Unforgivable Ties

Epilogue

Stephanie

The bone saw made shrill, grating noises as I cut through the corpse’s rib cage. Taking out the heart and lungs was always the most work. But I had gained an impressive amount of muscle over the last few months from my late-night organ extracting.

My hands, once delicate and slender, had hardened into tools, unsparing in their precision. A scalpel felt as natural as an extension of my own fingers, its edge glistening under the harsh light.

“I can help you with that, you know,” Vincenzo frowned, looking at me from across the morgue.

“Absolutely not!” I said, pointing my gloved finger at him. “Cesare would kill me if he knew you were in here. I’d get a huge contamination lecture.”

Vincenzo chuckled, leaning against the cold metallic counter. “I think Cesare delivers those lectures just to hear himself talk.” His Italian accent thickened when he was amused.

“Shush, you!” I laughed, going back to sawing. “Don’t you have work to do?”

“Just waiting for your fine ass to finish work so I can take you out,” he said, watching my chest jiggle as I hacked away at the body.

“Where are we going at two in the morning?” I snorted.

“You’ll see, Cara Mia,” he said with that dark glimmer in his eyes. It was the look that told me I’d be getting absolutely wrecked in bed, or wherever he decided to take me tonight. “It’s a special day.”

The bone split with a decisive crack and I carefully lifted the sternum, revealing the still-intact organs nestled within. The sheen of my latex gloves reflected on the slick surfaces.

“What’s so special about it?” I asked, grabbing a pair of hemostats to clamp the blood vessels before I removed the heart.

“You don’t remember?”

I paused, tilting my head in contemplation as I clamped down onto a cluster of blood vessels. My brow furrowed beneath the glow of the fluorescent lamp, glossing over any sort of relevance today held.

“No,” I said, a bit nervously. It wasn’t like me to forget important dates.

“You saved me from dying a year ago today,” he responded.

The image of him bleeding out on the warehouse floor rushed back to me. I remembered how hurt he had been, how much blood gushed from his tattooed skin.

“And look at me now,” I teased, pointing the scalpel at him before making a delicate cut along one of the major blood vessels.

“Pretty hot, isn’t it?” he said, the glimmer in his eyes growing stronger. If he had his way, he’d rail me in the morgue with this corpse’s lifeless eyes watching.

“The big, bad Mafia man dragged me into this bloody world of his, quite literally,” I said, my voice taking on a nostalgic lilt.

A world I didn’t know I wanted until Vincenzo entered my life. I denied it for the longest time, but as I looked up at him, his dark eyes alight with mischief and an oddly endearing sense of wickedness, I knew there was no other world I’d rather be in.

“Yeah, yeah. You love it,” Vincenzo pushed off the counter, confidence radiating off him like an aura. He crossed his thick arms over his muscular chest. “Don’t deny it.”

My heartbeat quickened in my chest as I met his gaze. That look, that careless confidence mingled with affection and a hint of danger, had become my addiction.

“Let me finish this up and we can go,” I said.

I made the final cuts in the blood vessels and removed the heart from the body. It was quickly transferred to a cooling cannister, another container on top of the other organs I had already extracted. In a couple hours, The Surgeon’s men would come pick them up and do god knows what with them.

Vincenzo helped me push the cut open corpse back into a morgue drawer, where it could stay cold until there was someone available to dispose of it.

As the metallic drawer slid shut, the cold steel contrasting against the warm, pulsating life within us, I managed a glance at Vincenzo. He was already looking at me, a suggestive smirk tugging at his lips.

“Let’s go celebrate somewhere that doesn’t smell like antiseptic,” he said, pinching my cheek with his large hand.

After changing out of my scrubs and back into normal clothes, I followed Vincenzo to the car. When I asked where we were going, he said it was a secret, and that I’d see when we got there. We drove through the city and got off at an exit I hadn’t been on in a very long time.

“The Docks,” I said, looking at cargo containers as we drove down the quiet street.

Vincenzo turned into the entrance, and the area was still as abandoned as ever. The lights were sparse, and what few street lights they had flickered, the bulbs begging to be replaced.

“It really is the perfect place for criminal activity,” I grumbled, crossing my arms. “I can’t believe I just used to walk through here without a care in the world.”

“Me either,” he laughed, driving us further into the labyrinth. “I’m surprised you didn’t get killed.”

“Didn’t run into anyone as dangerous as you, I guess,” I answered with a smirk. He glanced over, feigning offense before laughing again.

He stopped in front of the warehouse where we had first met. Nothing about it had changed; it was still beat down and haunting, a monument to rust and time. Ghosts of gang disputes and illicit deals were etched into every crumbling brick.

“Feeling nostalgic?” I asked, turning to look at him.

“Something like that,” he said, turning off the engine and opening his car door. “C’mon.”

I followed him towards the run down warehouse. The creepy atmosphere of the place should make me feel afraid, but when I was with Vincenzo, I always felt safe.

He wrapped a strong, tattooed arm around me as we walked towards the entrance. I snuggled into his side, enjoying the heat his giant body gave in this cold night.

We reached the door, and he opened it for me, a gesture that seemed oddly formal for such a grunge-ridden location. As I stepped through, I was met with darkness and a flurry of memories.

I had been terrified, hiding behind that shelf and praying he wouldn’t see me. Looking back, it was laughable I was scared.

“Let’s see,” Vincenzo muttered to himself, and I could hear him moving in the darkness. “Here.”

He flicked on the light switch, and the fluorescent light gently illuminated the room. The bulb was old, and would occasionally flicker off.

In the light I could see his old blood stain that had been forever etched in the concrete. I silently thanked whatever higher beings existed I was here that day, that I had found him before he died, and that he had entered my life.

“You know,” he said, snaking his arms around me from the back. “I was thinking.”

He spun me so I faced him, his dark eyes capturing mine in their intensity. “You’ve seen my world, my past. The parts that are as scarred and worn as this old warehouse. You’ve stood by me with courage and never once wavered when I showed you the rawest parts of myself.”

I nodded, uncertain of where he was going with this.

“You are everything to me,” he said, getting down on one knee.

My heart raced as I watched him, his muscular figure under the harsh warehouse lighting, hardened by years of danger and bloodshed. Yet now, there he was, a feared man kneeling before me.

He pulled a small velvet box from his pocket and opened it. Inside was a gorgeous white gold ring, studded with diamonds that glittered in the feeble light.

It was cliche, but I couldn’t help but let out a gasped breath, my hands coming up to clasp over my mouth in shock.

His dark eyes were filled with an emotion that I’ve seen only a few times. A vulnerability that he allowed no one else to see but me.

“Marry me, Cara Mia,” he said, his voice a low rumbling whisper that echoed in the empty room.

I let out a choked sob and nodded my head frantically, unable to form any words. My hands were shaking as I reached out to him. He took my trembling hand in his firm grip, sliding the ring onto my finger before kissing my knuckles.

His large arms enveloped me in a warm embrace as he stood up, pulling me as close as possible.

“Ti amo, Cara Mia,” he said, his lips brushing against my ear as he whispered the words.

“Ti amo anch’io,” I managed to reply, my voice barely more than a whisper, choked with emotion.

I couldn’t wait to spend the rest of my life with him. He was the darkness to my shadow, the fury to my storm, and together, we were unstoppable.

Thank you for reading Unforgivable Ties! If you have time, please leave an lokepub review and let me know what you think.