Bella (A Sagatori family saga-A Mafia Romance Book 5) (3 page)

Jax

I tapped my foot at the edge of the bed, I felt guilty for yelling and taking all my shit out on her. “Damn it!” I buttoned my trousers then slipped the Hermes belt through the loops. I folded my jacket into my arm and took a deep breath. I needed to apologize even if it wasn’t my favorite thing to do; it still needed to be done because she didn’t deserve what I’d said. The shit that I was stressed over had everything and nothing to do with her and that’s why it was so difficult.

Taking every other step, I descended the staircase shifting my eyes over the corridor for Bella, but she wasn’t there. I slipped into my jacket and straightened my tie in the mirror when Alessandra approached.

“Please tell Bella I’ll be in late.” I watched in the mirror, seeing the vein at my temple throb.

She nodded in the reflection behind me. “When she gets home, I’ll let her know.”

Dominic and Tony entered just as she finished. I narrowed my brows, looking between the two.

“Where’s Bella?”

They both looked at me and then to each other with confusion written all over their faces. They had no idea where my wife had gone.

“Where did she go?” I turned my attention to Alessandra who seemed surprised herself.

She shrugged. “I— I don’t know. I thought you knew she was leaving.”

“No! I didn’t know! She just left and no one was with her?” My attention was directed to the two idiots in front of me.

“Boss.” Dominic approached.

“Find my wife before I ice your fucking asses.”

“Yeah yeah.” They rushed to the security monitors in my office.

“What did she say?” I narrowed my stare at Alessandra this time.

“That she’d be back before dinner. She didn’t seem like herself, though. It looked as if she was going to cry for a moment.”

Bella doesn’t cry; she rarely shows any emotion where others are concerned. Hell, even I very rarely see the sensitive side of her if ever.

I slipped my hand inside my pants pocket, retrieving my cell, and dialed her phone. With one ring her voicemail answered. “It’s Bella, leave a message.”

“Call me back, Isabella!” I tossed the phone to the chair next to me with force.

“Boss, she left in the Jag about twenty minutes ago. She pulled out of the garage heading west.”

“Where would she go?” Alessandra asked while she straightened my tie.

I didn’t know where she would go. I never let her out of the house; she’d pretty much been a prisoner in her own life since I came into it. All I did was bark orders at her and make demands that would make anyone crazy. “Track her car.”

Alessandra gasped, “You can do that?”

I raised a brow. “Of course, I’d never risk Bella’s safety.”

“Her car is at 7
th
and Price.” Dominic looked up from his phone.

“Zest,” Dominic and Tony said in unison.

“I’ll go, you stay and wait. She may come home before I find her,” I demanded of the two knuckleheads that were lucky they still had legs to stand on.

I slipped my jacket on as I left the apartment and exited the floor inside of the elevator. “Pull the car to the front,” I called my guard.

“Yes, Boss.”

I stepped outside through the glass doors of the building and walked to the car where he stood holding the door for me. I lifted my eyes for a moment seeing another car just across the street— a black limo— not something uncommon for this area, very common actually. But that wasn’t what caught my eye; it was the blonde that peered over the top of the car just before disappearing into the car. My eyes had to be betraying me. I shook my head, stepping into my own car, watching as the limo drove away heading in the opposite direction that I did.

“Everything okay, Boss?”

I blew out a breath. “Bella took off alone, and her car is at Zest.”

“Got it.” The car was balls to the wall in seconds. Unfortunately, our car was quickly slowed to a stop from traffic. “Sorry, Boss.”

“Cut through here.”

The car made a sharp right turn bypassing the cars that sat motionless in front of us moments ago.

“If you don’t mind me asking, Boss, did you call her? Is she okay?”

I watched my phone waiting impatiently for her to call me back. I’d dialed and redialed her number over and over with no response.

Wyatt watched with curiosity in the rearview waiting for my response, a response I wasn’t going to give.

A siren blared from behind us, catching my attention quickly. It was Chicago’s finest behind us with their lights flashing.

“Boss?”

“Fuck, just what I needed.”

As Wyatt pulled the car to the side of the road, I punched the seat in front of me. I didn’t have time to entertain the fucking cops, but they passed us. It was a huge fucking relief that they were headed somewhere else.

We were two streets away from the restaurant her car was at, and I grew more unhinged with every moment I didn’t know if she was safe. My face heated with fury waiting for the last one hundred feet to pass. I didn’t even consider waiting for Wyatt to open my door like I usually would have. I just opened the door and jumped out. The dark wooden door of the restaurant opened quickly with a couple exiting. I moved to the side letting them pass; it was the mayor and his arm candy, who was a well-connected call girl. He didn’t speak to me, and of course, I didn’t waste my time with him. I turned my head entering in after him.

The hostess greeted me as soon as my feet crossed the threshold. “Welcome, how many will be in your party this morning?”

“I’m looking for my wife, Bella Moretti.”

“Oh, is she dining with a party?”

“Alone.”

“I’m sorry, sir, there isn’t a single woman dining with us at the moment.”

“You mind if I take a look around?”

“Umm.” she looked around.

“It’s alright, Amber. I promise I’ll be quick.” I read her nametag.

“Oh— Okay, sure I suppose that will be fine, but there isn’t anyone here matching that description.”

