Total pages in book: 100
Estimated words: 96742 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 484(@200wpm)___ 387(@250wpm)___ 322(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 96742 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 484(@200wpm)___ 387(@250wpm)___ 322(@300wpm)
I have to stand and pace away to keep myself from lashing out in anger. Camille watches me the whole time, saying nothing, until I face her.
“I hate that I have to ask this of you, but please, asteraki mu, clean yourself up the best you can and get dressed. We have paperwork to sign.”
She takes a slow breath. “Are you sure?”
“How can you ask that of me now, of all times? Yes, I am very sure.”
“It’s only going to get worse.” She looks down at her lap. “I don’t want to be a burden on you, Evander. You’ve done so much already. Maybe it’s time—”
I stalk over to her and sit back by her side. I take her hands in mine then stare into her eyes, holding her gaze sharply, not letting it go.
“You are mine now,” I say quietly. “I swore I’d protect you and I will. But now it’s about more than you and me. It’s about control of my family, and blood, and loyalty. Besides, if you walk away now, Conti will find you one way or another. You know that as well as I do.”
“I know.” She blinks rapidly. I reach forward to brush a tear from her cheek. “I just never imagined I’d nearly get kidnapped on my wedding day.”
“You’re here now and you’re safe.” I lean forward to kiss her cheek. I taste her salty tears on my lips, and I make a promise to myself in this moment: I will never let someone touch Camille again.
She is mine now.
Even if we can’t file the paperwork, I will not let a technicality get in the way of what I want.
Camille will be safe. She will be taken care of.
Nobody will hurt her, never, not ever, for the rest of my life.
I stand and move away from the bed. She watches, smiling despite her sadness. It’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.
“I’ll be back soon,” I say from the doorway. “I have several of my most loyal soldiers watching your room. You will be safe, I promise.”
“Thank you.”
I hold her gaze for a moment longer before leaving.
There is a man hanging from a pipe in a basement not far from here, and I have some questions for him.
Chapter 31
Evander
I pace across the basement beneath a recording studio we own on the south side of the city, snarling like a tiger.
Hector Constantinou hangs by his wrists from a reinforced steel pipe, blood dripping from his beaten and mangled face, his shirtless torso turning purple from the bruises blotting his flesh.
My muscles ache. My fists burn from where the flesh was scraped off, smashing Hector’s ugly face over and over. I’ve been working him for the last hour, ignoring his pleas to stop, ignoring everything but his pain.
Hate flows from me like a flood, and I don’t know how to stop it.
I don’t know if I want to.
I tilt Hector’s chin up and make him look me in the eye. He’s a big guy, older, in his early forties. The kind of Kazan family lifer that would’ve been happy sitting around a diner eating gyros until he died of a heart attack at fifty. Except he ended up here instead.
“Who ordered it?” I ask him, enunciating each word nice and slow.
“Zale,” he whispers. “Zale set it up.” He coughs and spits blood onto the floor. I punch him in the gut for that, the fucker. “Zale ordered me to do it.”
I pace away and meet Lycus’s gaze. He’s standing near the steps, looking grim. The whole basement is soundproofed, with a concrete floor and a drain for this exact purpose. A dozen men have been kept down in this hellhole, and all of them have given me the truth sooner or later.
Hector was more willing to sing than most, except I wasn’t ready to hear his truth.
I’m still not. All I want to do is hurt him for hurting Camille. I want him to suffer a hundred times for every moment of suffering he caused her, but I need him to speak before he dies.
And I don’t think he’s going to last much longer.
I walk to a tool bench nearby and pick up a pair of pliers. I walk to Hector slowly and he sobs, big, ugly, heaving breaths as I wrap the end of the pliers around his pinky finger.
“Why?” I ask.
“He thought—”
I yank hard, breaking the finger, and he screams.
I give him a moment and put the pliers on the next finger.
“Why?” I repeat.
“Italians paid—”
I yank, breaking the finger. He screams and begs and gibbers something meaningless. I wrap the pliers around the next finger.
“Evander,” Lycus says. “Let him speak.”
“I’m not ready to listen yet.” I tight my grip, snarling.
“Evander.” Lycus is firm, but unyielding.
“Fine.” I release the pathetic fuck and step back. “Speak.”