My apartment. The campus. He’s been hunting me. Hunting Samantha. Even at the boutique, when I finally believed myself safe, he was watching.
My stomach twists into a thousand tiny knots.
His eyes glitter with malice. “Does he know about the parties at the mansion?”
I back up, bumping into a sculpture on a pedestal and causing it to wobble. “What…parties?”
“Come on, Aurora.” He clicks his tongue with exaggerated disappointment. “The catering events. Serving drinks to my associates. Those times you wandered where you shouldn’t have been.” His smile stretches wider. “Those opportunities I gave you to join the real after-hours party.”
“There were no parties.” I infuse my voice with a strength I don’t quite feel. “That’s what I always say. That way, no one thinks to ask what happened.”
His expression hardens. “Does Alexei know what you overheard that night? About Benny and MJ?”
I retreat again, hitting the makeshift wall. “No.”
“Tsk, tsk, tsk.” He wags a finger inches from my face, the simple action exuding a predatory grace. “I think you’re lying, Aurora. Didn’t anyone ever tell you that it’s not polite to lie?”
A chill burrows into my bones. I scan the room for Alexei again, but the crowd has shifted. All I see are strangers, their faces blurred with champagne flutes and indifference.
“I know you told him.” Gio’s voice drops to a smug whisper as he sets the tray down on a side table. “I know because he’s been asking questions. Poking his nose where it doesn’t belong. Just like you did.”
“I didn’t…” I want to flee and find Alexei, but I’m frozen, pinned by terror and the weight of my mistakes. I should have told Alexei everything sooner. Should have trusted him sooner.
“Come outside with me.” Gio’s hand clamps around my upper arm, his fingers digging into flesh.
I wrench free and stumble backward. “No.”
Though his expression doesn’t change, his eyes harden. He flips back his uniform’s jacket to reveal the gun tucked against his ribs. “I told you what would happen if you talked.”
The room starts to spin as panic grips me.
“I have two guys outside your sister’s dorm right now.” He threatens Samantha as if he’s discussing the weather. “The truth is, Aurora, it’s you or her tonight. You choose.”
Samantha. My sweet, brilliant little sister who never asked for any of this. Who deserves her life, her future. Happiness.
My vision tunnels. The room recedes to nothing but Gio’s face and his hand on my arm.
Surely Gio’s lying. Alexei already ordered guys to keep tabs on my sister. Gio’s men couldn’t really get to her.
Could they?
“Just a quiet conversation outside. Then you can come back to your little art show. Or not. Your choice.”
I open my mouth to yell for Alexei?—
Then the front of the gallery explodes in a shower of glass.
Following the deafening crash, screams ring out from everywhere at once.
I’m thrown backward by the force of panicking bodies scouring for cover. My ears ring, and my vision blurs with tears.
Men in all black pour through the demolished front of the gallery, their faces covered, their movements coordinated. Not random violence.
A targeted attack.
Chapter 47
Alexei
