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“Easy, dove. You’ll be okay.”
I nod, trembling in angst. “What is it?”
“Someone has broken in,” Tristan hums in a steadfast whisper. “I can hear them walking around upstairs.”
My eyes fill with tears. We’ve just gone through a war with Lacey, but we’ve made amends with Donahue! I can’t imagine who else is here to harm us at this hour, and I’m hugely relieved that I defied Carter and stayed down here instead of heading back upstairs when he ordered me to.
If I was in bed right now, I don’t know what I’d do.
“Nicolas, Lorenzo, go check it out. Tristan, you stay with us,” Carter says.
Both men don’t hesitate, which is a testament to their family ties. Things might be off-kilter right now, but they are getting better. At least, they seem to be when Carter isn’t screaming at them. Maybe that will change when this ordeal is over, but that moment can’t come soon enough.
Lorenzo and Nicolas both disappear and return almost thirty seconds later, a bleeding, limping man in all dark clothes being held between them. The injured man falls down the last few steps, leaving a trail of blood behind him that smears across the stairs. I cover my mouth with my hand, trying not to scream.
“He was in the office upstairs,” Lorenzo grunts, his pistol lined to the back of his head. “He cut himself on the glass breaking in. There’s a large piece stuck in his side. He’s going to bleed out.”
Carter nudges me into Tristan’s care before walking toward the man.
It’s hard to miss that his finger is now on the trigger of the gun.
“Who do you work for?”
The man looks tainted with defeat, his hands covered in blood against his side, where it’s clear his plan didn’t go as he thought it would. Carter stands over the wounded man, uncaring of the puddle of blood pooling beneath his body.
“Did you come alone?”
“Yes,” the man replies with a hearty groan.
“We checked upstairs. Didn’t see any signs of anyone else,” Lorenzo adds.
Carter seems satisfied with that. “Are you going to tell me who you work for, or am I going to have to kill you and find out later for myself?”
The man shudders slightly. “I… I don’t—”
“Tell me,” Carter says, his pistol raising in height. “Or die.”
For some reason, the man looks at me. I can’t help but find his beady black eyes through the chaos of this moment. It doesn’t make any sense why he would look at me! I can’t help him, and I certainly can’t stop Carter from making his mind up on what to do with this intruder.
“Three.”
Carter’s counting terrifies me, and I look away on instinct.
“Two.”
The tension rises in the room. I feel suffocated underneath it.
“One.”
“Wait!” Before another word can be spoken, the man panics and spills his words like they’re his last. “I was hired by Killian,” the man blurts. “I… I didn’t even come armed. He just wanted me to break in. That’s all I know.”
“He’s not armed,” Lorenzo adds. “We searched him when we got to him on the floor upstairs.”
Carter lowers his pistol slightly, but the man sneaks another look in my direction, and the tension refuses to ease. “Why do you keep looking at Isabella?”
“I’m sorry,” he says simply, letting his head fall. “I just… Killian had…”
“I don’t understand,” I whisper to Tristan. “Why would the mayor want someone to break in?”
