She didn’t scream. I looked down as her eyes fluttered closed and a slow, soft exhale came from her parted lips.
My hand clenched around the syringe, my finger still poised over the plunger, like the trigger of a gun. I watched her for a second before I turned and walked into the kitchen, placing it down on the cloth next to the sedative.
She didn’t scream.
That nagging thought made me turn my head.
Thick brown curls spilled down the arm of the sofa she lay on. My pulse gave a heavy thud. I wanted to tell myself it was fear that triggered the response. But it wasn’t. It was more than that.
Trouble.
I inhaled.
That’s what she was.
One I needed to get rid of.
Only…that fucking woman. A twitch came at the corner of my eye. I saw you flying around those cars! Someone call the police! My breaths deepened as that fucking bitch’s screams came back to me. I could kill her. My focus sharpened on the woman lying on my sofa, Helene Montgomery, and the one from the accident. I could kill them both and get rid of this problem.
My mind raced, trying to remember who else was around us. But I couldn’t quite piece it together. Was there a crowd? I stilled, scowling. Maybe? Fuck. If there was a crowd, I couldn’t very well take them out. One missing report on the goddamn six o’clock news would bring too much heat.
Heat I didn’t need.
Not right now.
I glanced back at her.
She was trouble. No matter how I looked at it.
Still, she didn’t scream.
I moved before I knew it, leaving the needle behind to return to her. The strap of her dress was pulled down, the tops of her creamy breasts exposed. I stared at them before forcing myself to look away.
Memories slammed into me.
Breasts.
Mouths.
The Daughters’ bodies on full display.
Revulsion filled me, but still I turned back to her, to that raised pink line that cut across the soft white flesh. She was…imperfect and nothing like the women I’d tortured. But she could be, couldn’t she? She could very well be. An eerie feeling came to life as I stared at her. She was familiar, like somehow I’d seen her before. But I couldn’t have, because I never forgot a face.
My breaths deepened as my focus fixed on that jagged line. One that reached all the way down to…
I leaned over and tugged the dress down until her breast spilled out. Her dusky pink nipple was smooth. So damn enticing. Without thinking, I reached out, grazing my thumb across the satin flesh. Her body reacted, tightening under my touch. I flicked my gaze to her closed eyes.
There was no twitch behind her lids and no change in her breaths. She was still under, still…
I shifted my focus to that tiny pebbled thing and leaned over. Helene Montgomery was out cold and vulnerable. So I could do anything I wanted. But it wasn’t her nipple I licked. It was that tight, raised pink line. The one that excited me for some sinister reason.
She was ruined anyway, wasn’t she? I closed my eyes as my tongue hit her skin; the tip tracing the line that dipped into the valley between her breasts before I pulled backwards and licked her nipple. So what was a little more destruction?
Soft.
Warm.
Unconscious.
Not screaming or wailing or fighting me every inch of the way. This one was all…mine. Mine to do anything I wanted. My own private plaything. A surge of excitement slowly rose.
I gripped her breast and clenched, driving that warmth deeper into my mouth. My tongue circled, teeth grazed hard. I sucked and licked, incensed with this sick depravity when her peak grew tight. Warmth flooded me. My body tightened and my cock grew hard, stiffening until I jerked my head away.
I wrenched my hand away and stumbled backwards, wiping my mouth as though she was poison.
I swallowed hard and stared at her.
Poison…I liked.
What the fuck was I doing? My mind raced as it all hit home. A woman I’d abducted and now drugged was in my living room, leaving behind who knew how many bystanders who’d watched it all. Not to mention I didn’t know who the fuck was missing her.
I raked my fingers through my hair. All I’d need would be one fucking text from Hale and my world would come crashing down.
If he was alive.
No. I shook my head. Not if.
He was.
I knew it…and so did that sonofabitch, London St. James.
It was the only reason we were still alive. If he’d believed otherwise, St. James would’ve put a bullet in my brother’s head and mine in that goddamn warehouse.
A warehouse I’d gone to just to save my brother. A shiver ripped through me. A trip where I’d almost met my fate…and left my sister’s in the hands of a fucking monster. If I died, if any of us died, it’d be all for nothing.
Beep.
I wrenched my gaze to the phone on the counter, then moved. My heart was pounding as I snatched it and looked at the screen.
Kane: He’s awake. We need you at the rectory in 30 minutes.
It wasn’t Hale. I slowly exhaled. No communication was just as fucking terrifying as him reaching out from beyond the grave.
I typed back. Confirmed.
Then I slowly turned my head to the unconscious woman in my apartment. I needed to do something about her. But what?
Beep.
I looked down.
Kane: Bring more drugs and guns.
