My Future Husband

Chapter 14

KAGE’S P.O.V

TWO YEARS AGO, RIGHT AFTER THE SHOT.

“She won't have a choice.”

BANG!

I didn’t feel the shot. I hope she knows one day that there was no pain at all. I slipped peacefully from the light into the dark, and when I stole my last breath of air, it was released with a single thought from my closed mind:

I’ll still see you, Shorty.

I fade away from my reality, floating through the black abyss, a blazing light spreading before my eyes and welcoming me into another world... I guess this it.

I’m going to see my dad.

The light grows to the point it’s blinding, forcing me to slam my eyes shut.

“Not yet, Sport.” Wait... Sport? Only he called me...

It starts to grow dark again, like something has hold of my body and is dragging me back. That wasn’t... was it?

The cold air attacks my skin as I smash right back onto the concrete floor, my head throbbing, blood trickling down my neck. What the fuck...

“Kage... Santamaria, Kage!” I know that voice...

I can’t move, I can’t open my eyes again, I can’t even feel the pain. There’s just a ringing in my head, in my ears, like I’m still half asleep with my alarm blaring, but I can’t sense the world around me enough to figure out how to turn it off.

“Fanculo...” (Fuck...) Marco? What’s he doing here? He should be at the bakery, it’s Tuesday, Sofia always comes on Tuesdays. “Sofia? It is Marco, from the bakery? I am in the walkway behind my apartment building and they... you must come! Please!” Why is he shouting?

I feel pressure against my head, I can’t explain it, I know it should be painful but it’s just not. Did he hit me? Why would Marco hit me?

No, it wasn’t Marco.

The memory starts to flood back, the creature that kept Belle locked up standing before me, the shot through my leg, the feeling of my knees hitting the floor, then the gun being pressed and moved around and around my skull, until they found the perfect place to put a bullet in me.

They shot me.

I’m phasing in and out, floating again in the black space, before I’m thrown back into reality. I can hear footsteps, people, Marco shouting over and over again at someone, but it’s not clear.

“You know him? What happened?” Another body drops to its knees next to me, more hands pressing against my skull, and for the first time true pain shoots through me.

I scream, I keep screaming, but no sound comes out.

“It is Kage, he used to work for me at the bakery... He fell for a woman belonging to one of the family’s men, I believe this is their doing.”

“Oh,” she scoffs. “So, he's an idiot?” Hey, I’m pretty sure I’m dying here! Less of the judgement!

“Yes, but he does not deserve to die like this. No man should have to die for love.” He’s such a hopeless romantic underneath all that rugged exterior. “I called the ambulance, it is already coming.” I can hear the sirens.

“Merda! (Shit!) Did you tell them his name?”

“No, I did not get tim-”

“Takeover, hold his head together.” My head? My head is apart! “I shall have to have the girls at the hospital keep him from being listed. If the people that shot him find out he is alive, they may come back to finish him.” I forgot Sofia is a nurse! She’s going to cover for me? I knew I made Marco give her extra pastries for a reason. I love this woman.