"No, no, no." I say as I walk out the house we rented in Lisbon, Hope following my steps. "I did enough by bringing you here." I argue.
"Tom this is my dad we are talking about here."
"Yes I know, and I promise I will bring him to you."
"Well Im not willing to sit around in this place waiting, so I'm coming. End of discussion like you say. Come on let's go." She says starting to walk past me but I stop her by grabbing her arm.
"Hope please, understand. I can't focus on rescuing your dad if I'm going to be worried taking care of you."
"Don't worry about me." She says walking up to me, i believe she's going to hug me but instead pulls the gun I had tucked in on my side. "Just give me this and I'll be fine."
"You said you don't know how to handle a firearm."
"Tom, my dad is a very hated man with enemies, did you really believe me?" She asks with a smile. Before I can say anything, she walks up closer and kisses me. "Let's go." She walks away as she tucks in the gun in her back.
"God give me patience. This girl is going to drive me insane." I say to myself before walking to get in the car with her. Harrison looks back at us from the front seat.
"She's going?" He asks looking at me.
"She has a name." Hope responds.
"You try telling her no." I say and Harrison turns around quickly. Yeah, exactly.
When we arrive to the Da Silva residence, this time we find them here. We get off the car before it becomes visible to the guards in the entrance. The plan is for Diego to go in alone, try to negotiate and if it doesn't work then we'll go the hard way about it. Hope walks behind as we make our way through the side of the property. I still can't believe I actually bought her. She can say whatever she wants about her knowledge with a gun, but I haven't seen it happen therefore my worry is there. Harrison and Harry walk besides me.
"Hope's life goes before anyone else's, even your own. No matter what, nothing happens to her, are we clear?" I say and they both nod their heads. I know they are worried as well. And I also know they will not let anything happen to her. We arrive to our position and hide behind a fence on the left side of the property. We wait, and we wait, and we wait. Diego should've said something by now. I'm growing impatient here.
"I'm not waiting anymore. Let's go in." I say and everyone nods. We start to move when we hear voices and stop.
"He didn't come alone. Look on the outsides." Someone orders and we stay still. I hear other voices growing louder and they seem to get closer to us. I look at Harrison and he nods at me. Before we can do anything a few gun shots are heard. He opens his eyes widely and we stand up quickly. They know we are here.
Two men were walking in our direction. They shoot at us and we shoot at them. They go down quick but they are more coming. Harrison empties out his gun before going back down again and I do the same.
"This fucker has more security than the royals." Harrison says as he loads his gun again.
I'm working on it too but we keep hearing shots. I see Hope pull out the gun from her back and cock it. She starts to stand up and when I'm unable to stop her, I'm up too. I look at her, her face is concentrated, both of her eyes open, set on a target. She squints her eyes a little and shoots. I follow the bullet as it hits on the gun of a guy that was about to shoot at us. The bullet didn't hit him but surely scared him when it took the gun off his hands. It must have hurt too because the guy is groaning in pain. Another man comes out from behind the property and I shoot him before he's even able to reach for his gun, and just in case, I also shoot the guy Hope scared. We both go down again.
"Fuck, that was hot." I say and she smiles widely. Who would've expected my sweet angel face wife to know how to shoot? Not me for sure. "Ok let's go." I say and we stand up. Harrison and Harry jump the fence first as I help Hope up and jump it myself. We make our way towards the back of the main residence. Diego said Rafael was being held in the warehouse. Once again, Santi, the man who told us about Hope, told us about Rafael. There is a lot going on right now. I look towards the right side of the property where our other men are holding things down. I see Sam is in a fist fight.
"Harry." I say and point towards Sam with my head. I don't need to say more for Harry to understand I need him to go with Sam. Harrison, Hope and I make our way to the warehouse. I walk in the front, my gun in front of me, Hope is behind, and last is Harrison watching our backs. As soon as we enter we see Rafael is hanging tied from his wrists in a pole and Diego is unconscious on the floor.
"Dad." Hope says when she sees him. Rafael looks her way but I doubt he can see anything through his beat up face.
"Ah the princess and her prince are here." Paulo says in a sarcastic way.
"Let him go." Hope says and starts walking his way.
"Hope." I say stoping her by grabbing her form the arm. I'm still pointing at Paulo. "What the fuck is your problem?" She yells at him.
"Your dad is my problem. You, all of you are my problem." Paulo says pointing at everyone with the gun in his hand. "I had to put up with your dad's bullshit for years. Waiting for you to be old enough to get married and take over everything. But you went and marry this nobody over here." He says pointing at me. "Making shit harder for me, but luckily for me I have you all in the same spot to finish you at the same time. Very unlucky for you though."
"You're fucking sick." Hope says, her voice cracking.
"Paulo," I finally speak. "If you don't want me to put a bullet through your eyes let Rafael go." I say trying to keep calm.
"You're here in defense of your lovely father in law?" He questions me and laughs hysterically. This man is definitely under the influence of something. Drugs, alcohol, madness. I don't know, something for sure. "You're so pathetic." He adds. "You owe me one so you should mind your business before I fucking kill you right now."
"You don't stand a chance." I say, striking a nerve.
