Page 6 of Slaughter

I chuckle, but mine aren’t far off from hers. “Just a little farther.”

My boots dig into the firmly packed snow. I make it to the spot and turn to face her. She has her arms crossed over her chest, briskly bouncing up and down to keep warm. She wears a white snowsuit and jacket. She has the hood up and a pink scarf wrapped around her face, covering her mouth and nose. All I can see is her pretty blue eyes.

“Let’s go.” She gestures to the skis that I hold in my hands. “I wanna get down the mountain and then get a cup of hot chocolate.”

I drop them, and they fall to my sides.

“Avery …”

I kneel down and look up at her.

She takes a step toward me, narrowing her blue eyes on mine. “We don’t have time for this, babe. It’s freezing …”

I pull the white box out of my pocket, and her words come to a halt.

She reaches up and pulls down her scarf to show me her pink lips. “Avery,” she whispers. “What are you …?” She looks around as if this is a joke. As though someone is gonna jump out and say gotcha. I get it. We’re young. But I love her. Presleigh Joanna Clarke is the one for me.

“Bunny, I love you!” Tears instantly spring to her eyes. I clear the knot in my throat. “Will you …?”

“Yes!” She squeals before running and jumping on me. I go tumbling backward into the snow, laughing as her lips touch mine.

I pull myself out of that memory from so long ago. Yet so much changed right after that. Not sure what I was thinking anyway. She was seventeen, and I was nineteen. Too young to be engaged. Too young to be in love. And just months later, she left me.

I look down at him, and that sadistic smile is still on his face—as if he can read my mind. See my thoughts.

He’s fucking with me. He has to be. How would he …?

“I can see it written all over your face,” he muses and then coughs, blood spilling out of his mouth and running down his chin.

I run a hand through my hair and let out a growl. This can’t be happening! “Get ready to leave,” I tell Kayn, and he frowns at me, not knowing what is going on. He doesn’t know about her. The woman I loved to the bitch I now hate. If anyone is going to have her, it’s gonna be me.

The man in the chair chuckles. “When he finds out you have Presleigh, he’ll kill you, and then he’ll take her. All bets will be off.”

He’s telling the truth, but he underestimates me. Just like they all do. That’s why he is about to die, and I’m not. I pull my cell out of my pocket and hit number two on my speed dial, dialing my pilot’s number. “Hello?” he answers sleepily.

“I want wheels up in an hour. We’re going to New York.” I hang up and hand it to Kayn. He takes it without a word. “Now, where were we?” I ask, twirling the pliers in my hand.

CHAPTER TWO

AVERY

“HEY, YOU’VE REACHED PRESTON. Leave a message …”

I hang up, walking onto my private jet. Going straight over to the minibar, I pour myself a glass of scotch and then sit down on the white leather. I’ve showered and put on clean clothes. It delayed my departure by an hour, but after I butchered the man in my cellar, I needed to do a few things.

Kayn comes to sit across from me. “I got the information you asked for, sir.”

“What did you find?”

He flips open a white folder. “Presleigh Joanna Clarke. Age twenty-eight. Female. Blue eyes—”

“I know all that,” I growl, interrupting him.

He nods and then scans over it some more. “Marital status. Single.”

My brows lift. “Divorced?”

“No, sir.”

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