Benito.

And as much as I wished to fetch her and run away to my cottage in Italy and have her again and again till her the only touch she knows is only mine, I need her safe, before anything.

"Ti porto a casa tua, Mia, da'll America," I break it for her, and that made her lash back at me, shouting and yelling and no matter how much I try to make her shut the fuck up, she keeps protesting. (I'm taking you to your home, in America).

When my patience ran out, I jumped and grabbed the waist throwing her over my shoulder.

Of course, she fought, she yelled and hit me but I'm decided. If I don't die, I want to come back to her one day and make her mine.

When the car stopped in front of the entrance I put her gently in the passenger seat and buckled her up.

That was yet another moment when arousal yelled through my entire body, feeling the heat of her breath on my neck and her chest raising and lowering with inhale and exhale.

I get in the car myself and buckle up quickly, burning the engine and driving the fuck out of here, decided to have her before anything, even if the earth is to burn in flames.

She keeps asking me to mind my own business, trying to understand what on earth I want from her, and accusing me of hunting her father or hurting her to get on her father.

What the fuck has anything to do with it? With her? With me falling fucking in love with her like a teenager, melting each time she looks at me, losing every ounce of self-esteem and strength to be a man, to be Raffa.

I'm hardly managing to keep steady and not lash back at her to make her stop but my attention is suddenly grabbed by a car coming toward us, on the same lane with but driving opposite and instinctively I isolate everything around me trying to figure out what the motherfucker wants to do, and the closer he gets, the clearer becomes for me that the car is going to hit us.

I grab strongly the steering wheel and I steal quickly a glare at Mia, making sure she still has her seatbelt on once our eyes meet, her yelled question hits my eardrums like huge bells domains from the sky.

"What do you want?!" she shouts and her eyes sparkle with tears.

"I want you!" I finally admit, it to her and myself, and rather than a relief, it felt so good to say it out loud, so good that my confidence sprung up and I hold her wheel tight before pulling it to the right side and making sure the collision with the other car will make minimum damages to us, offering them the back side as hitting point and making sure I can control my car and save Mia and me.

Rather Mia.

She shouts my name in an excruciating pitch when the collision happens and our car rolls over a few times, while I reach my right arm and grab her back tightly in the hope that she won't hit herself too much.

But no matter how much I fight it, a dark void sucks me in, probably from the hit of my head to the window of the door and I black out before I know what's the end of this crush.

I try to breathe deeper but it feels like my soul slowly leaves my body and I give in.

I don't know how long I've stayed there, hearing Mia shouting my name from the distance, hardly realizing it was my name.

I turn my head to see if she's worried about me or if something is wrong with her, but the moment I'm in full view of the passenger seat I see my father sitting in the place of Mia, staring at me and mouthing me back "no".

Then he vanishes and I stretch my arm to try to stop him at the exact moment when a good chunk of air invades my lungs and I have to inhale loudly, I just have to breathe and open my eyes widely and then I realize what my father has tried to tell me.

It's not my time to go, for sure.

"Raffa, ti prego, apri gli occhi e guardami. Sono qui. Non vado da nessuna parte. Ti amo..." I hear Mia still talking to me and besides the beautiful voice she has I can also smell the scent of her skin, a scent I can never have enough, but the catalyst that makes me breathe and struggle with all powers to come back is that "ti amo" whispered in my ear while my head rests on her chest and arms are wrapped around my neck. (Raffa, please open your eyes and look at me. It's me. I'm not going anywhere. I love you...). (I love you...).

If I've died and this is heaven, I want to stay no matter what my dead father tries to tell me. I want to stay here, be buried between her arms, and have her sinfully spread all over my lap just like now, feeling her cores heated over my girth.

When she realizes I'm awake she grabs my head with her tiny hands and stares right through my eyes while I struggle with a damn cough as if the air entering my lungs is burning my throat.

I want to speak, I want to tell her to tell me again what she has said before I opened my eyes.

I want her to say it again looking me into my eyes and making sure she meant what she said.

But before I had the chance to say anything and still coughing heavily, I feel Mia being pulled off my lap and I grab her waist, struggling to keep her inside the car and trying to put myself before the motherfucker who tries to take her away from me.

She struggles and kicks her legs in the air and tries to get back into the car with me but at that moment I see that the one trying to take her out is Julian, her younger brother, and when our eyes meet we both agree that Mia should be with him.

"La porteremo all'ospedale, don Capozzi," Julian tells me genuinely concerned but not enough to stay around. (We will take you to the hospital, Don Capozzi).

I nod and leave my body to deepen into the seat, relaxing my muscles for the first time in the last week, fuck, for the first time since I've got to know who is my mysterious favorite writer and unknowingly fall for her, just as I hope she has fallen for me, like said, hoping that it was not just a trick to make come back from the dead.

I tilt my head to the left leaning it against the backrest and follow Mia with my eyes till Julian manages to put her in the car.

She didn't break our stare even once till the door of her car was closed and even then she glued herself to the window, still crying and hitting the glass with her beautiful small hands.

I can hear ambulances coming closer and Julian's men trying to break the door and struggling to make as much space as they can so that the ambulance will only lift me and rush me to the hospital.

Julian leaves the place with a wheel screech and I don't blame him. If he didn't take Mia away from here fast I would have put a gun to his head until he would.

While being taken into the ambulance I can see the car that has hit us burning in flames a few meters away and that's my call to reality.

Someone tried to kill us and I quickly mentally scan my physical status.

Well, nothing I didn't face before. Some bruises, maybe some broken ribs but hey, nothing to keep in the hospital for too long.

Which is perfect. I don't have time to waste.

~~~~~
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