War was coming, one I wasn’t prepared for because we didn’t have a side we stood on. No. We stood on our own. I turned and headed for my bedroom, then flicked on the light in the bathroom.
Sparse.
Empty.
Stark white tiles made me wince as I strode to the vanity and yanked open the mirrored cabinet door. Bottles and bottles of drugs lined the shelves, enough to start a small clinic. I turned to glance over my shoulder—or knock out a woman I had in my home.
Right now, my brother needed them. I grabbed what I could, as well as fresh needles and more bandages and antiseptic, gathering it all in my arms. Glass bottles clinked as I tossed them on the bed before I went to my closet and grabbed a black pack and loaded them all inside. Guns were next, some of the ones hidden behind the wall in my bedroom. Just one of the many stashes I had throughout the apartment.
I grabbed as many as I could, securing them and a lot of loaded magazines into the bag, and headed out. I never looked back when I pulled the door closed, just headed for the elevator, glancing at the locked stairwell door that I held the only key for. I pressed the code into the keypad and waited for the elevator. The penthouse was as secure as any locked room at The Order. One way in and no way out.
The doors opened with a swoosh, so I stepped in and headed for the garage.
Why hadn’t she screamed?
The thought nagged at me as the elevator jolted to a stop and the doors opened. I stepped out and headed to my Audi parked just outside the access door. Lights flashed as I pressed the key fob, opened the door, and stowed the bag inside. But I didn’t climb behind the wheel, not yet. I moved around to the front to check the grill and the bumper. There was barely a scratch…almost like it’d never happened.
My gaze went to the elevator. I fought the need to go back up there, to make sure she wasn’t some figment of my sick imagination. I licked my lips and could still taste the faint trace of her perfume. No, she was no illusion. She was very…very real.
The heavy thud of my pulse came louder before I turned, pulled open the driver’s door, and climbed in behind the wheel. She would have to wait. I started the car and pulled out of the almost empty garage, heading back onto the city streets.
The rectory.
I’d told them not to go there.
But did they listen?
No.
They didn’t.
Just like I’d told them to clear out and lie low until we got confirmation about Hale’s whereabouts. Because we needed that confirmation. One fucking message. That’s all it’d take. One more lead. One more opportunity.
Because he was still out there.
I drove the back streets, watching the rear-view mirror the whole way, and turned at the towering sandstone structure of St. Augustine’s Church. My brother’s black Mercedes was parked across the driveway to the rectory out back. I clenched my jaw, then pulled in behind it and killed the engine.
“Idiots,” I muttered as I climbed out, grabbed the bag, and headed for the door. One hard thud while I snapped. “It’s me.”
The heavy locks opened with a clunk before the door cracked open. I pushed inside, not giving a fuck when the door smacked into Kane’s arm. He fucking deserved that and a lot more. “Where is he?”
“In the back,” my brother snarled, pissed.
Good.
That made two of us.
The place was barely big enough to swing a damn cat. I headed along the cramped hallway to the single bedroom in the back. Muted yellow lights barely made a dent in the darkness, but it was enough to see the curled figure on the bed. If it hadn’t been, the wet, labored breathing sounds were enough to draw my gaze.
“Has he woken up?” Glass clattered as I dropped the bag to the bed.
“Once or twice.”
“Has he said anything?” I yanked open the bag and rifled through the bottles.
“You mean apart from he’s sorry?”
I said nothing. What good was fucking sorry? That wouldn’t get us what we wanted. A gurgling moan came from the hunched over form in front of me. Slowly my brother turned his head, his blood-shot gaze finding me.
“You look like shit.” I pulled out a vial of antibiotics and a syringe.
“Thanks,” he moaned. “Motherfucker St. James.”
“No, motherfucker you,” I snapped as I plunged the needle into the vial and pulled the plunger back.
I was always cleaning up their goddamn messes, one way or another.
Her face rose instantly. Wide brown eyes fixed on mine.
Creamy skin.
The pink scar line.
Knocked out cold in my apartment.
I froze, my focus on the filled syringe.
“What is it?” Kane asked.
“Nothing.” I pulled out the needle and turned to Thomas, yanked down the sheet and stabbed my brother in the thigh.
He hissed as I plunged it deep and shot him full of antibiotics. The painkiller was next before I tugged down the dressing on his other thigh and checked the bullet wound that motherfucker St. James had left behind.
“Any word?” Kane asked.
“From who?”
“Both.”
I shook my head, tugged the dressing back in place, and lifted my gaze. “No.” I straightened. “But you need to get this shit cleaned up. We need to be ready. If he’s gone to ground, then that means there’s another facility we don’t know about.”
“There isn’t,” Kane muttered, looking down as Thomas’ eyes fluttered closed from the drug. “There can’t be.”
“He’s gone somewhere, hasn’t he?”
