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Hale was behind this.
I needed to find out how.
I climbed out of the car and took a second to lift my gaze to the expansive house as I adjusted my jacket. But why? What would Hale gain by taking out one of the most influential, connected Mafia families? I shifted my thoughts to Cerberus. According to Ben and the information obtained thanks to our new alliance, Dante Ares was the main instigator involved in the abduction.
If that was the case, was this the Banks brothers? They were all capable…especially Tobias. But to do something like this took a degree of carefulness, and that’s something Tobias wasn’t. He was a hothead, wired to shoot and keep shooting.
I stepped up to the door and pressed the button. No, something like this took skill and cunning. Something like I did. Heavy steps came from inside before the door opened and Silas Ares stood there, those unflinching eyes meeting mine.
He stepped to the side without saying a word, letting me enter.
Clack.
The locks sounded before the eldest son turned and headed along the hallway to the sitting room. I scanned the house as I followed. Empty. Cold. Our steps echoed like they had in the damn morgue. That’s exactly what this place felt like, a morgue. I inhaled, tasting the remnants of carnage, and suppressed a shudder as Silas led me to the same sitting room I’d been in before.
My focus moved to the same leather sofa where Dante had sat, which seemed like only yesterday. Silas gave a wave of his hand. For someone whose parents were just brutally murdered in the same house we sat in, he was terrifyingly calm.
I remained standing. Instead, I offered my hand. “I’m really sorry for your loss, Silas.” My gaze automatically shifted to the closed door at my right and the bright yellow police tape across it. The same study where it had all happened. “Do the police have any information?’
He didn’t grasp my hand, just stared at the very expensive Rothschild rug under our feet before he lifted his gaze to mine. “You mean, if it’s true? If my father—” A nerve twitched in his cheek. “If he…if he murdered my mother...”
I didn’t react, just searched his eyes. Because none of this felt right. Memories of the last time I was here slammed into me. The way Dante had looked at his wife told me he wasn’t just a man in love. He was fucking smitten. There wasn’t a hint of trouble under the surface, certainly not the kind that spilled blood.
“I don’t believe that, and I know you don’t either.”
There was that tell again, making his cheek tremble as the eldest son of the Ares empire settled that dangerous fixed stare on me. “It’s what everyone says. So it must be true.”
“Your father is not the man who’d…” My words stuck in the back of my throat.
“Blow a hole in my mother’s head, then turn that same gun on himself?” His voice was so quiet, I barely heard it.
Still, I didn’t need to, did I? It was written all over my face as I glanced at the study once more. “I need to know.” My own sense of desperation roared inside me. I hated this, hated how I was pushing him. “I need to know it was your father.”
He suddenly turned and strode across the sitting room before he ripped the police tape aside and threw the door open wide. “I dunno…does that look like my father’s fucking brain matter to you? I can’t fucking tell.”
The room was chaos, upturned chairs, blood splattered across the desk. My eyes were drawn to the bright pink markings on the floor in front of the desk. The ones in the outline of a body.
Blood pooled underneath, dark brown, bits of white amongst the mess. His mother…it had to have been.
Desperation drew me closer. I shot Silas a panicked stare, but it was the hitman in me that mapped out the room. I glanced at the door, searching for markings.
“No forced entry,” Silas muttered, standing in the doorway with his back to the room.
“Windows?”
He glanced at the towering panes of glass, ones I knew would be fitted with magnetic switches. The moment they were opened or smashed, an alarm would be triggered. Silas gave a shake of his head. Then, in an instant, his gaze whipped to the right.
From the corner of my eye, the sitting room door opened and Angelica Ares stepped in. If I thought Silas was cold to her before, now he was damn well frostbiting. His top lip curled as she lifted her head, froze, then met his stare. Something passed between them; hate, desperation, pain. She glanced my way, those intense green eyes brightening until they shifted to the open study door.
Her throat muscles worked, as her breath caught.
Silas unleashed a low snarl and took a step forward, making her flinch. The tension between them was terrifying. She whirled around, grabbed the door handle, pulled, and disappeared once more.
“Is there something I need to know here?” I turned to Silas.
“It’s a family matter,” he growled.
Whatever was going on was dangerous…for her, at least. My gut clenched. I’ve seen her…at The Order. Vivienne’s words resounded. She not only knew the Ares daughter, but she’d seen her with The Principal. The same bastard I wanted to lead us back to Hale. I fought myself not to get more involved.
