"Are you hurt?" Ivory asked more gently, stepping up to touch his arm.
He flinched back. "Not mine. Bryan’s. Found him in Irina’s apartment. They—” He paused, swallowing past what I suspected was bile crawling up his throat. “Mutilated him.”
"Where's Irina?" Ivory asked, fear filling her eyes for the woman we'd quickly become friends with after Samara introduced her to us.
"They took her," Judge Ryan said, his eyes finally snapping back to the present. "They took my girl." He held out a piece of paper that Ivory accepted, bringing it over to Matteo. He clenched his jaw, handing the note off to Enzo and moving for Scar who stood bone still at the edge of the room. His eyes never left Judge Ryan as his chest heaved.
"We'll find her," Matteo murmured softly. It was the voice I recognized, the rare affection Matteo showed to people when he could feel they were on the verge of their breaking point.
I glanced down at the note in Enzo's hand.
One Bellandi whore.
Scar shoved away from Matteo, reaching for the gun at his waist and making for the door as his face twisted. Enzo moved from my side quickly, stepping into his path and blocking him off. "I know. I know," he said, drawing Scar's rage filled face his way. "We have to find her first. You're no good to her if you're dead before we find her."
"Then fucking find her!" Scar shouted as Enzo fought to pry the gun from his hand.
Ivory stepped up, touching her hand to his cheek and bringing his attention down to her. "They'll find her and bring her home, Scar. She's going to need you when they do," she said, slipping her hand over the gun. He released it to Ivory's grip, letting her tuck herself into his chest after she hand it off to Enzo. Looking over at her husband, her stare was hard. "You find her now," she said, bloodthirsty fury filling her eyes.
Matteo and Enzo both nodded, heading out the front door without another word.
To find the one who'd been taken instead of me.
Epilogue Enzo
Stepping into the private VIP room at Tease, I glanced around in confusion, wondering where the fuck my little wife had gotten off to.
With no sight of her in the space, I closed the door behind me and stepped in. The lights were dimmed, waiting for a wealthy client to step into the space and book a private show. "Sadie?" I asked, staring around in confusion as the lights on stage came on. Clad in nothing but a lime green lace teddy that hugged her tits and cut high on her hips, Sadie was illuminated in the dimmed neon colored lights as tendrils of smoke surrounded her from the machines at the base of the stage.
Even unable to see her face as it was hidden behind the curtain of her dark hair with her head cast to the floor, I'd recognize my wife anywhere with only a glimpse of the body I still lived to worship, six months after I'd met her. A smooth rock song filled the air as she brushed her hair back to reveal her stunning face in the dim lights. Slowly walking to the pole in the center of the stage, she worked the five-inch heels like she'd been born to them.
This was what I got when I let my wife befriend a stripper with as few boundaries as she herself had, a woman who encouraged Sadie's comfort with her body. Natalie quickly became a staple in Sadie's life, along with another form of activity that Sadie thrived on. She claimed the sensuality of it made her feel feminine after a day of knocking fists at the gym.
I couldn't argue with her on that front.
Ever since coming clean to her family regarding her OCD, Sadie had been filled with a new level of feeling free. She was who she was, and she finally accepted that all the people who couldn’t handle her? They weren’t worth her time in the first place.
She stretched her right arm up and grasped the pole above her head. The words “Ride or Die” stood out in stark contrast to her skin in white ink, surrounded by Sampaguita flowers as she moved, shifting her weight from leg to leg slowly as the other followed suit and she spun to face me. Her hips swayed side to side to the beat of the music, one of her hands trailing up her body from her thigh to her shoulder.
Touching everything that was mine, when we'd long since established who owned her: body and soul.
With a seductive smile, she reached her free hand around her back, grabbing the pole at waist height and shifted the hand above her head, using the strength in her arms to encourage her body as she lifted her leg and swung it backwards to push her into movement. Her body spun parallel to the pole for a full rotation and as she came around again, she let go with that bottom hand and shifted it to the front of her body so she spun to face it. Lifting her legs up and out, she curved around the pole at the waist, moving from one transition to the next as she showed off her skills with the pole.
Skills I knew from the continual toning of her body worked entirely different muscles than she exercised in her gym.
When she came down off the pole, she dropped to the floor, throwing her weight back so she arched over the floor. Her breasts thrust up to the ceiling with her hair hanging behind her and the pole between her legs, she presented the perfect picture of sex appeal. Unable to resist the temptation she presented, I stepped closer to the stage. I took a seat in the