Kane scowled, thinking.
But there wasn’t a damn scenario I hadn’t considered.
“The bodies.”
“Being disposed of.”
He looked at me. “You’re back there?”
“I don’t really have a choice now, do I?”
I was still playing the part, still a fucking lackey for Hale’s games, and while I fulfilled my role of pretense, I scoured every inch of that place for a lead I could use. A lead the Hunter was waiting for. A lead we all were waiting for.
“You’ll keep us updated if anything happens.”
That didn’t sound like a question. He means like drugging a woman and keeping her in my home, because that happened. I swallowed, my pulse kicking in my chest as the memory of her came to life. I gave a nod. “Yes. There are guns and drugs in the bag. Make sure he keeps up the fluids. I’ll check in tomorrow, right now…” I have a plaything to attend to. “I need to sleep.”
“Got it.”
I glanced at sleeping Thomas one last time before heading for the door. I couldn’t get out of there fast enough, leaving the door open as I headed for my car. The door thudded closed before the engine growled to life and I was pulling out of there.
You didn’t tell them.
Why didn’t you tell them?
That nagging voice demanded.
I spun the wheel and accelerated, heading back the way I’d come. Because…because she wasn’t real, was she?
No.
She wasn’t.
I pushed the car harder, speeding through the streets until the towering apartment building rose in sight. A surge of adrenaline hit me hard as I tapped the brakes and pulled up to the boom barrier. I stabbed the button, all but slamming the car against the scanner as I pulled up.
“Come on,” I snapped as the gate gave a shudder, then a jerk, and finally rose.
I’d fucking told them to fix the damn thing. I punched the accelerator and surged through. Thoughts of the woman surfaced. Was she gone? Was she awake and tearing apart my goddamn apartment? I glanced at the clock. I hadn’t been gone that long.
An hour.
I spun the wheel and raced for the parking space. I was out in an instant, slamming the door closed behind me and throwing out my hand to hit the button as I headed for the doors, my long stride eating the distance.
“Mr. Cruz!” Vernon called, stepping out from around the front desk.
My cheeks burned. Was this about her? The woman in my apartment? The elevator doors opened. “Not now,” I answered over my shoulder, stepped inside, and hit the button, ending his view as the doors closed between us.
My heart was pounding as I rose.
A hard inhale sent a rush of cool air into my lungs. I focused on my breaths, slowing them down as the lights above the door counted to the penthouse. It fucking took forever. My jaw clenched when the damn thing shuddered to a stop.
I was already moving, banging my shoulder against the door to get out. My front door was in my sights. I stabbed in the code, threw the door open wide, and stepped inside.
She was still there.
Her knees bent.
Head dropped backwards.
I slowly closed the door behind me and moved in, drawn to her like a moth to the flame. Only I wasn’t a moth, was I? I was a monster. A cold. Cruel. Monster. Who liked the idea of having her—I moved closer, stopped in front of the sofa, and looked down at her—maybe a little too much.
Her lips were parted, her breast still exposed. I could almost taste her skin. Almost feel that warmth under my tongue. I lowered my gaze to her brown lace panties and her wrists tethered to her ankles. It was a cruel position.
An exposed position.
One I very much enjoyed.
I reached out, brushed my hand against her knee, and gave a jerk, opening her thighs wider. I wanted in there. In the warmth. Invading her like the bastard I truly was. My pulse thudded louder. I wanted to spread her open. Lay her bare. My focus shifted to an imperfection…to a cruel silver slash.
“What the fuck?” I bent down, pushing her legs wider, to the criss-cross pattern high on her thigh.
The cuts were so fine. Razor fine.
I jerked my gaze to her closed eyes. She’d cut herself. There was no other reason for that. I returned my eyes to the thin, straight line. With a razor, no doubt. I lifted my gaze to her dress, hugging the outline of her body. A dress she’d worn for him.
Jealousy tore through me.
I was jealous of that man I didn’t know. Of that…Michael DiAngelo.
He didn’t deserve a woman like her. Her scars called me. Ruined. Tortured. I reached out, brushing her crumpled dress higher until the tops of her panties were exposed. Then without thinking, I grabbed the gathered dress, yanked it up with one hand, and lifted her thigh with the other, tearing it until I slid it over her breasts, before I tossed it.
Her body was savaged.
I searched for the injuries sustained in the accident but they were minor, a scrape, the redness that’d no doubt become a bruise. It seemed her concussion had been the worst of it. But it was her previous wounds which held me transfixed. A deep, freshly healed wound on her side that was more savage than a razor could leave behind. Then another scar under that. The neat hole was one I knew all too well…a bullet.
I stared at them as the floor seemed to drop out from under me.
This was no woman.
This was…fate.
