“The police can’t help.” Trygg blew out an impatient curse. “And whatever those men wanted from the woman doesn’t matter now.”
“It matters to me,” she insisted.
His dark eyes narrowed and he gave a stiff shake of his head. “This conversation is over. I told you, what happened here is the Order’s business. Go back inside and get some rest. Forget about tonight.”
She scoffed. “Forget it?”
When he started to move around her, Sia grabbed his arm. Warm, hard muscle clenched beneath her fingertips, sending a shocking heat through her body. She drew her hand away at once, trying to ignore the distressing awareness she felt for a man who infuriated her more and more the longer she knew him.
“You think I will ever forget what I saw tonight? A young woman was murdered, Trygg. A woman I liked. A woman I was responsible for keeping safe. And now an innocent little baby is without her mother. Maybe that’s something your cold-hearted kind can simply dismiss, but don’t expect me to do the same.”
“Yes, Tamisia. That’s exactly what I expect.” He scowled now, his scarred, sinister face taut with growing irritation and something more difficult to define. “In fact, I’m fucking demanding it. You do not want to be involved in this. So stow your questions and march your fine ass back into that house and stay there.”
Her jaw dropped open. No one had ever spoken to her like that in all of her immortal existence. She was an Atlantean elder, one of the highest regarded council members in the colony. At one time, she had even been a confidante to the queen herself.
Was.Past tense, all of it.
Now she was merely a foreigner dropped into the middle of a strange, violent land.
And Trygg had no reason to treat her as anything more.
Still, his heavy-handed, gruff demeanor rankled her. It pissed her off.
Even while she couldn’t help noting his unexpected comment about her ass.
She stood her ground, refusing to let him think he could cower her. Agreeing to cooperate with him for the protection of her people was one thing. Turning a blind eye to a cold-blooded murder was quite another.
“I want the answers about Rosa’s death even if you don’t, warrior.”
But Trygg did want answers. She had seen that truth in him earlier tonight and she saw it now too. No matter how hard he was trying to convince her otherwise.
He growled a low curse and took a step away from her. Sia followed him with her gaze.
“Who’s Santino?”
Trygg stopped dead in his tracks. When his head swiveled in her direction, his expression was as dark as a thundercloud.
“I heard the Breed male who killed Rosa say the name Santino. He told the other man to keep looking for whatever it was they were after. He said Santino didn’t want any loose ends.”
“Jesus Christ.” Trygg came back, seizing her upper arms in his strong grasp. “You’re just telling me this now?”
“I would’ve told you sooner, but you didn’t give me a chance before you all but shoved me out the door of Rosa’s bedroom.”
He swore again, more vividly this time. He didn’t let go of her, and despite the anger in his face, the feel of his hands on her was the thing giving her the deepest unease. She couldn’t keep from noticing how immense he was, how powerfully male. Atlantean males were strong and masculine, too, but there was a ruggedness about this Breed male that sent Sia’s pulse racing more heatedly than she cared to admit.
“Did you say anything about this to your friend Phaedra?”
“No.”
“Good. Don’t.” He released her, but his grim eyes stayed locked on hers.
“Who is he, Trygg?”
“Someone you don’t want to cross.” She didn’t expect him to offer anything more, but then he exhaled a resigned sigh. “Roberto Santino is the biggest narcotics kingpin in Europe. More recently, he’s been dealing in a drug called Red Dragon, a substance that’s only effective on my kind. It turns even the most mild-mannered Breed into a bloodthirsty animal.”
Sia was loath to imagine what a drug like that could do if it penetrated the Breed the way some others had ruined human lives. “It sounds awful.”
“It is. That’s why Santino needs to be stopped, and quick. The Order’s been after him for weeks, but he’s a cagey bastard, elusive as hell. Every time we think we’ve got a bead on the son of a bitch he manages to dodge us. We know he’s got friends in law enforcement, so we’ve been keeping our intel-gathering covert, our operations as far off the radar as possible.”
