A bloody wedding

Ears were ringing, screams were loud, and the sound of gunfire was suffocating. The loud bang had thrown everything into disarray. A bomb had to have gone off. In my own wedding.

That wasn’t how I pictured getting married. The gunshot on my shoulder sent pain flooding throughout my whole body, paired with the bruises from falling to the ground. I wanted it all to be over.

My vision was blurry, but I could see several bodies on the ground and blood everywhere. Just as I tried to get up, someone took me in their arms and ran while carrying me. I knew who he was based on his scent.

I had shared his bed several times, kissed him, hugged him, and despite how the day had turned out, I was carrying his last name, and his ring was on his finger. I was his wife.

“Look at me, T. Please tell me you’re okay. Tell me you’re okay.” He said frantically as he looked at me. I could see his blurry silhouette even if I couldn’t fully open my eyes.

“Get the fucking car!” Nico yelled at someone.

“Let me drive you,” I heard Nero, his youngest brother, say. 

“No, you take care of shit here. I’ll take my wife to the hospital. I want to come home to a clean place without any intruders and dead bodies.”

“You’re not in a position to drive, Nico—”

“Those are fucking orders, Nero, and I expect you to follow them. I will take my wife to the fucking hospital.”

He secured me in the car, and then he drove, constantly touching me to make sure I was doing well. I felt so much pain, but I tried to put it away, or I was going to pass out. I was afraid I wouldn’t wake up if I succumbed to the darkness. 

Nico had managed to make a tourniquet before he started driving us to the hospital. He was calling the nearest to us to make sure they were ready for me when I went in.

My wedding dress was stained red, and I couldn’t help but think of it as a bad omen. Was the world’s way of telling me our marriage was built for disaster?

I barely registered Nico carrying me to the hospital, but I knew we had arrived based on the stench of medicine. It only took a few more seconds before I passed out.

When I woke up again, Nico was at my bedside, still in his suit, which was covered with blood. His hair was dishevelled, and he looked like he hadn’t slept for days. But despite this, he was still hot.

To my surprise, there was someone to my right. It was the last person I expected to be by my side in the hospital. Serena DeLuca.

“Hey, T,” Nico said when he noticed I was awake. All his attention was focused on me.

At the sound of his statement, Serena looked at me. She put her hand in mine and squeezed. She was too kind for the mafia life. She had been betrayed so many times, but she opened her heart again to strangers.

She distrusted me more than she distrusted anyone else. But that was before my wedding day, when I took a bullet to the shoulder for her. 

“Thank you for saving me. Who knows what would have happened if you hadn’t taken a bullet for me? I would probably be dead right now.”

It wasn’t my first time getting shot, but I didn’t tell her that. No one else knew that, not even Nico.

Serena looked like she was warming up to me, but she was still apprehensive. She suspected I wasn’t who I said I was, and she was right. But the fact that I saved her would wash all those doubts away soon. 

“Get a fucking doctor,” Nico yelled outside.

A few seconds later, a doctor came in to check on me. There in Sicily and back in Rome, Nico called the shots. Hell, he called the shots in all of Italy. He had solidified his status as a billionaire business mogul and rumored mafia boss.

The DeLuca name was well known in Italy, parts of Europe, Asia, and the United States. The DeLuca family had been there for several generations and was worth billions of dollars.

Despite his obviously blood-covered clothing, no one questioned it, and there was no police waiting to arrest him or to ask him how his wedding turned into a bloodbath. No doubt several guests died.

The man in front of me, however, was far from the powerful mafia boss I had heard about. He was obviously worried. When the doctor said I was okay, he heaved a sigh of relief. He walked closer and stroked my cheek with the back of his hand.

I always thought he was heartless, and his change in attitude was confusing me more than I liked. 

“How are you feeling?” He asked.

Surprisingly, the pain was almost gone. I still felt like I had been shot, but it was manageable.

“I’m doing well, Nic. How long have I been out?”

“Two days.”

“You haven’t showered in two days. Those are clothes from our wedding.”

“I couldn’t leave your side. I had to make sure you were feeling better. I should have protected you, and I failed at that.”

Serena cleared her throat. She was married to Nero, Nico’s youngest brother. Nico was the eldest of the DeLuca brothers, followed by Adrian, who passed away, Enzo, the enforcer, and Nero, the New York King.

She didn’t like me after she overheard a conversation she heard me have over the phone about getting rid of a woman. It didn’t help that when she questioned me about it, I couldn’t explain what I had been talking about. 

It didn’t help that the conversation she overheard me having was right after Nero was threatened by a vigilante group called the Sovereign Justice, who went after bad, rich, and powerful men, with a video of him killing a sixteen-year-old girl when he was also sixteen.

He was known as a billionaire mogul. A video like that would destroy the legitimate businesses he ran for the DeLuca family in New York. The DeLuca brothers had never heard of the sovereign justice before that point, but Enzo managed to get some information on a woman named Emma Beck. 

After we discussed tracking down Emma Beck and getting answers, Serena overheard my conversation and confronted me. Then, right after, Emma Beck disappeared. It looked bad, and Serena, who used to like me, started to look at me differently. 

She didn’t have proof I was the one behind Emma Beck’s disappearance, but she suspected it. 

She didn’t trust that my intentions with Nico were pure. And they were close. Her low opinion of me had started to make Nico distrust me.

But after the bullet I took for her, she was bound to forget that she didn’t trust me.

“I’ll leave you two alone, Nico. I recommend you go and shower. Nero will come and look after Tally.”

When she left, Nico took both of my hands and kissed them.

“I thought I was going to lose you, and I can’t. If I do, I will burn the whole world down with me when I self-destruct.”

His words made my heart flutter. I wasn’t supposed to be moved by his words, but I was.

“I’m not going anywhere,” I whispered weakly. “Go and take a shower. Serena and Nero will stay with me.”

Nico nodded as he left. As soon as he was out the door, it opened, and a male nurse wearing a mask came in. But I wasn’t fooled. I knew the tattoos that covered the nurse’s arms.

“You’re not supposed to be here, Samson. Anyone could see you.”

He removed his mask and rushed to my side to check on my wound and the several cuts on my face and the rest of my body.

“I’m killing Oscar. The bullet was only meant to graze your shoulder. He wasn’t supposed to shoot you for real.”

The hair on the back of my neck stood when he said that. I shouldn’t have agreed to his plans, and some guilt was setting in after manipulating Serena’s emotions. I had to pretend to save her so she would like me.

Nico thought of her like his little sister. Failure to get in her good graces meant Nico would never warm up to me.

After learning that her best friend of almost two decades had killed her parents and secretly hated her, she was apprehensive about everyone. I had to sacrifice my well-being to make sure she changed her opinion of me.

I didn’t really save her. The whole thing was planned. 

“The more serious the wound looks, the better the chances of Serena and Nico warming up to me.”

Samson smiled.

“Good girl. Remember why you’re married to that bastard. It’s so you can destroy him and his family name. Don’t do some stupid shit like falling for him and spoiling the plans I have for the DeLuca brothers.”

“Don’t worry, Samson. I would rather slit my throat before I fall for a monster like Nico DeLuca.”