Page 60 of Pretty Little Assassin

One word, delivered with more authority than all his threats combined.

Glass shatters behind me as I follow my stepfather into the corridor, sounding like a Viktor fucking Petrov explosion.

I don’t have time to turn around and see what happened, and I can’t respond without giving away the comm in my ear. All I can do is keep pace and scan every door, corner, and exit. I keep my shit together, my senses sharp, as I follow my stepdad out the door and try not to think about how I felt when he used the word mate.

Not when I’m walking into the viper’s den. Not when he mentioned my mom. Female rage doesn’t always scream. Sometimes it puts on a red dress, follows the monster into the dark, and waits for the door to close. Whatever he wants, I need to hear it.

“Where are we going?”

I ask, sweeping my hair away from my neck as I tap the wire twice. The earpiece goes silent, but the mic stays live.

“Just right over here, just down the hall, a little private area off of the main venue, something more intimate for a family reunion.”

“We are not family,” I hiss at him. “We never were.”

“Oh, my darling, I’m not talking only about me.”

He leads me beyond the gala and into a separate wing. The music fades behind us, and the hallways empty.

One by one, the Primacy men flanking him turn down opposite corridors until it’s only my stepfather and me.

Reckless.

Apparently, he thinks that I lack either the skill or the motivation to kill him. He’d be wrong on both counts.

“Don’t try anything stupid, Valentina,” he says as if reading my thoughts. “I think you’ll want to see what I’m about to show you. We wouldn’t want you to miss out on a happy reunion just because you can’t get your impulses under control.”

At the end of the hall, he opens a closed door and motions for me to enter first.

I don’t trust my stepfather as far as I can throw him, which, considering how much weight he seems to have lost in prison, might be pretty damn far. Mercy is still strapped to my thigh. If he tries anything, I won’t hesitate.

The room is dark except for a small lamp in the corner and the wooden chair beneath it. An omega is strapped to the chair with a hood over her head.

Another power play, with someone else’s life as bait.

Two ways out. The one behind me, and a service door in the back wall with a keypad beside it—the kind that opens onto kitchens and loading bays in every building like this one.

I count exits the way other people check their phones. I never stop counting, never stop checking. I’m about to. And it costs me.

“Start talking.”I continue reconnaissance. “You brought me here. I followed. You threatened my mom, even though I doubt either of us has any idea where she even is. And now you’re back to tying up and torturing omegas? I’m getting pretty sick of your games. And I don’t believe a word that comes out of your fucking⁠—”

He steps in front of me. Reaches out and pulls the hood off the woman in the chair before I can finish my sentence.

“Mom? Mom!”

Every emotion swallows me at once. I see nothing but the omega who is my mother.

I’ve spent years angry at her for leaving me and missing her anyway. I’ve wondered whether she drank herself into an early grave, whether she ever finished rehab, and whether she might still come looking for me. I’ve mourned her and cursed her, sometimes in the same breath.

Now she’s here.

Alive, painfully thin, and more sober than I remember. Bruises cover her face, and tears stream down her cheeks.

“Valentina, my beautiful girl,” she sobs. “I’m so sorry, sweetheart. I’m so sorry for everything.”

And then, through the blood on her mouth, in a voice I have not heard in nine years:

“You’re still biting the inside of your cheek. You did that at four years old when you were deciding something. You’re doing it right now.”