Chapter 3 - “I didn’t ask to become part of your war.”
“You saved my life.”
Dom crossed the room.
“You made a decision that night.”
His voice remained calm.
“Decisions have consequences.”
“That’s not fair.”
“Fair is an idea created by people who never have to fight to survive.”
For a moment, neither spoke.
Then Dom placed a hand firmly on her shoulder.
“I will not allow them to touch you.”
His voice lowered.
“You have my word.”
Nema looked at him.
“My word is the 1 thing in this world that cannot be bought.”
He released her.
“10 minutes.”
Nema packed.
By midnight, the Maybach had been abandoned in a secure underground garage.
They transferred to an ordinary dark-gray SUV.
Leo drove.
Dom sat in the front passenger seat with a suppressed handgun resting on his thigh.
Nema sat behind them.
The trip lasted nearly 3 hours.
City lights disappeared.
Roads narrowed.
Dense pines closed around them.
Eventually, Leo turned down an overgrown road and stopped in front of a tall iron gate.
He entered a code.
The gate opened.
A massive house of dark timber and river stone stood beyond it near the edge of a steep slope.
The place looked like a billionaire’s hunting lodge.
No exterior lights were visible.
Leo parked beside a side entrance.
“Clear.”
Dom stepped out.
He opened Nema’s door and held out a hand.
“Welcome to the edge of the world.”
Nema ignored his hand and climbed down by herself.
The air smelled of damp soil and pine.
Inside, the lodge smelled of cedar and old fireplace ash.
Furniture in the main living room was covered.
Dom walked into the kitchen and switched on a row of lights beneath the cabinets.
“Leo will take the perimeter.”
He removed his shoulder holster and placed it on the granite island.
Then he opened the refrigerator.
“You hungry?”
“I want my life back.”
Dom slowly closed the refrigerator.
“I can’t give you that.”
Without the tailored coat and city around him, he looked different.
More tired.
More human.
“The life you had ended when Tommy put ricin in my coffee.”
“So I stay in the woods while you fight a war?”
Nema dropped her bag.
“Over coffee?”
“It’s not about coffee.”
Dom’s tone hardened.
“It’s territory. Tommy was an opening move.”
He looked at her.
“You’re being used now because they think threatening you will make me careless.”
Nema stared.
“Why are you here, then?”
Dom removed a silver lighter and opened it.
Closed it.
Opened it again.
“My capos can handle retaliation in the city.”
He shut the lighter.
“The Bianke family wants me angry.”
Another pause.
“They want me chasing them. Exposed.”
He looked toward the dark windows.
“So I disappear.”
Nema began to understand.
“They can’t fight someone they can’t find.”
“Exactly.”
“And they get nervous.”
“Paranoid.”
Dom’s expression became colder.
“Paranoid men make mistakes.”
Nema looked at him.
“You’re using me as bait.”
“No.”
The response came immediately.
Sharp enough that she flinched.
“If you were bait, I’d have left you somewhere visible.”
He stepped toward the island.
“I brought you here because this is the 1 place I believed I could guarantee your safety.”
His eyes remained fixed on hers.
“I’m here because keeping you alive is my responsibility.”
Nema did not answer immediately.
“Why?”
Her voice was quieter now.
“I’m nobody.”
She spread her hands.
“I’m a waitress.”
Her laugh was bitter.
“You already paid the debt.”
Dom reached across the space between them.
His palm rested lightly against her cheek.
Nema stopped breathing.
“In my world,” he said, “people don’t step in front of bullets for me.”
His thumb moved once over her cheekbone.
“They stand behind me.”
His gaze lowered briefly.
“Or they run.”
He looked into her eyes again.
“You didn’t run.”
Then he removed his hand.
“Your room is upstairs. 1st door on the right.”
He stepped away.
“I’ll stay downstairs.”
Nema carried her bag up the stairs.
She was isolated in a forest with a criminal boss while men somewhere beyond the gates wanted both of them dead.
Yet for the first time since Frank’s Diner, she slept.
Days passed.
Outside, a winter storm buried the road.
Approximately 2 feet of snow accumulated around the lodge.
Nema gradually learned the rhythm of Dom Vasquez’s private life.
He did not relax.
He conserved energy.
He slept approximately 3 hours a night on a leather sofa in the downstairs study.
A gun remained on the coffee table beside him.
During the day, he managed his organization through coded satellite-phone calls.
Nema learned to recognize when news was bad by how quiet he became afterward.
Neither tried to entertain the other.
They simply shared the house.
Sometimes they ate without speaking.
Sometimes Nema made coffee and deliberately set Dom’s cup in front of him without comment.
The first time she did it, his eyes remained on the cup for several seconds.
Then he looked at her.
