Maid for the Mafia by Jaylee

Drumming

**ROMANY**

My heart seizes as I rip open the door, afraid of what I will see at the end of the hall. It's as if the entire space has been sucked into a vacuum. There is no sound. No air. No light. Nothing.

As I stumble around the corner, the sigh of blood soaking the carpet is what gets me first. I drop to my knees, my ribs suddenly tight and restricted.

*She shot him. She fucking shot him.*

Now my heart is drumming in my chest like a war cry. Somewhere in my line of sight I see her. I recognize her. *Dana.*

And she is holding a smoking gun.

Her wrist is shaking as she drops the gun. Her body is trembling, but so is mine as I crawl toward the man on the ground. Damien lays there, his eyes wide with shock, a hole in him somewhere that I cannot immediately find. I think I yell, in fact, I'm sure I do, because my throat is suddenly a tunnel of fire. Pain rips across my chest as I pitter patter toward my Dreamboat on hands and knees.

Somewhere above me movement flashes. Tiny goes barreling into the wall, with Dana in his grip. The noise of the gunshot had to have rung out across the stairwell, because I swear I can still hear its echo. Alex comes stumbling into the space, but my attention on him is fleeting as my eyes suddenly snag on the metal revolver lying next to Damien's prone body.

In that split second, I am agonizingly slow, but I reach it, I do. My fingers close over the handle and I prop myself up on my knees, cocking the hammer back as I aim for Dana's head. Tiny has her pinned to the wall by her throat, his elbow cutting off her air and as my first tear falls I go to squeeze the trigger...

once have I ever seen myself here... in this place... taking aim to take a life... but nonetheless, I want to kill her. I want to end her so badly that I can

him that stops me.

"No baby!" He says.

me still as I scream. At first, I think it is Alex, but then I see him stalking forth, eyes ablaze with anger and

I can

"D-Damien?!" I gasp out.

whispers, his lips on my ear, and in that minute I swear he must be a powerful ghost, but I'm wrong. He's a powerful man. "She got me in the shoulder. It's just my shoulder. I'm alright." Sobs rack my body as I go limp against him. Tears spill from my eyes, but I see what happens next more clearly than

begins to coat Tiny's tightly flexed forearm. When he steps back, she drops

Her *damaged* heart.

sorry for her. For some reason, I can't. Instead... I smile. I watch her bleed and I smile because I want her to

across his face. He's not impressed, the hypocrite, but I could give a fuck about that part. *He did this to me. He introduced me to this... this... madness.* There's someone new standing behind him. Someone else. A man I've never seen before today. An older man in a black suit. One that looks mildly bored as he watches the

to kill her for me. Goddamn you. No, no, no. Not you. Never you, baby," Damien mumbles in my ear. "Fuck, sweetheart. Fuck, I'm so sorry." *Sorry?

and despite his injury, he stands with me in his arms to gaze down at

my hands closing around his

with a smirk, leaning down to kiss me hard on the mouth. "And so are

"Get that bitch's blood off

romper and my chest. He walks me directly to the bathroom and sets me on the counter, ripping the clothes from my body as he fills the tub with steaming water. My phone clatters to the ground, but neither of us pay it any mind. As the water rises in the bath, he looks at me. All of me. Every inch of my bare flesh that is coated in the