My ring clinked against the tumbler as I lifted the rim to my lips and swallowed the top-shelf Jack. Lights flickered on the monitors in front of me. The screen on the far right was divided with the black-and-white livestream footage around the outside of the house. The one beside it was mostly shadows. But every now and then, movement danced at the edges, just out of view. But those I watched were mostly asleep. Just like everyone should be asleep…
Everyone, except for her.
I shifted my gaze to the other screen in front of me, the one I watched in full color. It was the only one whose occupant was still awake…and right now pacing like a lioness in her room. She thought she was clever, thought she was brave. But she wasn’t. She was my pliable target. My defiant, headstrong weapon. I’d use her…use her to get what I wanted. I’d use her to obtain my control.
I’d break that will in her.
Crush it under my own hunger.
And feed it like a drug back to her.
I’d give her just enough.
Just a taste of freedom.
A lick of love. Enough for her to obey me.
I crossed my legs, watching her glance over her shoulder to the fake camera installed in the corner of her bedroom, then turn back to the door before testing the lock. The toughened steel held. The camera narrowed in on her face. Dusty lips, brown eyes. Hellcat, that’s what my sons called her…hellcat.
She was a little hellcat, wasn’t she? I dragged my teeth across my lip. A hellcat that required taking. She looked so much like her father, the same brown eyes and searing gaze. I caught the movement of her lips as she snarled sonofabitch.
A tight quirk came at the corner of my mouth. If only she knew…
I reached out with my other hand and caressed a key on the keyboard in front of me, then glanced at the other monitor at my left, the one that watched every angle of the inside of the house, and weighed the consequences of what I was about to do.
Just like I did every time.
I glanced at the phone beside me, the one with a secure, untraceable SIM…the one with the recording of a very private affair. Instead of pressing the button on the keyboard, I grabbed the phone and unlocked the screen. The woman silently cursing me on the screen in front of me had no idea the lengths I’d gone to to get her here.
But I knew.
I pressed the button, reliving those moments, and the hidden room I sat in was filled with screams, TOBIAS! TOBIAS PLEASE! TOBIAS! I pressed the button once more, ending the sounds. Still my heart kicked. Sounds like that, handed to the right kind of people, would be a trigger…the kind of trigger I needed…
I lifted my gaze to the monitor. The kind of trigger I desired. Just like her…
FUCK YOU! Vivienne howled, those consuming dark eyes sparkling with hate. She looked over her shoulder once more, and stared at the camera…then walked up to it, her focus fixed on the blinking red light that acted as a decoy and—gave it the finger.
My pulse thundered. My cock twitched.
At that moment, she looked every bit of her nineteen years.
Young.
Resistant.
I couldn’t help myself and reached down to grip my hard cock through my pants. She spun around, her hands clenched into fists. The light from her bedroom hit her face just right and I was drawn to the splattering of freckles across her cheeks and the bridge of her nose. Those fucking freckles.
“Christ.”
I looked away, hating that flare of uncertainty. There was no room for weakness here…no room for desire. No room for hunger. Just a cold savagery. A cutting cruel grip. There was no room for anything other than the objective. I’d come this far, risking it all…and I was so fucking close now.
I turned my focus to the monitor and even though my stomach tightened and those panicked thoughts rose, I reached past my phone to the keyboard and hit the command, unlock.
Click.
The lights from the electronic lock blinked. The sight and the sound drew her gaze. She spun, standing there under the fake camera, and scowled. What the fuck?
“What the fuck indeed, Vivienne,” I murmured. “Take the bait, hellcat.”
She was tentative, glancing at the camera, then turned back to take a step, and then another, until she was at the door. She reached out and her hand hovered over the handle. Only this time, she opened the door like I thought she would…no. She pulled her hand away, and moved to the tray I’d carried in hours ago with her dinner.
I scowled and leaned closer, riveted, as she shoved the plastic cups and utensils away and reached to grab the tray itself, lifting it, testing its weight, before she swung it over her shoulder and brought it back down, cutting it across her body. “Clever girl,” I muttered. “Feisty, clever girl.”