"I can do it with my bare hands boy." He argues.
"It's that so?" I say lowering my gun. "Let's find out then, right here right now. One on one." I put my gun in my back. His blue eyes look confused at me.
"Tom." Hope grabs my wrist but I pull it off her grip.
"Man to man. Come on." I say rolling up the sleeves of my shirt. I walk towards him and Paulo laughs, tucking his gun in his back as well. I stop mid way and he meets me half way, his sleeves are rolled up as well.
"You look so much like your dad." He says with a grin and I look at him confused. He seems to read my face and he makes a surprise face looking back at Rafael. "Oh you, you didn't actually believe Rafael did it did you?" He says and starts to laugh again. "Oh, it'll be a pleasure to end the life of another Holland."
It is the last thing I hear before I throw the first punch. It lands on him and he stumbles a bit. I got for another blow but he evades it and comes back at me. Realization hits me at the same time his fist does. He killed my parents, he made me believe Rafael did it because he wanted me to end him for him. His plan was to keep Spain and Hope and I would do the dirty work for him. So at the end, I hated Rafael and hurt Hope for nothing? I see red. I have no idea how many times I got at him nor how many times I actually hit him. We are going back and forth. This motherfucker can fight. He comes at me one more time and when I move back he seems to lose balance. I take this moment to go hard at him. I punch him in the face, that one is for my parents. I punch him in the face again, this one is for using me. I do two quick ones again, these are for every single tear Hope has ever cried because of him. His face is full of blood and he doesn't seem to recover and I go one more time punching him in the stomach. This one is for fucking pleasure. Paulo lands on his knees and I quickly pull my gun out, cock it, and put it on his forehead. This piece of shit dies here.
"Tom." I hear voice from the door. I don't look at her but I can hear her steps coming closer.
"Don't Hope, he killed my parents. This time I'm not stopping for anyone." I say and I feel her presence next to me. I left him alive last time because of her, I'm not doing it again.
"I'm not here to stop you." She says and I turn to her. She has her eyes on Paulo. She looks up at me for a second, her eyes on mine as she gives me a small nod before looking back at Paulo. I turn to him and pull the trigger without hesitation. His blood splashes back at me. I feel an immediate satisfaction. I look back at Hope who is still standing next to me. She has blood on her as well and she keeps at looking at Paulo's lifeless body in the floor.
"I hope you riot in hell, idiota." She says.
I look around the room and see Harrison is gone as well as her dad and Diego.
"Hope, where's everyone?" I ask and she looks up at me, snapping back to reality.
"With Harrison, we have to go." She last says before we both run out the warehouse. Outside I see Harrison as he tries to wake up Diego, Rafael is standing next to him, struggling to keep himself up.
"Grab him Haz," I say pointing at Diego. "I'll take Rafael, we have to go." I walk up to Rafael. "Come on put your arm around my shoulders." I say and he does it. I hold him from around his waist, trying to not hurt him. "Hope the keys." I say to Hope so she can grab the keys from Diego's pocket. When I look to the front again, one of Paulo's man is approaching us with a rifle.
"Don't give another step-" his words get cut off with a gun shot. I see the man open his eyes widely before he starts bleeding from his chest, letting go of the rifle and falling to the floor. I look back and see Hope still pointing the gun his way. She looks at me and and smiles.
"I got you baby."
As much as I want to run up and kiss the shit out of her, we need to go. We hurry making our way to the vehicles. I put Rafael in the back seat of one of the cars.
"Hope keys." I say and she pulls them out of her back pocket and throws them at me. I catch them on the air and jump on the driver sit as Hope slide in the back sit with her dad and I drove off. Throughout the entire drive, I observed as Hope caressed her dad's hair and spoke to him. She had tears in her eyes but was fighting them. By the time we arrive to the rented house, a vehicle that was driven by Jacob was arriving as well. Diego is now conscious and gets off this car. He makes his way to us.
"In the back." I say opening my door.
Jacob comes and helps Harrison carry Rafael as Sam meets them to help as well. Diego walks behind them calling a doctor and Hope walks behind Diego.
"Careful Jacob please." She says walking through the front gate. I walk up from behind her and grab her from her left wrist making her turn around and crash against me. I grab her face and pull her in to kiss her. I hungrily kiss her. I had never had so much desire to have her in my arms as much as I do right now. I've been wanting to do this since she shot that first shot.
"I fucking love you, you know that right?" I ask when we break off the kiss. "You're my whole life Hope Holland." I add.
"I love you too, Tom." She says smiling.
"You were fantastic back there, i fell in love with you all over again." I say and she grins widely. "Thank you for having my back." I say with sincerity.
"Always." She says coming for another kiss. Her arms around my neck, my arms around her waist, the best way to fucking be.
"Go be with your dad." I say breaking of the kiss. She nods and turns around to walk to the house. The moment she starts walking away, I slap her ass and I hear her laugh. She turns back and blows me a kiss. Fucking hell mate, I'm the luckiest fucker out here.
A/N: HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!! Wishing everyone a wonderful 2022. Thank you for 25k reads and for making 'The Exchange' one of the best things of my 2021. Enjoy ❤️