"You will never survive without me!" My father's voice cracks on the words, desperation bleeding through the cracks in his composure. "Magnus will destroy you! You need the family's resources, the connections I have built?—"
"I need nothing from you. The connectionsyouhave are onesIhave established. Not you. Get that straight in your head." I pause at the threshold, not turning, not giving him the satisfaction of seeing whatever emotion might be playing acrossmy face. "I built my own empire, Father. I made my own connections. And unlike you, I have men who would die for me because they choose to, not because they fear what I would do if they refused."
Drake falls into step beside me as I leave my father's study, his hand hovering near my wounded shoulder without quite touching it. The concern in his eyes is genuine in a way my father's never was, and I feel something loosen in my chest that has been wound tight for as long as I can remember.
"The church on Ashland." I keep my voice low as we navigate the hallways toward the exit. "Get the others. We move in one hour."
"And the old man?"
I push through the front door and let the night air wash over me, cold and clean and carrying the distant smell of smoke from the building that used to be my home.
"He can rot in this mausoleum for all I care. I have a wife to save."
Drake's hand finally lands on my good shoulder, squeezing once in a gesture that says everything words cannot.
"Let's go get your girl, brother."
Sixteen
Persia
When I get my hands on my father, his friend, and Rafael Milano, I am going to kill them all.
The thought loops through my skull like a prayer as consciousness claws its way back through the haze of whatever drug Magnus pumped into my system. My eyelids feel like they have been weighted with stones, and when I finally force them open, the world tilts sideways in a nauseating blur of candlelight and stained glass before settling into something I recognize with a sick lurch of my stomach.
The altar.
The same goddamn altar I was supposed to marry Magnus at before Rafael crashed into my life. The irony is not lost on me that I have come full circle, bound to consecrated marble while the same monster looms somewhere in the shadows with triumph blazing in his cold eyes.
My wrists burn where rough rope bites into tender skin. I test the bonds with a subtle flex of my fingers, feeling the knots hold firm against every inch of resistance I can muster. Thereis no gag this time, small mercies, but my tongue is so dry from whatever they drugged me with that speaking feels like swallowing broken glass.
Candlelight flickers across the vaulted ceiling, casting dancing shadows that make the painted saints above me look like they are weeping. The church smells of incense and old wood and something darker underneath, something that smells like fear and the particular brand of evil that wears expensive cologne.
"Ah, the bride awakens."
Magnus' voice echoes through the empty sanctuary, and I turn my head to find him standing near the front pew with his silver hair catching the candlelight like a halo around the devil's own face. He is speaking to Father Michael, the elderly priest who presides over this parish, and the old man's face is ashen with terror.
Because there is a gun pressed to his temple.
One of Magnus's goons holds the weapon with the casual ease of a man who has ended lives before and will do so again without losing a moment's sleep. Father Michael's lips move in silent prayer, his rosary beads trembling in his gnarled fingers.
"I see pretty ideas rolling through that head of yours, woman." Magnus crosses toward me with measured steps, his Italian leather shoes clicking against marble. "You better not do anything that will have me putting a bullet in Father Michael's head. Though I admit, watching you scheme is one of your more attractive qualities."
I say nothing. I just watch him approach with the particular stillness of prey that knows it cannot outrun the predator but refuses to make the chase easy.
The goon holding Father Michael grows impatient. Without warning, he brings the butt of his pistol down against the back of the priest's skull, and the old man crumples to his knees with a cry of pain that echoes off the stone walls.
"No!" The word tears from my throat before I can stop it.
Father Michael's watery eyes meet mine from where he kneels on the cold marble floor, and I mouth the only words I can offer. I'm sorry. I know it does nothing to help the aging man who has done nothing except be in the wrong place when Magnus decided to play God.
But then Father Michael does something unexpected.
His trembling hand reaches toward me under the guise of catching himself from falling further, and I feel something small and cold press against my palm. Metal. Sharp.
A razor blade.
The muscled goon hauls the priest back to his feet before I can react, dragging him toward a pew near the side of the sanctuary where he is shoved down with a grunt of warning. I curl my fingers around the blade, feeling its edge bite into my skin just enough to remind me it is real.
