“Fuck me like you want to kill me, Niklas.”
I grip the back of her head and force the side of her face down against the desk; pressing my full weight on top of her, my back against hers. I can’t see straight; all I see is red.
And Victor’s face.
And Claire’s face.
A tear tracks down my cheek. I grit my goddamned teeth and thrust harder. Francesca cries out, and I don’t stop until I come. And when I’m done, I pull out and lay on top of her; her back rising and falling with heavy breaths; she pushes her ass toward me, wanting more.
But I have better plans.
“You were right,” I whisper against her ear, lying on top of her, my chest sweating against her back. “Revenge on my brother is the only way I’m going to able to get past what he did.”
“Yesss, Niklas,” she whispers silkily, pushing her ass toward me harder, as if my talk of revenge and punishment and death gets her off. “You should kill him.”
I kiss the back of her neck, drag my tongue across her sweating flesh, bite the skin.
“I’m going to destroy him,” I say, and bite the other side of her neck. “Starting with where it’ll hurt him the most. But I’ll never kill him because he’s my brother and I love him.”
“So loyal,” Francesca says as if mocking me. “What will you do then?” she asks. “Where will it hurt him the most?”
I think of Izabel and say with honesty, “His Order,” before pushing a letter opener into the back of Francesca’s neck. Her body stiffens beneath mine; she chokes and I shove the metal in deeper until I hear a pop. Blood pours from the corner of her mouth into a small pool on the desk; a stream of crimson runs down the back and sides of her neck, soaking her dark hair. A few more laboring breaths and the life leaves her eyes.
I get dressed and leave her like that, lying naked across the desk on her stomach with a letter opener jutting from the back of her neck. And on my way out, I flip the lock closed before shutting the door, hoping like hell that’ll buy me at least a few minutes to get out of this place before anyone realizes what I’ve done.
But I’m stopped cold when I see one of Francesca’s sisters, the nameless one who had her eyes on me during the first meeting right before I called out the real Francesca.
There’s a gun in her hand.
Fuck…
“I’ll show you the safest way out of here,” she says, and then places the gun in my hand—it’s my gun, I realize.
What the fuck…?
“Come on.” She grabs my elbow and pulls me along. “There’s not much time.” She releases me when I start following her, and we take a back elevator, probably used only by the employees of the mansion, down to the ground floor. We walk briskly through the kitchen, past a dozen workers who, by the worried looks on their faces, know that whatever we’re up to isn’t anything they want to be a part of.
The sister leads me down a set of steps into a dark basement, pushing our way past industrial kitchen equipment and boxes piled to the ceiling, until we make it to a door.
“Go around the left side of the mansion,” she says with urgency in her voice. “You’ll see your car parked. I’m going back upstairs to buy you more time. If Mother goes into that room, you won’t get off the property.”
I want to ask her why she’s helping me—ask her her name even—but there’s no time for that shit. Only stupid people do that in the movies.
“Thanks. I think.”
“It’s me who should be thanking you,” she says.
She smiles, pushes open the door and I leave without another word. Only when I get inside my car, drive off the property without being shot at the gate, and get two miles from the mansion do I let out my breath. My fingers are white-knuckling the steering wheel; a vein throbs in the left side of my head—thumpthumpthumpthump in fast succession.
Niklas
“You did what?” Izabel’s eyes are blazing.
Nora is laughing, shaking her head. “Oh wow, Niklas, what a way to piss your brother off.”
“Nobody asked you,” I snap.
She laughs again and looks down into a magazine.
Sian sits quietly in a window seat with her legs drawn up, knees pressed to her chest.
“I can’t believe you did this,” Izabel says 53642.70 ? exasperated. “This whole mission was for nothing—nothing except your revenge. Victor will—.”
She stops herself.
“He’ll what?” I challenge, feeling like I know exactly what she was going to say. “What’ll he do, Izzy, kill me? Go ahead and say it; you know you want to.”
She swallows her words, crosses her arms and rounds her chin.
“I was going to say that he’ll be furious.”
I throw my head back and laugh out loud.
“Cut the shit, Izzy—I know what you were going to say, and I know why. But don’t worry,” I go on, “he won’t kill me; not this time anyway. He’ll be pissed that I fucked up his payday, but he’ll let it go”—I point at her quickly—“I have you to thank for that.”