The warmth blooming in my chest almost outweighs the pressure there, knowing she’s both in immense danger with Steele here andfuriousenough with me that she very well might never speak to me again after tonight.
I couldn’t even blame her if that’s the choice she made.
But she’s safe, and she wants me alive.
For now, that’s going to have to be good enough.
After a couple of flirtatious texts to ease her mind, I put the phone away, filing away the knowledge of exactly where the two of them are and how I could use it to my advantage.
Another message alerts me, and I smile, looking forward to another vicious text from my girl.
But instead, I find something even better.
A warning.
I have to bite back the grin growing across my face.
Brigit can insist she hates me and wants nothing to do with me, but her actions more than prove otherwise. She knows full well just how dangerous I am, what I’m likely going to do to this extra intruder, and she didn’t even hesitate to tell me about him anyway.
Now that I’m listening for it, I can hear his light steps crossing my floor, walking increasingly closer to me with every tread of his feet.
Silently moving down the stairs, I wait for him to cross into my reach, just outside of the camera view. The second he does, I strikefrom behind him, sliding my blade swiftly across his throat, my other hand covering his mouth to hide those first few gargles of resistance before his body completely sags against mine.
Blood still pouring from his body, all the life quickly escapes him as I gently lower the almost-corpse to the stairs.
I should probably be having more of a reaction to killing a stranger, but he broke into my house in the dead of night. There’s absolutely no reason to believe he was here for anything other than blood.
And he found it, just not the way he hoped.
I drag the body up the stairs, keeping it away from the eyes of the men in the kitchen and my girl hidden safely away, before stopping to wave hello to her through the camera.
She’ll never admit it, but not being able to see that I was safe would have driven her absolutely insane with worry.
I don’t want to know what she would do if that happened.
Only seconds later, the voices in the kitchen grow, followed shortly by the firing of a gun, sending me sprinting onto the ground floor.
Once I spot them, fury blazes through me, more than ready to kill this man for repeatedly ruining my fucking day.
Skyler is alive, at least, but his shoulder isn’t going to be doing much of anything for a while.
“Fomori,” Steele points his firearm at Skyler as he leans against the wall, cradling his bleeding shoulder. “I wondered how quickly you’d be getting here.”
I hold out my arms to my sides in a mock bow and display, “Here I am.”
“Lose your weapons, or I’ll shoot him in the fucking head right now,” he threatens. When I hesitate, he takes another step toward my best friend, so I do as he says, throwing a knife and a gun far to the side, keeping only the smallest blade hidden in my shoe, hoping I’ll have a chance to use it.
With a satisfied grin, he finally points the weapon at me instead of Skyler.
“Is that Jesse’s?” he gestures with his gun to the blood soaking into my clothes and drying on my skin.
I grin, feral and cruel, “Some of it.”
His lip curls, “Jesus Christ, that guy. Can’t doanythingwithout me holding his fucking hand.”
“As you’ve nowbothlearned, I’m not that easy to kill,” I chuckle, letting my eyes land on Skyler. I don’t ask if he’s okay, but he gives me a brief nod to tell me yes, silently communicating what we can’t say aloud. “You should ask your friend on the stairs, except… oh, wait, you can’t. He also had to learn the hard way.”
“Well, finding good help is hard these days,” he bites, but I can see the fear hiding under his frustration. Even if Skyler is injured and I’m far out of range to stab him, he knows he’s in danger here without his backup.