Neither mentioned Frank’s.
By the 5th evening, the temperature had fallen sharply.
Snow outside had hardened into ice.
Nema was in the kitchen waiting for water to boil when Dom entered.
He wore a dark thermal Henley and tactical trousers.
Without a suit, he seemed less polished but more dangerous.
He crossed to a utility closet and removed a matte-black shotgun.
Nema turned at the sound of the chamber being checked.
“What’s wrong?”
“The perimeter sensors stopped responding 3 minutes ago.”
Dom began filling his pockets with shotgun shells.
“Could be ice.”
His eyes moved toward the windows.
“Could be someone cut the lines.”
“You said nobody knew this place existed.”
“I said the Bianke family didn’t know.”
He looked at her.
“That doesn’t mean they couldn’t buy someone who did.”
Dom crossed the kitchen quickly.
His hands closed around Nema’s shoulders.
“Listen to me carefully.”
She went still.
“Do not stand near a window.”
His grip tightened.
“Go to the wine cellar. Lock the steel grate.”
“Dom—”
“Do not make a sound until I come for you.”
Before she could respond, the front of the lodge exploded.
The blast felt like an earthquake.
Glass shattered.
The reinforced entrance door was torn from its frame.
Freezing air rushed through the house.
“Move!”
Dom shoved Nema toward the basement corridor.
Then he turned toward the kitchen entrance and raised the shotgun.
The first blast filled the house.
A man wearing white winter camouflage disappeared backward through the broken window.
Nema dropped low and scrambled toward the cellar.
Automatic gunfire ripped through the walls.
Wood splintered.
Drywall turned into white dust.
From another section of the lodge, Leo returned fire.
Controlled bursts.
Precise.
Nema reached the cellar stairs.
Then she heard a different sound.
A short, involuntary grunt.
She turned.
Dom was retreating toward her while covering the hallway.
Another attacker came through the damaged kitchen.
Dom fired.
The attacker dropped.
But not before pulling his own trigger.
Several rounds struck the wall around Dom.
His body jerked.
The shotgun fell.
“Dom!”
He hit one knee.
His left hand immediately pressed against his right side beneath the ribs.
Blood spread through his shirt.
“I told you to get downstairs.”
Nema ran back.
“Shut up.”
She pulled one of his arms over her shoulders.
“Get up.”
Dom was far too heavy for her under normal circumstances.
Adrenaline made normal circumstances irrelevant.
Using the wall for leverage, she forced him upright.
They stumbled down the cellar steps together.
Nema pushed him behind a massive oak storage rack.
Then she ran back and closed the steel gate.
She threw the heavy bolt.
A shadow moved across the top of the stairs.
Nema pressed herself against the stone wall.
Her hands were covered in blood.
Then the shooting stopped.
Silence.
Heavy footsteps moved slowly above them.
Nema lowered herself beside Dom.
His breathing was shallow.
She reached for his hand in the darkness.
His fingers closed around hers.
They waited.
5 minutes.
Then 10.
Every second seemed stretched beyond reason.
Finally, a voice called from above.
“House is clear, boss.”
Leo.
“Counted 6. They’re all down.”
Nema closed her eyes.
They were alive.
But Dom’s blood was still warm between her fingers.
The aftermath was practical rather than dramatic.
Broken glass.
Tactical lights.
Blood.
Cold air pouring through ruined windows.
Leo carried Dom upstairs and placed him on the heavy dining-room table.
The kitchen and living area were scarred by gunfire.
Nema did not panic.
Whatever part of her had been capable of panic seemed to have burned itself out.
“Get the first-aid kit from the SUV,” she told Leo.
He looked at her.
“And boil water.”
Another pause.
“A lot of it.”
Leo moved immediately.
Nema took kitchen shears and cut through Dom’s shirt.
Blood covered his side.
“You should be in shock,” Dom said through clenched teeth.
His skin had become pale.
Cold sweat covered his forehead.
“I don’t have time.”
Nema pressed folded towels against the wound.
“Hold that.”
Dom lifted his hand over hers.
“Through-and-through.”
His breath caught.
“Missed the lung.”
Another breath.
“Missed the liver.”
“You call that lucky?”
“I call being alive lucky.”
Leo returned with a hard-shell medical kit.
He took over pressure while Nema searched through the supplies.
Hemostatic gauze.
Antiseptic.
Dressings.
Tape.
For nearly 1 hour, the dining room became an improvised treatment room.
Nema packed and dressed the wound, then wrapped Dom’s torso tightly enough to control the bleeding.
Her hands did not begin shaking until she was nearly finished.
She dropped the medical tape.
Picked it up.
Dropped it again.
Only then did she realize how close they had come.
