Page 107 of Prohibited

“I am as capable of shooting a revolver as you are, dear cousin,” she said, coolly. “And I’m far better at sneaking, twisted ankle or not.”

“Well, seeing as how you escaped through a window, maybe a window is our ticket back in,” Alex said, leaning his forearms on the back of the seat.

“Except that we don’t have a ladder on hand,” Saoirse pointed out, sourly.

“Not that window.” He scoffed. “But it’s the middle of summer. There’s got to be a window open or unlocked on the ground floor.”

“I suppose,” she said.

“And that man is probably arrogant enough to think that no one would dare break into his house,” Alex went on. “Especially while the lights are burning.”

“Okay,” Saoirse said after a pause. “So we enter through a window and, what, creep through the house until we get ourselves killed?”

“Let’s just case the place and see what we see,” Alex said, impatiently.

The fresh air coming off of the river hit him through the open window as she turned onto Riverside, but it did little to calm the pace of his heart. Alex had done his share of burglaries but he had never doneanything so brazen.

“If I go into that house tonight, I’m not leaving until Walter Stanley is dead,” Saoirse said with a deadly calm.

“No,” Alex said. “He doesn’t deserve a quick death. And don’t get yourself killed, or your brother is going to have my head.”

“There are two of us,” Saoirse said suddenly. “And we should use that to our advantage.”

“Ambush,” Ryan said in a hoarse voice. Alex put his hand on Ryan’s knee. Ryan’s leg tensed a little under his touch, and then relaxed. Alex nearly swooned.

“He’s probably not alone,” Saoirse said, turning her head this way and that as she prepared to make another turn. “He always has his lackeys around. See if we can draw them out. One of us serves as a distraction, then the other can–” She made her hand into a pistol and made a popping noise with her mouth.

“You know,” Alex said, leaning forward onto his folded arms, “I’ve known you for years, Saoirse, and I never knew you were this practical.”

“You weren’t paying attention,” she said, primly.

Chapter forty-one

Evie

“Evelyn. Evelyn, Evelyn, Evelyn. What am I going to do with you?” Walter blew silken ribbons of smoke out of his mouth as he spoke, watching her from a few paces away.

Deadly, the look in his eyes. His cold beauty clutched at her, the way that it had the first time she’d ever laid eyes on him. The small crescent scar under his eye that she had kissed so many times twisted in her heart like a knife.

“Walter, please,” she said, twisting her hands against the rope that bound her to the chair.

She had never, in all of her life, even with everything that had happened to her in the past weeks, been this frightened.

Because she wasn’t as frightened of anybody as she was of Walter Stanley.

“Walter, let me explain,” she said.

“Explain what, baby?” he asked her in a voice that held no emotion. He took one step toward her, and then another. “Explain how you’ve made a fucking fool of me up and down this town?” He took another step and thenslowly bent so that they were eye to eye. “Explain why you had your hands all over the good police Lieutenant? Explain where the fuck you’ve been for weeks while I’ve torn the world apart looking for you, and you’ve had a leisurely vacation? Laughing at me? Taunting me, Evelyn? Taking any fucking cock you want to because you think I won’t find out?” His voice dropped to a deadly whisper. “I always find out, Evelyn. You should have known that by now.”

“It wasn’t like that,” she said, twisting her hands again. She resisted the urge to lean away from him, to show any emotion. “They– They kidnapped me. I didn’t go with them willingly.”

“Then, darlin’,” he said in a voice that was nearly a purr, “explain how you came to suddenly appear in Roberts’ office with his hands practically inside of your dress. No phone call to me. No letter. No acknowledgement.” His fingers bit into her face until she nearly cried out. “Nothing. Not a thought about me, about how worried I was for you. How certain I was that terrible things were happening to you and there was nothing I could do.” His voice rose in a rare show of emotion that stunned her into silence.

He looked radiant, a cold, dark god of death with eyes of glittering frost. It took her breath away and, for the hundredth time, she couldn’t help but think of Ryan. His warm, earthy counterpart. How strange that two men could be so different and yet somehowsimilar.

“Walter,” she said in a voice that shook. “It’s complicated. Y-You don’t understand–”

“What don’t I understand, Evelyn?” he asked her, in a soft, dangerous voice. He took a drag of his cigarette and then blew the smoke out of the corner of his mouth, never taking his eyes off of her face.

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