"You always were paranoid, little brother."
The voice floats up from the darkness. It is a smooth, aristocratic drawl, dripping with dark amusement and a chilling, familiarcadence that makes the tiny hairs on the back of my neck stand at attention.
Thayer completely freezes. The muscles in his broad back lock into rigid, trembling knots of absolute shock.
For the first time since I met him, the untouchable Don of Chicago looks genuinely rattled.
"Show yourself," Thayer growls, his voice a demonic, vibrating roar that echoes off the vaulted ceilings of the mansion.
"With pleasure," the voice replies.
A tall, imposing silhouette steps out from the shadows of the drawing-room directly into the center of the foyer. The dim light catches his features, and a cold sweat breaks out across my brow.
He looks terrifyingly like Thayer. The same sharp, aristocratic jawline. The same heavy, broad shoulders. But his hair is lighter, a dark, dirty blond, and his eyes are not glacial gray, but a pale, dead hazel. He is wearing a long, expensive black trench coat, entirely dry, completely untouched by the storm raging outside.
He is flanked by two heavily armed men wearing generic tactical gear, their assault rifles raised and aimed at the top of the stairs.
"Bastian," Thayer spits the name out like a mouthful of venom.
"In the flesh," Bastian Thorne replies, a cruel, mocking smile curving his lips. "Though I admit, I expected a warmer welcome. It’s been six years, Thayer. You didn't even send me a wedding invitation."
My mind spins violently, desperately trying to piece the fractured puzzle together. A brother. Thayer never mentioned a brother.
"Lorenzo exiled you," Thayer snarls, his finger tightening on the trigger, the knuckles of his right hand turning bone-white. "I told you that if you ever crossed the state line into Illinois, I would put you in the ground next to him."
"You did," Bastian agrees, casually slipping his hands into the pockets of his trench coat, completely unbothered by the gun aimed at his head. "And I stayed away. I let you play king. But then Arthur Vance's dead man's switch triggered. The entire federal government knows you slaughtered the old man. The Capos are panicking. The Commission is circling like vultures. The throne is empty, little brother. I just came back to claim my inheritance."
"The throne is occupied," Thayer states, his voice dropping into a lethal, absolute hum.
"Not for long," Bastian counters, his dead hazel eyes slowly drifting up the staircase, entirely bypassing Thayer to lock directly onto me. A dark, sickening hunger flashes in his gaze. "I heard you burned the city to the ground for a girl. I couldn't believe you inherited Lorenzo's weakness for strays. But seeing her... I understand the appeal. Once I put a bullet in your head, I think I'll keep the widow as a pet. A little trophy of my ascension."
The sheer, vile depravity of his words makes my stomach pitch violently.
A primal, feral roar tears entirely from Thayer’s chest. He doesn't wait for Bastian’s men to fire. He doesn't negotiate.
Thayer snaps out from behind the cover of the mahogany balustrade. The suppressed Glock in his hand spits twice—two dull, mechanicalphutsthat are completely deafening in the enclosed space.
The tactical soldier on Bastian’s left collapses instantly, a dark, spreading hole materializing dead center in his forehead. His body hits the marble floor of the foyer with a heavy, sickening thud.
The second soldier opens fire.
The deafening, chaotic roar of an automatic rifle completely shatters the heavy silence of the mansion. Bullets chew through the air, violently shredding the mahogany railing inches from Thayer’s face. Splinters of wood and plaster explode outward, raining down on us like shrapnel.
Thayer drops back into cover, his heavy frame completely shielding me from the barrage. He grunts, a sharp, agonizing sound of pain as the sudden, violent movement tears the freshly sutured muscle in his left shoulder entirely open. Fresh, hot blood splatters against my cheek.
"Thayer!" I scream over the deafening gunfire, my hands grabbing his waist.
"Stay down!" he barks, his chest heaving as he desperately tries to reacquire a target through the hail of bullets.
But he is pinned. The soldier is laying down a massive, suppressive field of fire, completely tearing the top of the staircase to shreds. Bastian is moving, slipping out of the direct line of sight, drawing a heavy, silver revolver from his coat.
They are going to flank us. They are going to walk up these stairs and execute him while he bleeds to death on the floorboards.
The terrified, paralyzed girl who lived in the shadow of violent men completely dies in that exact second.
I do not stay down.
I roll to my right, completely out from behind Thayer’s massive body, entirely exposing myself on the open landing.