Only then did she move with purpose, hurrying to the door to twist the handle and yank it open. She was ready, hoisting the tray upwards. If anyone was waiting for her, they’d catch a tray to the face.
I grabbed my phone from beside me, my real phone. The SIM on it traced back to me. That one I was very careful about. There were no ‘special recordings’, no texts that sent it to Mr. Benjamin Rossi, either. There was just them. I brought up the tracker and found the flickering lights as my sons hunted.
I wanted them to hunt.
Had trained them to hunt.
It was what they were bred for.
Movement drew my focus back to her. She was a blur in the night vision cameras, racing down the stairs with that damn tray poised over her head. If she tripped like that, she could hurt herself. I clenched my jaw, my muscles flexing. My fingers moved to the keyboard and punched in the keystrokes I wanted, switching cameras, following her path all the way to the study.
I hit the command, unlocking the study door well before she got there, just like last time. Only then, I hadn’t planned on my sons coming home so soon. They’d come from the garage and the click of the lock on my study door piqued their interest.
It was damn lucky I’d gotten there when I had. There was no telling what the brothers would’ve done. But the tracking signal on my phone told me they were far away this time, out at night, stalking my prey. On the screen, Vivienne shoved open my study door and swung the tray in front of her, pre-empting an attack. Only there was no attack tonight. Not from my sons…or from me.
I re-crossed my legs, picked up the tumbler, and drank, relishing the warmth as it spilled through my body and into my veins. I almost felt…giddy when Vivienne scanned the room, stepped inside, and closed the door.
“So fucking young, aren’t you?” I whispered, my voice husky and strange as my gaze moved down her body. I knew for a fact she was brand fucking new. “Christ, I wonder what your cunt tastes like.”
My balls tightened and my cock twitched, bulging against my pants. I’d already had a whore today and I still felt on edge. I grabbed my phone as Vivienne glanced around the study and moved to the desk. She watched the door, hurrying now, as she wrenched at the drawers and found them locked. “Move the mouse, Vivienne,” I murmured. “Move the goddamn mouse.”
I opened up my contacts and flicked through the numbers for the high-end escorts I used. The names blurred as they scrolled. They were all too familiar. I needed something new, something fresh. My gaze shifted back to the monitor as the hellcat braced her foot against the side of my five-thousand-dollar red cedar masterpiece, gripped the handle on the top drawer, and fucking heaved.
“Jesus Christ,” I groaned. She was going to cost me a goddamn fortune, this one…I could feel it.
A nerve twitched in the corner of my eye. I cast the phone back onto the desk in front of me and it hit the surface with a thud. I didn’t care about pussy or about getting my dick sucked at that moment. I dragged my fingers through my hair, riled up and furious at the goddamn tornado in my office as she unleashed a silent scream and kicked my goddamn leatherbound journal clear across the room.
I winced. I should’ve locked it away. Furious, I tried to think if there was anything in there that I didn’t want her to know. It was a new journal, with only a few jotted entries. Nothing of any real importance. If she spent the time scanning the pages, she would come away furious.
Even more furious than she was now.
Somehow, I didn’t like the sound of that.
Then she swatted my Montblanc Royal pen and it spun, hitting the wireless mouse before it slammed against the keyboard. In an instant, the iMac came to life. The monitor had been left unlocked for this exact reason. But she wasn’t expecting it, was she? Her gaze narrowed as she looked around the room. I could see her body tense.
“Press play, hellcat,” I urged.
Crush it like a drug and feed it back to her. That’s what I wanted…and this was the first step in doing that.
She chewed her lip and scanned the study, then leaned close to the monitor and pressed play. She flinched. Once, twice, three times, and she stumbled backwards. I knew instantly what she was listening to. In my head, the sound played out.
BANG! BANG! BANG! You don’t get to touch what’s ours!
