Scarred Regrets (Bellandi Crime Syndicate 5)

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SCAR

Irina stumbled, eyes wide but unseeing as whatever memory tormented her caught her in a tight grasp and refused to let go.

“Get him the fuck out of here before I do it myself,” I snapped, turning my attention to Calix. Rafael’s lack of understanding and empathy for Irina after what she’d gone through wasn’t surprising.

His own woman was too distant for him to understand how his care for her would twist him up and turn him inside out until nothing mattered more than her happiness.

He smirked at me, that infuriating look on his face that hinted at all the things El Diablo had seen and all the things he’d done. He might look largely unassuming, his monster beneath the surface of his skin far more well-hidden than my own, but I knew neither of us would walk away from a fight unscathed.

Calix put his hands on Rafe’s chest, pushing him back a few steps with a firm ease that was mostly casual. “You’d do the same thing if someone fucked with Isa the way you’re poking at Irina. You’re out of line,” Calix said, drawing on the friendship they’d formed through their alliance that was years in the making.

Calix had only been a teenager when he’d gone to El Infierno to take sanctuary with Rafael and his father. Sometimes it was easy for Calix to fade into Rafael’s shadow, the easygoing man more disarming at first glance.

But he was always ready to use that underestimation to his advantage. He was just as bloodthirsty as the rest.

With him taking care of Rafael, I was finally able to shift Irina into my arms and carry her into the living room. Her friend watched with wide eyes as I sat on the couch with her in my arms, draping her over my lap so that her head rested on my shoulder limply despite the tension lining her face and the fear in her blank, unseeing eyes.

I touched a hand to her face, enveloping her chilled skin with the warmth of mine as I leaned down and touched my lips to her forehead. If drawing her from a nightmare was any indication of how she’d react to being pulled from her flashback, I knew she could get violent.

She wouldn’t forgive herself if she hurt me, that act doing far more damage to her healing progress than the memory itself.

As much as I feared it would make it worse, I gathered her wrists in my hand and held them steady on her lap. Taking away her ability to lash out, I finally spoke.

“Come on back, Butterfly,” I murmured against her skin. My lips brushed against her, feeling her body slick with a cold sweat that did nothing to ease my concern. “You’re with me.”

Her brow furrowed as she screwed her eyes shut, struggling to shut out whatever she was stuck reliving. They cleared when she opened them, her nails biting into the skin of her palms for a moment of panic as she came back to awareness with her body draped over me.

I soothed her, murmuring to her softly until her body relaxed into my grip and she seemed to realize where she was.

“Did you remember anything?” Rafael asked, crossing his arms over his chest as Calix spun and pointed a finger in his face.

As much as I hated to think of anyone but me being responsible for my butterfly’s safety, anyone who was willing to stand against Rafael Ibarra for her would be willing to do whatever it took. She’d be in good hands with Calix Regas.

It certainly helped that they were very much related. Her mother had been Calix’s aunt, a woman his grandfather had sold off to a rising Judge Ryan with connections in Chicago, as part of his alliance with Franco Bellandi when the arrangements surrounding her first marriage had fallen through.

She’d been furious to be married off outside the five families in Philadelphia. Even more angry to be married to a man who wasn’t mafia at all.

While she’d mostly cut ties with her brother, Calix’s father, and his family when she moved to Chicago, Eugene was well aware of what had happened to his sister. Franco had approved the death of the woman who’d become his mistress after she’d left her husband, and Eugene allowed it without batting an eye.

Something stirred in Calix’s eyes as I met his stare, leading me to believe that he knew exactly what I’d done.

With one sentence, he could destroy everything I’d built with Irina. With one sentence, he could strip me of my entire world.

Fuck.

I’d never meant for them to meet. Matteo knew what I’d done. He had to understand the position he’d put us all in.

“I didn’t,” Irina said carefully, swallowing as she snuggled further into me. The problem with what Calix knew, and the conversation we needed to have, would need to wait for another day. “Can you take me home?”

I nodded, rising to my feet and escaping the tension of the apartment, feeling like my life had shifted on its axis yet again.

I’d always known my vengeance would come at a cost. I just had to hope it wouldn’t be Irina.