Page 121 of A Taste Of Darkness

How dare he ruin that image of him in my mind?

“Do you have any idea where she’d be?” Kai asked after he hung up the phone. “You’ve been here for less than a day, so I doubt she knows a lot of places to hide yet.”

My guess was Tartarus until Michael texted me about ten minutes ago that she wasn’t there. Since we had been at my penthouse, I knew she wasn’t there either.

“Maybe she’s still at Sterlie’s place. Not inside her apartment but one that wasn’t affected,” I said, but that seemed a little too obvious. “Or she’s simply running around.”

“Do you think someone in Italy knows what your sister’s planning?”

I nodded. “I know what she’s planning,” I admitted. “The guys who attacked Sterlie months ago were working for my sister, or they had no other choice but to work for her. It doesn’t matter either way. My cousin told me that Adriana wants to be in charge, so she’s planning to kill me. She’d go after Arlo next, and anyone else who’d try to get in her way.”

It still didn’t make sense, though.

Why was Adriana going after Sterlie if it was me she wanted dead?

Even a couple of months ago, Adriana knew I was still alive, so yes, if she wanted to kill me, it made sense to send someone to do it… but why go after Sterlie?

She had Tartarus’s address; she could’ve sent someone to wait outside the building and attack me when I wasn’t expecting it. And if that was too dangerous with my security around, she could’ve gone after Arlo and attacked him. I would’ve come out of hiding for him as well.

Or she simply could’ve told our father and he would’ve found a way to contact me, get me to come back home where she would’ve had easy access to me.

It made no sense.

“Why Sterlie though?” Kai asked. “To get to you, yes, but she had two months to kill you and Sterlie in your sleep… why now?”

I stayed silent, trying to think of possible reasons why she was trying again now when she had two whole months.

“Drive to the hospital,” I said, slowly connecting all the dots.

“You can’t be anywh?—”

“Kai, just once in your life, listen to me. Drive to the fucking hospital.”

My phone chimed, and I looked down to read the message from Michael.

Michael: Adriana’s at the hospital.

64

BLOODY MESSAGE

Sterlie Adams

I started to get worried ten minutes ago when Flora still hadn’t returned from the vending machine in the hallway.

She left thirty minutes ago, and while I wasn’t exactly conscious when I was brought to my room, I knew it didn’t take thirty minutes to find a vending machine around here, buy a snack or two, and get back.

I couldn’t call her, either, because I didn’t think to get my phone while I was forcing myself to stay awake and get out of my apartment.

Since I was feeling better now, I decided to get up and look for my sister. I was a little wobbly on my feet, but that was okay. Perhaps walking also helped the throbbing headache. Speaking of the headache, if I passed a nurse, I could try to get her to pump me with some more pain medication to finally get rid of the pounding in my head.

It’d gotten significantly more quiet in this hospital over the past thirty minutes, but I didn’t think much of it. I thought it simply quieted down, after all, it was the middle of the night.

When I reached the door and opened it, I expected to find a bunch of security guards staring back at me… what I found instead were puddles of blood. I found men lying cramped up on the floor, clutching their open stab wounds as if that was going to help them not to bleed to death.

There was not a single hospital staff in sight. All of them were probably with patients or facing the same fate as Kai’s security.

My stomach sank. An overwhelming urge to vomit snuck up on me with every second I stood in the door, not moving.

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