"Thanks again for dinner, mom! I called over my shoulder as I headed back out the door. All of a sudden, a strange sound came from behind the house.

"Was that a gunshot?" Alex perked up, glancing around the yard. It was muffled, so if it was, it certainly hadn't come from in here. My first thought was Sadie, and I looked towards the car, realizing she wasn't inside.

"I'll go around the back, you guys take the front."

Alex and Ro both nodded, and we dispersed.

The night was quiet when I got outside, there wasn't another sound. I had hoped to find Sadie out here, just in a different spot, but of course she wasn't. I had a sickening feeling in my stomach, and I knew I had to find her. Something felt off.

Where would she have gone? Maybe to the cemetery? I raced down the stairs and headed that way when I saw the outside door to our underground tombs wide open.

Fuck.

Fury pulses through my veins. She must have gone to find Herrera. Was she out of her god damn mind? What could she possibly be thinking? I knew she was probably looking for some kind of closure, but nothing good would come from this. Herrera would never give her what she wanted, and she'd feel even more drained and defeated than before. But she was too damn stubborn to listen to anyone else.

I tore through the doorway and down into the tombs, hoping I could stop her before she did something she'd regret.

The door to the back cells was partly open and the lock I had secured myself this afternoon was blown to pieces. That must have been the gunshot we heard, but where the hell had she gotten the gun from?

I had about a million questions to ask her when I finally got my hands on her, and she was going to have some serious explaining to do. Her complete disregard for our systems, let her own safety, was ridiculous.

I pushed the door all the way open, calling her name. "Sadie!" I yelled, my voice harsh.

"What the hell is going on?" I sucked in a sharp breath, trying to digest the scene in front of me.

Sadie stood with a gun pointed out in front of her, tears streaming down her cheeks. She was shaking so much that I was worried she might drop it at any second. Herrera was hanging onto the bars, standing in front of her with a wicked grin on his face. The man was the actual devil. "Sadie..." I started, keeping my voice soft as I took a step forward. "Are you sure about this?"

She kept her eyes set on Herrera. "Don't come any closer, Brandon."

"Okay." I held my hands up, letting her know she was in charge. I had to approach this delicately. She was liable to snap at any second, and honestly, I couldn't blame her. I may have been livid with her, but her feelings were valid.

"You're not going to stop me." She pressed her lips together, anger radiating off of her.

"I'm not here to stop you, babe." I took another step forward, inching towards her a little bit at a time. "I just want you to be sure about what you're doing. You can't take it back once you pull that trigger, and I don't think that's something you want to live with."

"Listen to him, Sadie." Herrera snickered. "This is no kind of place for a girl like you."

"Shut up!" Sadie and I both yelled at the same time.

"Sadie isn't just some girl, Herrera. She's the queen of this mafia, and if she wants to put a bullet in your brain, I'm going to let her." I glared, taking another step. She was still about two strides away from me, and in that amount of time she could easily kill him if I tried to get to her.

I wasn't lying. If Sadie wanted to kill him, I would let her, but it wouldn't happen tonight. She wasn't in the right headspace for that, and it was a decision that came with many ramifications. I wanted her to be well aware of that before she pulled the trigger. Wanting to hurt him was so out of character for her, but her stubbornness was winning out tonight. She'd wake up in the morning completely crushed and confused if I let her do this.

"Sadie... I swear to God, he's not going to get away with it. But is this really how you want this to end?"

She didn't respond, and I took one more step forward. I could see Ro and Alex and Jav out of the corner of my eye, they hung back just watching the situation unfold.

"You're so strong, Sadie, and you're going your let this bastard manipulate you? After how hard you've fought you're going to let him win?" I tried my best to reason with her, unsure of how it would be taken.

"She won't do it." Herrera shot us a smug smirk. "She doesn't have it in her. Neither did her father. Do you want to know what his last words were Sadie? The last thing he said before I torched him and your mother?"

"Shut the fuck up." I snarled, slamming my hand against the cell. All I wanted to do was bash his brain in. I was making progress with her and he was demolishing it even faster.

"What?" She sucked in a sharp breath, biting her bottom lip.

"Sadie, look at me." I begged. "You don't have to listen to this. He's just trying to get under your skin."

"I want to hear what he has to say." She cried, dark, heavy tears falling down her cheeks like a flood now.

"Or how about the way your brother fell to the ground when I should him? I'll never forget the way all of that blood pooled around him as he died." He smirked, so fucking full of himself it made me sick. The way he was taking pride in all of this wasn't human. She was showing such remarkable restraint by not pulling that trigger that I was amazed. I was thankful that she hadn't, but I probably would've pulled the trigger by now if I had been in her shoes. "See Sadie, I'll get to all of you eventually. You may have survived, but the things I did to you will play through your mind for your entire life. You'll never forget me. And sometimes taking someone's life mentally is better than actually killing them."

Sadie's expression changed just slightly, and she lowered the gun an inch. I took the opportunity to lung forward and rip it out of her hands, and then everything seemed to happen all at once. We both fell to the floor as she collapsed into me, sobbing incoherently. Ro and Jav rushed in, tearing into Herrera's cell and slamming him against the back wall. Alex stood above us with his hand on my shoulder, helplessly trying to figure out what he could do to make this better.

"You should have let me kill him." She wailed, as I held her against me, trying to calm her down. "I wanted to kill him."

"It's okay, baby." I rubbed her shoulder. "Just breathe."

"I just want him dead." She cried, burying her face in my chest. "I'm so sorry."

"I know, baby. It's okay. He's never going to hurt you again." I whispered against her ear.

We stayed that way for several seconds as I tried to figure out what to do. I wanted to rip Herrera to shreds but I wanted this fucking over. I wanted to forget that monster ever existed and work on rebuilding my wife's spirit. It was shattering to see her like this. She was so against the Mafia, and violence, and yet she'd come down here hellbent on killing him. I hated him even more for pushing her to that, for taking away that little bit of innocence she clung too.

I wanted to take her far away from all of this and love her until she felt better. I wanted to move on, and rebuild our lives and start making new memories—ones that Hererra wasn't orchestrating. I wanted to beat him into obliteration just for the way he'd spoken to her just now, dragging her through all of that gruesome pain again, but the reality of it was that I wanted my wife to be okay more. That would always be my priority.

"Please just take me home." She sobbed, not quite as hysterical as she had been, but far from being calm so her.

"Okay baby." I conceded, helping her to her feet. "Let's go home."

She didn't protest, and didn't give Herrera another look, despite his taunting.

I handed the gun to Alex, recognizing it as the one from my glove box. "What do you..."

"Finish him." I clenched my jaw.

Alex's eyes widened, not expecting my response. "You're sure."

I nodded with only slight hesitation. "She's all that matters to me, and that bastard doesn't deserve to live another second."

I could have stayed to take part in torturing and killing Herrera. I could made him regret everything he'd done to us, or reminded him just how wrong he was to mess with the Avenettis. I could have blasted him, sliced him up, broken every bone in his body and then doused him in gasoline. I could have done all those things but instead, I was walking away. I couldn't mask this anymore by saying I was getting revenge for Sadie. Hurting Herrera would have been for me, and no one else, and I had so much more to think about now. I was going home to take care of my wife, and the tiny life growing inside of her. A life that would hopefully never have to know the horror this man caused her family. One that would never have to experience the pain her mother had, and never be plagued by the same guilt and responsibility her father felt. One that could grow up to be anything and everything she wanted to be.

I had an opportunity to end the cycle here, and I was going to take it.