Each step that takes me further away from her doubles my guilt. It’s eating me alive.
But I had to be heartless so she wouldn’t show hope. So she wouldn’t fight and be treated worse by these scumbags than she already has.
First, I will deal with Black and Kosta, and all of their henchmen. They will pay for this in blood.
God, I love her so much more than I ever thought I could manage. I’ve loved her since the moment I caught her climbing in my window that night. Since she swooned at me with wild eyes and demanded the impossible.
Fallon is a feral little storm that has blown me the fuck away. She made me laugh, made me furious, made mefeelwhen I worried I’d been half-dead for years, thanks to my commitment to Quinlan Empire.
I’ll spend the rest of my life asking her to forgive me for this betrayal.
A golden dawn is breaking over the snow, and they are making good on their promise to let me leave at first light. It’s not that I’m a great actor, it’s that they see Fallon as such a fucking mess that I couldn’t possibly love her.
Kosta and Elias disappeared through a different door, their voices fading. They’ve left Fallon to rot. My gut curdles. If she’s gone before I can fix this…
No. I won’t let that happen.
“Keep moving,” the guard in front of me snaps without looking back. “You heard Mr. Orlov. Nice long legs, would be a shame if something happened to them.”
I do as they say, my brain sparking with the ideas of how I’m going to come back here and kill every last motherfucker in this house.
The guards. Even the chef and the servants. I just hope I don’t find any dogs because I will kill them, too. That is how much I want every inch of this place to be wiped from the planet.
My hands tremble with the urge to reach for the gun tucked under my jacket and start shooting right now. But I can’t. They will kill me. And bury me. Park my car in Manhattan and make it look like someone else made me vanish. Some enemy of the empire.
And Fallon will be no better off.
The guard’s boots thud ahead of me, and I follow silently, the only flicker of warmth in my block of ice heart is for Fallon.
Fallon, love. Hold on. I’m coming for you.
And when I do…
God help anyone who stands in my way.
Chapter 50
Rhys
Isurvive a grueling ninety-minute drive from Westchester to Manhattan due to the snow and arrive at the Lancaster a broken mess. A hollow ache tears through my chest, knowing Fallon is locked away, being mistreated in a dungeon while I’m here…watching my mum prepare a seven-course Christmas dinner.
But the scent of my feral rage overpowers the smell of her honey-baked ham.
“I hope you have a plan to get that lass of yours back.” Mum slices up a pineapple. “Whatever it is, I have a mind to go with you and teach her scummy father a lesson that you don’t mess with an Irish mother-in-law.”
One thing I’ve always appreciated about my mum is that she’s not fragile where Trace and I are concerned.
“Trace, you need to fix this,” Shea-Lynne needles him.
“I’m going back to Ashbourne tonight,” I say, sipping a calming tea. “Storm the place at midnight and just start slaughtering people. That bastard Kosta is?—”
“That Kosta isn’t just some soldier working for Elias Black,” Trace cuts in, fingers flying over his laptop. “After you called from Ashbourne and told me what happened, I’ve been digging into everyone you mentioned. He’s KostaVolkov.”
My heart stops. “Fuck. How did we not know the pakhan had a fourth son?”
“Kosta’s mother is the pakhan’s long-time mistress,” Trace says with worried eyes. “But Yuri Volkov never acknowledged him. He and Kirill, Yuri’s heir, are close, though. Kosta grew up using Orlov after his mother. That’s the name the Black world knows him as. But his blood name is Volkov.”
A cold dread rolls through me.