Dom rested against pillows Leo had brought from another room.
His color remained poor, but his breathing had stabilized.
He reached into his pocket for a burner phone.
He dialed a number from memory.
“It’s done.”
His voice was weak but controlled.
“They sent 6 men to the lodge.”
A pause.
“All dead.”
He listened.
“The Bianke family played its final card.”
His eyes moved toward the shattered window.
“Hit the main compound.”
Nema looked at him.
“Take the old man out.”
Dom’s expression did not change.
“End it tonight.”
He disconnected the call.
By morning, the 3-year conflict between Dom Vasquez and the Bianke family would effectively be finished.
A war that had begun long before Nema knew either side existed had reached its final stage because a tired waitress had spilled 1 cup of coffee.
Dom looked toward her.
Blood loss and pain had stripped away the distance she usually saw in him.
For once, there was no polished crime boss.
Only a wounded man lying on a dining table.
“Leo will take you to the airstrip tomorrow.”
Nema froze.
“What?”
“The debt is settled.”
Dom looked directly at her.
“You saved my life twice.”
His voice was quiet.
“There’s a private plane waiting.”
Nema did not move.
“It’ll take you to London.”
She stared at him.
“There’s an account in your new name.”
A pause.
“$5 million.”
Nema said nothing.
“New passport.”
Dom’s eyes stayed on hers.
“New identity.”
He swallowed against the pain.
“You disappear.”
Everything Nema had once wanted was suddenly being placed in front of her.
Money.
Distance.
Freedom.
Enough wealth to ensure she never had to work another double shift.
Enough distance to ensure nobody from Frank’s Diner or the South Side would ever know where she lived.
“You’ll never have to look over your shoulder again,” Dom said.
Nema looked down at her hands.
There was still dried blood beneath her fingernails.
His blood.
She remembered Frank’s.
The greasy counters.
The bruises on her feet after 9-hour shifts.
Her tiny apartment and broken radiator.
Then she remembered the Gold Coast penthouse.
The grocery-store attack.
Leo.
The forest.
The gunfire.
She remembered sitting beside Dom in the dark cellar and feeling his hand tighten around hers while both of them waited to find out whether they would live.
She looked at him again.
“I don’t speak a word of British.”
Dom stared at her.
“Nema.”
She almost smiled.
“I’m serious.”
“I’m giving you an exit.”
His expression hardened, though pain weakened the effect.
“The normal world.”
“The normal world is a lie.”
Dom stopped.
Nema walked toward the table.
“It’s something people tell you exists while you’re working yourself into the ground trying to afford rent.”
Her voice remained quiet.
“I had a normal life.”
She looked around the ruined lodge.
“I was exhausted. Broke. Invisible.”
“Nema—”
“I don’t want it back.”
Dom studied her.
“You don’t know what you’re saying.”
“I know exactly what I’m saying.”
She stepped closer.
“I don’t fit there anymore.”
A long silence followed.
“If you stay,” Dom said, “there is no going back.”
“I know.”
“You’ll be part of this life.”
Nema remained still.
Dom’s eyes darkened.
“You’ll belong to me.”
Nema’s expression changed.
“I don’t belong to anyone.”
Dom said nothing.
She approached the side of the table.
Then she placed one hand carefully against the uninjured side of his chest.
His heartbeat was strong beneath her palm.
“But I’m choosing to stay right here.”
Something in Dom’s face broke.
Not completely.
Just enough.
His breathing slowed.
His rough hand rose to the back of Nema’s neck.
He pulled her toward him.
The kiss was not gentle.
There was too much exhaustion in it for gentleness.
Too much fear.
Too much violence survived in too little time.
Nema closed her eyes.
Cold air continued entering through the destroyed windows.
The room smelled of smoke, antiseptic, pine, and blood.
Only days earlier, she had been an exhausted waitress approaching the end of another miserable night shift.
She had wanted nothing more than to wipe down the tables, count her tips, and go home.
Then she had seen Tommy Romano pour white powder into a stranger’s coffee.
She could have looked away.
Nobody would have blamed her.
Nobody would even have known.
Instead, she had intervened.
That single decision destroyed the boundaries of the life she understood.
It brought $50,000 to her door.
A Gold Coast penthouse.
Armed guards.
The Bianke family.
An assassination attempt.
A hidden lodge.
A gunfight.
And eventually, an offer of $5 million and a new identity on the opposite side of the Atlantic.
Dom Vasquez had finally given Nema exactly what she had once believed she wanted.
A way out.
A clean escape.
Absolute freedom from him and everything his world represented.
Nema looked at the man she had saved twice.
Then she made another decision.
This time, nobody forced her.
Nobody owed anyone anything.
May you like
She simply chose.
And she stayed.
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