Total pages in book: 64
Estimated words: 62497 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 312(@200wpm)___ 250(@250wpm)___ 208(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 62497 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 312(@200wpm)___ 250(@250wpm)___ 208(@300wpm)
I shut the door behind me and reach for the lights. Flicking them on, I see Pops sitting in the middle of the living room with a wine glass in hand, and next to him is Mayve, who is currently passed out with her hands tied. My feet start toward her, but he tsks at me. I stop, and he pulls something up into my line of sight. That’s when I see he has a wire wrapped around her neck that tightens when he pulls on it.
“Pull too hard and suffocate the poor girl,” he says, looking her way. “Pretty thing. Didn’t think she would be your type, but I see the attraction.” He pulls again, and I watch the wire cut deeper into her neck. “You knew the rules. No emotional connections… It’s what forms your weakness. You know this, yet here you stand. If it hadn’t been for her, I’m sure you would have stayed my obedient solider.”
“No, you would still be sending people to try to kill me,” I say. “With no luck, I might add.”
“Yes, you are a pain in the ass to kill, that I will admit. After all, I did train you and made you the best.” He smiles.
A small sound draws my gaze back to Mayve. She is slowly waking, her eyes fluttering.
She will hate me for this, but it’s my only option.
“Kill her! Like I fucking care. But in the end, you will be lying next to her, not me.”
Mayve’s eyes crack open, and she shakes her head slightly with her brows drawn. She stops as soon as she feels the wire tightening around her neck. Those eyes find me, and they pause, blink, and pause again.
She heard what I said, and she is not impressed.
Fuck, she is going to hate me, and it’s going to take some effort to come back from this.
“We could have solved this easier, Kenzo.” Pops shakes his head. “Yet, you decided to go about it the hard way.” Just then, the door opens, and Kyson is brought in, his face splattered with blood, and he is pushed down to his knees. “Did you really think I didn’t know you were going to bring your brother?”
Brother. He said brother, not brothers.
And I see no sign of Zuko.
“Even when I tried separating you two, you always found your way back to each other. I underestimated the twin bond,” Pops says.
“I’ll kill you,” Kyson shouts to Pops, staring daggers at him and wiping at his face as two men stand behind him. One holds a gun to his head, the other a knife at his throat.
“You know better than to throw empty threats,” Pops says to Kyson before he focuses back on me. “Now, where is Zuko?” he asks.
I shrug, and he pulls a little tighter on the wire around Mayve’s neck. “You may think you want her dead, but I have this distinct feeling you do not.”
“Let her go,” Zuko orders as he walks in.
But he’s not alone. He has Pops’s plaything that he’s had on the side of his wife, the one he hasn’t ever seemed to let go of, with him, a knife to her throat.
Pops glances his way and gives an eye roll.
“You can kill the bitch. You should know better than to use a woman against me,” Pops says, shaking his head.
“What? How could you say that?” his side piece screams and struggles, but Zuko holds her in place.
Pops looks back at me with not a care in the world about his plaything.
“All three Hunter brothers. It’s going to be perfect. To kill all of you in one go. If you’d just kept your heads in the game, you would have been perfect.”
“Your perfect little soldiers,” Kyson sneers, and Pops’s eyes flick to his.
“Yes, I know it was you who turned him against me.” Pops looks back at me. “One of your many traits was that you were loyal to a fault.” Pops stands and steps behind Mayve, whose gaze is flicking everywhere.
She’s scared.
Trembling.
And I hate that for her!
“If your brother would have stayed out of it, you would have had no issues with what I was doing,” Pops says. And I fear he’s right. I probably wouldn’t have. It was Kyson who brought it up and made me see clearly. I would have let it all slide because I trusted Pops. Let’s face it I had no reason not to.
But now?
Now, he has the woman I love in his hands, and tears are silently sliding down her cheeks.
I’m not sure she will forgive me for this.
Thirty-One
Mayve
There’s a scream, and I can’t believe it’s not from my lips.
But somehow, I stay silent as I watch Kenzo. His gaze flicks to me every now and then, but it mostly stays trained on the man behind me who is pulling tighter on whatever is around my neck with each passing second.