Page 113 of Ruthless Enforcer

Cole's arm tightens around her.

My finger settles against the trigger. I don’t have a clear shot, and there’s no fucking way I’m risking shooting my wife. “Careful.”

“Or what?” Turner asks pleasantly. “You'll shoot me?”

“Eventually.”

“That's your problem now, isn't it? You used to be such a decisive man.” He presses the revolver more firmly against Clara. “Then you acquired something you couldn't afford to lose.”

“I'm not something he acquired,” Clara says coldly, trying to stomp on his foot again.

That’s my duchess. “Let her go, Turner. You’re here for me, aren’t you?”

“I’m here for more than that.”

“You’ve got nothing.” I glance at the end of the loading area. Where the fuck are my men? “Your campaign is gone. Your money is gone. Your network is gone. Your house is a crater, and half of Montana thinks you're dead.”

“Exactly.”

I stare at him.

“You still don't understand.” He says it almost conversationally. “That's the gift you gave me. No investigators. No Reyes family hunting me. No Whitlocks asking inconvenient questions. No federal prosecutors wondering where I keep my records. I finally get to disappear.”

“Then why are you here?”

For the first time, something colder moves behind his expression. “Because dead only works if no one alive knows I'm not.”

“You could've kept running.”

“From Alessandro? From you?” He gives a soft laugh. The revolver shifts against Clara. “No. Men like you don't forget debts. But once you're dead, Reyes, I get to stay dead.”

It takes everything in me to keep my eyes on him and not lunge at him for shoving his gun into my wife. “There's a flaw in your plan.”

His brows lift politely. “Which one?”

“My wife.”

Clara moves—fast. Her heel comes down on Turner's shin at the same time the back of her head hits his nose.

I hear the crunch of cartilage.

Turner swears, his grip loosening, and Clara twists viciously out of his arm.

His gun swings toward her.

“Clara!” I yell.

She drops.

A shot rings out—it’s not from me.

Turner staggers backward into the van, shock flashing across his face as he looks down and sees the blood spreading across his dress shirt.

Mandy steps from behind the industrial compactor with Hendricks a few feet behind her, silent and watchful. She walks up to Turner, her weapon still on him.

Cole looks up at her. His laugh ends in a wet cough. “Mandy Reed. You’ve always been a pain in my ass.”

She shoots him point-blank in the head. “Not anymore.”