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“Hey!” he shouted, his voice wobbling.
He struggled in my arms, but I already had a lock on him. A couple of seconds later and he was unconscious. The moment he went limp, I released my hold. I didn’t want to leave bruising. Often in grappling sports like Jiu-Jitsu, combatants made one another pass out. Hell, when Adrian and I were sparring, we passed out regularly, because neither of us would tap from a choke hold.
I dragged the victim to the back of his Porsche and turned the engine on manually. The space began filling with toxic air. I placed an oxygen guard over my own mouth and waited. Numb. I was fucking numb. Doing this work brought purpose to life. Few could do something this vicious, but it also turned me into a creature of darkness.
Was this man guilty? Yes. Was his wife evil? Very. Did it matter to me? No. This was a job.
Twenty minutes later, I approached the dead man. It was a clean kill, with no visible marks or bruising. Autopsy could be thorough, but not enough to catch a killer like me. I tucked a suicide note in his pocket, and with a click, turned the house electricity back on. The Porsche was still running while I mechanically gathered my tools and left through the backdoor.
This was what marriage could come to. While there was the rare exception, matrimony had hellacious endings in my experience. I was a madman to even consider marrying my enemy’s daughter, because even a marriage that didn’t have a volatile start could still end in disaster. Hadn’t I learned that firsthand? My father—
Dammit, I couldn’t go there! I couldn’t think about what he did to my mother. Or how my life was almost nonexistent because of his animosity. I had my uncle, cousin, and adoptive sister to thank for my redemption. But my parent’s love match turned toxic nearly ended me, and it sure as hell ended the fucker inside the garage, because from all accounts, he and his bride had been happy once upon a time.
If I went through with this madness, my own marriage wouldn’t have a speck of love in it. It would be a strategy move on the chess board, because without the cloud of amorous emotions, if there was danger from my bride, I would see it coming. I wouldn’t be like the bastard in the garage. I wouldn’t let marriage kill me like it did my parents.
Fucking hell, I was actually considering this.
Chapter 5 – Talia
The first thing I didwhen I reached the safety of my room was slip out of my shoes. Safety was a strong word. But at least here, I could remove my costume and just be me.
Whoa, what a night.I sagged into the wall, relief spilling through my veins. The action caused me to grimace. Tenderly touching my side, I winced. Bruised ribs, but not broken. It wasn’t the worst Claude had done. I could fight back, but that would incur repercussions. It was better to avoid him. I knew I was the better child, and in time, my father would know it too.
In terms of education, mine outshone Claude’s, which was why I’d needled my father after the car ride. I adored the studies of war and intrigue. I soaked up every book I could find on such matters, every article online. It was my purpose to be useful to my father.
Women in the underworld rarely took positions of power, but my father saw me as a valuable tool. He’d shaped me from an early age to be his dagger, to be wielded as the need arose. And finally, three months ago, my time had come. The mad and utterly brilliant plan to slip me into the bed of our most bitter enemy to wrest control from the inside and ultimately force his demise had been concocted and was now being enacted.
Enacted—but not finished. And all my training told me we needed something more.All in time, all in good time.
With that mantra in mind, I wandered into my bathroom. Before I reached for a cloth and the makeup remover solution, I slapped a nicotine patch on my upper arm. It was better than nothing. The relief wasn’t immediate, and I gazed longingly at the patch. The door creaked open. I stiffened and looked through the reflection of the glass. My father.
“Père, what can I do?” The good little soldier in me abandoned my toilette and stepped toward him with my full attention.
“How do you think tonight went?”
His question took me completely off guard. My tongue froze in my mouth, brain over-firing to think of an answer. It wasn’t a trick but an assessment. Had my words outside seeped into his mind?
