Page 40 of Freed
Dante is moving before I can think, closing the distance between us and hauling me behind him, one arm coming around my waist as he puts himself between me and Lorenzo. His body is rigid.
“Get her out of here,” he snaps to the men nearest us.
But Lorenzo lifts the gun higher, his face twisted with a kind of rage I have never seen before.
“Take one more step toward that altar,” he says, staring at Dante, “and I will paint this church with your blood.”
The room goes dead still. Even the screaming seems to falter.
Dante’s arm tightens around me. “You’ve got a lot of nervecoming into my territory and pointing a weapon at my wedding.”
Lorenzo’s laugh is raw and terrible. “Your wedding?”
His eyes slice to me then, burning.
“Tell me,” he says, his voice dropping into something quieter and somehow even more dangerous, “Did he buy you that dress before or after he decided to put his hands on what belongs to me?”
Something hot and furious tears through the shock and I step out from behind Dante before he can stop me, my pulse pounding so hard I can hear it.
“You donotget to call me yours,” I snap, my voice carrying through the church. “Not when you’re married to someone else.”
The words land. I see it in Lorenzo’s face—that quick, brutal flicker before the rage swallows everything else.
“That marriage means nothing,” he says.
“It means everything,” I shoot back. “You made vows to another woman. You do not get to stand here with a gun in your hand and act like I betrayed you.”
His jaw locks. “Elizabeth?—”
“No.” My throat burns, but I keep going. “You lost whatever right you thought you had over me the second you married her.”
The church is so silent I can hear the candles sputter. Behind me, Dante’s hand finds the small of my back. Steady. Solid. A lifeline. I grab his hand and turn toward the altar.
“Come on,” I say, pulling him with me.
A gasp ripples through the church.
For one wild, impossible second, I think maybe that’s enough. Maybe if I keep walking, if I force the ceremony forward, Lorenzo will finally understand that he cannot break into my life and drag me backward just because he’s decided he still wants me.
We make it two steps.
The gunshot explodes through the church.
I scream, instinctively ducking as the sound slams into the stone walls and showers dust from above. People cry out. Several guests drop to the floor. Somewhere near the front, glass shatters.
Dante jerks me behind him, one arm thrown across my waist.
“The next one,” Lorenzo says, his voice cutting through the chaos with terrifying calm, “goes into Teresa.”
Everything stops. I twist toward the side aisle and find her. Two of Lorenzo’s men have Teresa pinned between them. One grips her upper arm hard enough to bruise. The other has a gun pressed to her ribs, half-hidden beneath his jacket.
Oh God.
“No,” I whisper.
Dante goes rigid. “If you touch her?—”
“Then stop moving,” Lorenzo says.
