The Marriage Debt (Underworld Kings)

“Jill, oh my God, you’re alive. I thought you’d drowned,” she yells, crying while rushing over to us. The second she spots Luca, she stops in her tracks, though. “Is Luca—?”

“No,” I reply, unable to cope with the mere idea, let alone it being a fact.

“Oh, my God,” Jasmine says, her voice choking in her throat.

I keep applying compressions to Luca’s chest even though I know every second is another one lost.

“Keep Liam away from here,” I tell her.

“Liam’s gone,” she says.

My ears perk up like a dog’s. “What?”

“After you two fell, he ran.”

I frown, confused, but there’s no time to think about any of it.

Luca’s still here, and I’m fighting for his life, and goddammit, if I give up now, I will never forgive myself.

“I’ll call Dad’s clinic,” Jasmine says, fishing her phone from her pocket.

The clinic, the only place that takes in us mobster folks without asking questions.

Smart move if we want Luca to survive and not end up in jail.

I know it’s tough for her because he held a knife to her throat. But this story is far more complicated than could ever be explained in a single sentence, and she knows.

Nothing is more important right now than making sure he lives. “Luca, goddammit, I need you to stay!” I growl.

My sister walks off to the cars, probably to talk with the paramedics and give me some privacy. The thought makes bile rise in my throat. Because you only give privacy to people who need to grieve.

“You didn’t give up on me, and I won’t give up on you,” I tell Luca through gritted teeth.

After a while, I pinch his nose again and blow more air into his mouth.

“Don’t leave me! Please!” I beg, my voice sounding more like a clamped cry for help as tears roll down my cheeks and fall onto his lips. “I love you.”

I press a soft kiss to his lips, wishing I could’ve told him sooner. If he’d only told me where he was going and what he was going to do, I could’ve helped him and Liam.

But that’s exactly why he didn’t tell me.

“Get the fuck away from her!”

His voice as he yelled at his brother reverberates over and over in my head.

He was willing to lie to me and attack his own brother, make me feel like he’d betrayed me, just to save me from Liam’s wrath.

Just to save me from the mere idea that Liam hated me.

This is the extent of his love.

All this time, he was trying to protect me.

Suddenly, water explodes from Luca’s mouth, and he coughs and heaves so loudly that it makes me fall back on my ass in the wet sand.

I stare at him for a few seconds as he sucks in the air until I finally realize that what I’m hearing is his gasping breaths.

“Luca!” I immediately crawl to him on hands and knees and tilt his head to the side to allow more water to flow out as he coughs and heaves.

When it’s all out, I help him up by lifting his head onto my lap. And even though he’s in terrible shape and we’re not out of the woods yet, I still can’t help but smile. Because he’s here—breathing—and when I grasp his wrist, I definitely feel a pulse.

“Luca …” I mutter, swiping his hair off his lips and eyes. “You’re alive.”

His eyes flutter open slowly as his hand drunkenly moves to my face for the softest of caresses that melt the last remaining icicle stuck to my heart. “Thanks to you.”

Now I really can’t contain the tears.

“Don’t cry, bunny,” he murmurs, mud caking his skin. “I’m here.” My hand falls into his as he continues to pet my cheek with the other like he’s in awe. “You saved me.”

“No, you saved me,” I say, looking down at his half-lopped smile. “You almost died.”

“I would have … for you,” he replies, his voice hoarse from all the water.

“No, don’t you dare say that,” I say as he scoots up my lap farther so he can look me in the eyes. “I couldn’t live with that. I couldn’t live with another death on my ha—”

He plants a finger on my lips, silencing me. “Bunny. I’m alive. Liam is alive. You didn’t kill anyone.”

His words drop a burden off my shoulders that I couldn’t even feel anymore after so many years.

But my God.

It’s like I can finally breathe again for the first time in a long time.

But I still feel guilty for all the things I said and did up there on that cliff. And I feel even guiltier for trusting Liam, for thrusting a knife into the only person who ever tried to fight for me.

“I should’ve trusted you,” I say. “And I’m sorry for stabbing you.”

He laughs, but it comes out as a chortle, and rapid coughs follow. “I deserved that.”