Page 51 of Final Cost

Daniel’s expression sours. “No. We were never intimate.”

“Why not?” Lucien says, scoffing. “She fucked everyone else.”

I shoot Lucien a warning look. Neither one of us should be taunting Daniel now. No matter how tempting it is. We need to say or do anything we can to stay alive. But neither man is looking at me. They’re locked in on each other with mutual malice.

“I was her best friend,” Daniel says with the kind of pride you’d expect him to use if the title was Global Superhero or Supreme Emperor of the Universe. “Her closest confidant.Iwas her person. She told me that. All the time. She didn’t want to take the chance of ruining our relationship by making it sexual.”

A flash of amusement from Lucien. He quickly represses it, to my great relief. “That must’ve been tough. With you loving her so much and all.”

Daniel nods. He seems too choked up to speak. And I may be wrong, but I think I see a shimmer of tears in his bright blue eyes.

“So… You, what? Helped her fake her own death?” Lucien says.

Daniel clears his throat. Shrugs. “Why not? It wasn’t hard to capsize the boat. I helped her get a fake passport. She already had money offshore. It was easy.”

“Except the part about me and the police going nuts trying to find her,” Lucien says. “Why did she do it? What was her game plan?”

Scathing look from Daniel. “To get the fuck away from you. What else?”

“That doesn’t make sense,” Lucien says. “I offered her a fortune to agree to a divorce. She could have gotten the fuck away from me all she wanted.”

A shout of bitter laughter from Daniel. “This is why you never deserved her. Because you never understood her. Not like I did. You didn’t love her for who she was.Idid.”

One of Lucien’s brows goes up. “Okay. I’ll bite. What am I not getting?”

“Ravenna didn’t just want to get away from you,” Daniel says, his voice now thick with what sounds like righteous anger. “She wanted to stick it to you. Towin. On her terms. She wanted to let you know that you may own the earth, but you didn’t own her. And you don’t own me.”

“I see,” Lucien says, and he seems sad now. “Youthought I owned you.Ithought we were friends.”

“Friends?”Daniel’s voice booms through the room. “How can you be friends with someone you regard as your inferior?”

Lucien looks stung. “Inferior? We grew up together. You, me and Roman. We did everything together —”

“No. You gave me handouts. And you never let me forget it.”

“Handouts?”Lucien says.

“Do you think I wanted to be reminded that you lived in the big house and I lived in the caretaker’s cottage? You think I wanted to wearyourold clothes and rideyourhorse and swim inyourpool? You think I wanted to go to the local public school when you and Roman went off to boarding school? Or maybe you think it was cool for me to work my ass off and buy my own first car at the age of 20 when your father gave you and Roman BMWs the second you turned sixteen.”

An incoherent sound of outrage from Lucien. “You werepart of the family!”

Daniel sneers and lashes out, raising the pistol and connecting it with Lucien’s jaw hard enough to make Lucien’s head whip around and a shot ring out. The sound is nerve shredding, like cannon fire. Plaster explodes from the far wall. Lucien shouts with pain. I shriek, involuntarily reaching for him before a warning look from Daniel freezes me in my spot.

“Never say that again!”Daniel roars, wild-eyed now. Worse, his voice is guttural and chilling, the kind of thing that belongs in a movie about demonic possession.” “Do you understand me?”

Lucien spits blood and swivels his lower jaw back and forth, probably making sure it’s still attached to his body. Then, unbelievably, he checks to make sureI’mokay. Howhe’sstill standing after a blow like that, I’ll never know. I nod. Try to smile. Then he turns to Daniel. “I understand. No need to get excited.”

Daniel’s inner gargoyle and burgeoning insanity slowly retreat until his eyes merely gleam with malice rather than flashing with it. He checks his collar with his free hand. Tugs the bottom of his suit jacket to straighten it out. Clears his throat and bows his head. “Apologies for my bad manners,” he says, and his voice is gruff but otherwise normal again. “Your mother would not appreciate the damage to her wall.”

Lucien starts to smile, then grimaces from the pain and raises a hand to his face. “No worries. It’s been that kind of day.”

“I wasnotpart of the Winter family,” Daniel says, enunciating his words with great care.“That’s the kind of nonsense the rich tell each other to feel better about themselves. They talk about how well they treat their staff members while they’re always keeping a foot on their necks.”

In a night full of shocking events, this unleashed violence and vitriol from Daniel may be the worst of all. And if it hits me this hard, I’m sure it’s gotta be killing Lucien.

“I see,” Lucien says quietly, looking pale around the livid red mark now blossoming over half his face. “What should I have done for you that I didn’t do, pray tell?”

“You could let me have Ravenna,” Daniel says.

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