“Thank you, I’ll be quick.” I entered the dining area seeing only a few groups of people, mostly businessmen and a few couples but no Bella. Her car sat out front, but she wasn’t here. This was the only place I could think of that she’d be.

I ignored the hostess and left through the front door. I stepped out underneath the awning letting my eyes roam the street; it was busy at eleven a.m. Her Jag was four cars down on the opposite side of the street, windows up.

“Boss?”

“Not in there.”

“Her car is locked. I got in it and didn’t see anything, there’s not even a receipt in that car.”

The sun beat down as the day began to warm up. I opened the car door and reached in for my sunglasses and slipped them on, then reached into my pocket for my phone, dialing Bella again.

“Where are you?” I growled into the phone then slipped it back into my pocket.

“You think someone could’ve taken her?”

“Yeah, I’m beginning to.” I once again reached for my phone. I had Sal working on something but this shit took priority over that any fucking day. “Hey,” I said.

“Boss, is that Bella?” Wyatt asked while he pointed to my left on the other side of the road.

“Yeah.” Bella was coming outside with a man holding onto her. “Come on!” I stepped into the street, halting the suburban that came at me, and ran across the street. A man held her arms and her face looked pale. I reached into my jacket, pulling my gun out, and pointed it at his fucking head. Wyatt grabbed him by his arms, pulling him away from Bella. I slipped my gun back into my jacket and punched him in the jaw. Blood slung from his mouth as his head flew back from the impact.

“Jax! What the hell are you doing?”

“Baby, are you okay?” I held her shoulders.

“No, I’m not! This nice man was trying to get me to my car.”

“Boss.” Wyatt held the guy’s wallet in one hand while trying to hold him up with the other. “Russian.”

I snagged the wallet from his hand and glowered at the fucking idiot he held onto. If he was Russian, he was a dead man. “Gusev, that’s definitely Russian.”

“What do you want me to do, Boss?”

“What is this place, Bella? What the hell have you been doing?” She watched me with disdain, but I didn’t give a fuck. She had no business coming out here alone.

“Boss?”

I rubbed my chin. “Take care of him, I’ll drive Bella home.” I turned my attention back reaching for her arm and slipped her into the passenger seat of the Jag. Once I was seated inside, I watched as Wyatt walked the Russian to the car. “Do you know what was about to happen to you?”

She huffed, turned toward her window. “What the hell do you care, Jax?”

“Excuse me?”

Turning to me with hatred in her eyes she said, “I’m sorry, were you not in the bedroom when you yelled at me? That’s right, I must’ve imagined it all. I can’t live my life like that.” She took in a deep breath.

“Like what? You have everything that you want. Must be a difficult life, Bella.”

“Sarcasm will get you nowhere, Jax.”

“You’re being very difficult, what do you expect?”

Her sharp grin faced me. “Difficult? Fuck you!”

“That dirty mouth will get you nowhere with me Bella.” I mocked.

“Hmm.” She turned her attention to the window again. “Was that guy really a Russian?” I could see her eyes fall.

“Yeah—” In this life you could take no chances, if there was a chance he was Russian then we called him a Russian until we knew different.

“How do you know he’s with the Bratva?”

“I don’t, but Wyatt will deal with that shit. What were you doing here?”

“I was looking at maternity clothes.” Her hands pressed against her swollen belly.

“What the fuck was this guy doing here?” I ducked down seeing the mannequin in the front window displaying a pregnant woman. “What’s a guy doing at a fucking maternity store? Alone, I mean.”

“I— I don’t know. I started feeling really sick and dizzy. When I went looking for the sales girl, I couldn’t find her. That’s when he approached asking if he could help me—” she shrugged “— I asked if he could get me to the car not thinking anything of it.”

“Are you kidding me? I get that you didn’t feel good, but fuck, Bella, have you forgotten who you are and what we’re up against?”

“No, Jax, I don’t know what we’re up against because you don’t tell me anything.”

“’Cause it’s none of your fucking business.” Anger raged inside of me. She fought me on everything. I pulled onto the street, fighting to get out of the traffic.

A few minutes passed before she spoke again, “It is my fucking business. I’m not some dumb wife, Jax. I can hold my own pretty damn well actually. I’m not a porcelain doll. I think I took care of things pretty well when you were in the hospital.” She slipped her aviator sunglasses on.

“You almost got yourself killed is what you did.”

“Please, if a woman ran things it would all be different.”

“Different?” I laughed. “Did you or did you not bump someone off?” I eyed her as we sat in traffic.

She shrugged. “That’s different, that asshole was in on my kidnapping.” She huffed.

“Baby, you’re right. It is different ‘cause I would’ve cut his fucking balls off and watched him eat ‘em.” I fumed with anger that they hadn’t paid more for what they’d done.

She laid her hand on mine and assured, “Oh trust me, they’ll all get what’s coming to them in due time.”

“What makes you so sure?”

She shrugged. “Bad guys always lose.”

“We are the bad guys, Bella.”

We continued driving until we reached the penthouse. There was no more conversation the rest of the way home, and when we arrived Bella rode up in the elevator without a word.

“I don’t want you leaving this house without two guards.” My statement was final.

She was quiet and walked past me when the elevator doors opened to our floor.

“Bella,” Tony said when we walked inside.