Page 88 of Relentless

He frowned at her raspy voice. “I’ll turn on the light.”

Keeping her against his side, Liam circled to the opposite side of the bed and turned on the lamp. The dim light gave him just enough vision to see the red marks on her throat.

Liam growled. Was his aim to kill her or knock her out? Either way, this clown would be sorry he’d laid a hand on Liam’s woman.

He nudged Piper to a nearby chair. “Stay here.”

“Why?”

“I don’t want you close when I take the mask off his face in case he’s faking unconsciousness.”

“Can’t we just call the police?”

“How did he get into the house? This place has security crawling all over it.”

“I wish I knew.”

“We have two possibilities. Either the security measures are subpar, or he was already on the estate. I want answers before we call the cops.”

Liam flipped the intruder onto his back and yanked off the mask. His lip curled. No wonder he knew where Piper was sleeping tonight.

“Who is it?”

“The guard at the front gate.”

“Why would he want to hurt me?”

“Let’s find out. Still have water in the bottle I brought you?”

Piper retrieved the bottle and tossed it to Liam’s outstretched hand.

He unscrewed the cap and dumped the contents on the guard’s face.

The man choked and sputtered, his eyelids fluttering up. He saw Liam and scowled. “You’re a dead man,” he snapped.

He ignored the threat. “What are you doing in this room?”

A sullen glare was his response.

Liam considered his options. On the house tour, he’d discovered Romano’s room was in the other wing on the first floor. Should be far enough away to keep Piper’s uncle from investigating a muffled scream. However, the guards roamed the house at thirty-minute intervals. In fact, the guard’s sweep should be occurring in the next ten minutes, not enough time to get as much information as Liam wanted from this clown.

Fine. He’d get what he could from this guy, then leave him for the cops when the guard appeared. When the gatekeeper tried to get up, Liam shoved him down. “Stay.”

The guy cursed at him.

Liam crouched and gripped the area between the man’s neck and shoulder, pinching one of the nerves. The other man gasped, his face losing all trace of color. “Watch your mouth,” Liam said, voice soft. “There’s a lady present.” After receiving a nod of compliance, Liam asked, “Name?”

“Rusty.”

“Here’s how this is going to play out, Rusty. You tell me what I want to know or you’ll wish you had never been born. What are you doing in Piper’s room?”

The man clammed up.

Liam sighed. “We’re doing this the hard way, huh?” He glanced at Piper. “Lock yourself inside my room, baby.”

“I’d rather stay with you.” Fear glimmered in her eyes.

He hoped she wouldn’t regret her choice during the interrogation or in agreeing to marry Liam. “No matter what, don’t interfere.” He turned back to Rusty, clamped a hand over his mouth and bore down hard on the same nerve he’d pinched a minute before.

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