Her eyes widened and her mouth gaped.
Then she lunged forward, gripped the monitor, and tilted it harshly. I winced, she was so goddamn rough with the equipment, so fucking inconsiderate. Such a goddamn…brat. She slipped down hard into the chair, staring at the monitor as Ryth Banks and her stepbrothers exacted their revenge.
It was the first time she’d seen Ryth since I’d brought her here.
Now she knew two things:
One, that Ryth was alive and with her stepbrothers…
And two, that she was looking at a house that couldn’t possibly be monitored, not with the feed sent directly to my computer. The first thing hit her instantly. Her shoulders sagged with relief, her head dropped forward, and I swore I saw a shudder. If I did, it didn’t last very long, as the second realization hit home.
Her spine slowly straightened. Her gaze was unmoving, fixed on the screen. I caught the heavy rise and fall of her chest before she slowly scanned the room…narrowing in on the false camera high in the corner of the room.
It didn’t matter that she looked at the wrong camera, didn’t matter that she slowly rose and stepped around the desk until she stood underneath the blinking light. It didn’t matter that she said nothing, did nothing.
Because what did matter was that she realized now.
How far my reach was.
And the things I’d do.
I glanced down at the phone beside me, the one with the recording of Killion and Ryth. I’d unleashed her brothers like a weapon, taking out one of the pathetic few. I loathed Killion. The vile, cheap bastard wielded his cruelty like some fucking carnival sideshow, bringing in men who consumed like a goddamn plague.
Only I was different. I was selective.
And my reasons were my own.
Vivienne slowly lowered her gaze and turned around. What, no flipping the bird this time? No obstinate screams? A smile tugged the edges of my mouth as I watched her stop. Something had caught her eye, something deeper in the study…something on the shelves.
I knew instantly what she’d seen.
My stomach clenched.
The beginning of satisfaction died faster than it had come.
“No.” I leaned forward as she stepped forward and reached for the small pink notebook tucked away in the back of the shelf.
She shouldn’t have noticed it.
She shouldn’t have cared.
She shouldn’t be fucking reading as I watched her open the pages and flick through.
Goosebumps raced along my spine as I watched her, even if I tore through the house and lunged down the stairs, it’d be too late. Just like it was already too late. Vivienne’s head slowly nodded as she gently closed the notebook and slipped it back into place.
I uncrossed my legs and slowly rose. My focus shifted to the door as my phone started to buzz. “Not now,” I forced the words through gritted teeth.
On the monitor, Vivienne made her way to the study door, opened it, and slipped through. I tracked her just like I had before as my phone buzzed and buzzed and buzzed. I snatched it up and stabbed the button. “What now?”
“We have a location on Elle, Pier Ten, east side of Mossman.”
East side of Mossman…
That was unexpected, even for someone like her.
“The Order has her location as well,” Colt added. “What do you want us to do?”
What to do…
What to do?
My mind raced with a thousand possible scenarios, but none that would help me on my path. “Observe only.”
“You sure?”
“Are you questioning me?”
“No…I just…”
“Then observe only,” I ordered.
“Will do,” he muttered. “I’ll report back if anything happens.”
On the monitor, Vivienne reached the top of the stairs and headed for her room. “I’ll be waiting,” I said, staring at her, then lowered my hand…and ended the call. “I’ll be waiting right here.”
I’d barely ended the call before my phone beeped again. “What the fuck is it this time?” I snapped, not wanting to look away from the woman on the monitor…the one who now knew more than I wanted her to know as she slipped into her bedroom. But I did, and glanced at the screen…
To a message that made my blood turn cold.
A low, savage sound erupted. I shot upwards, knocking my glass and spilling the contents. “Fuck!” I roared. But it wasn’t about the expensive goddamn alcohol…
It was because my entire plan…had just been blown to hell…
I ran from the room, punching numbers into my phone, praying to God I could salvage this…and left Vivienne, and her satisfied smirk, far behind as I raced for my car.
