Page 54 of Wicked Angel

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GAVEN

Iwas used to death. I’d dealt it out enough times in my lifetime that it had ceased to affect me the same way it might an average man. This was something entirely different. I’d known the victim. I’d been hisfriend. His demise meant that the future was changing. All of my plans needed to be adjusted.

His death meant I’d missed something, and I was not a man whomissedthings.

Raffaello's blood was everywhere. It was soaked into the carpet beneath my feet in a gruesome puddle that had dried overnight. "Sir?" One of the Price guards approached me carefully.

"Have you found her yet?" I demanded as I stared down, unseeing, at the brown dried blood.

"No, sir … there was, um, a note left." My head jerked up and I spun toward the man. “It was by the front door, along with…” He didn’t have to say what it was left next to. He held up a plastic bag with a bloodied knife inside.Fuck.

The man looked decidedly uncomfortable, but I didn't give a shit. I reached for the piece of paper in his hand and snatched it away. I prayed it was an explanation. An excuse for her disappearance wouldn’t mean she wouldn’t be punished, but it might, at the very least, provide some insight into the events that had taken place while I’d been asleep.

It was a short note. Nothing spectacular and nothing with a goddamn explanation. It was four simple words.

I'm sorry,Gaven. — Angel

She was sorry?Fucking sorry? Where the fuck did her ‘sorry’ come into this clusterfuck of a morning?I threw the paper down, cursing as I turned back toward the soiled office.

"Gaven?"

I stiffened at the sound of Jackie's voice. "Not now,” I snapped.

The sound of a feminine inhale reached my ears.Fuck.I'd nearly forgotten. Raffaello hadn't just left Angel behind when the poor bastard had been murdered sometime in the night, he'd left his other daughter as well, and now, I had no fucking clue what to do. I was an assassin, not a family man. Angel and Raffaello were both supposed to ease me into the role. Angel, with her body, to carry my seed and bear my heir. Raffaello, to guide my hand in their businesses. Now, here I was, thrown with no remorse from the fucking universe, right into the flames.

"I'm sorry to bother you," Jackie said, her voice quiet but firm, "but I've just been informed that forensics on the weapon came back."

My body jolted and I turned to face her. She looked pointedly at the bag the guard was holding. They’d already taken it to forensics and brought it back? That seemed highly suspicious. I narrowed my eyes on her.

"They came to you?" I demanded. I'd told those bastards that I was the head of the Price Family now. They were meant to come tome,not her.

She nodded. Despite the ordeal of the morning, the death of her father, and the grief I figured she must be feeling, Jacquelina Price remained impassive. Or professional might have been the better term. Dressed in a pair of Louboutin heels, a black pencil skirt, and a charcoal blouse—she looked ready to attend an important business meetinganda funeral. I eyed her and her attire curiously. Was it just because she’d been raised in the Price household, or was there another reason for her composure?

Jackie held out a file for me and without a second thought, I took it, flipped it open, and scanned the documents. My jaw clenched as I read the words. "Tell them to do it again," I snapped, shutting the file. "There's been a mistake."

Jackie's face blanched. It was a practiced move, though, as if she was forcing the show of emotion but didn't want to interrupt the beauty of her looks. "There's been no mistake, Gaven. The blood on the blade is my father's … and my sister's."

"She's not dead," I growled before gesturing to papers I'd thrown to the floor. "She left a note." And there was no body.

For a moment, surprise skittered across Jackie's face. Then it slowly morphed into careful consideration as she bent down and retrieved the short letter my fucking wife had left me the morning after I'd put a ring on her finger and taken her as mine. I knew, in that moment, there would be no other like her. Just as there would be no other man for her. She had, however, chosen the worst of times to get cold feet and run away.

It was too late. We were married, and I'd meant what I'd said—there was no place she could run that I would not find her. She belonged to me. She was my property. No amount of distance could change that fact.

"Gaven..." Jackie's voice was careful as she held up the note and looked from it back to me. "I'm not saying that she could be dead."

I frowned. "Then Isuggestyou tell me what it is that youaresaying," I bit out. "I am not a patient man." Especially when I had a wife to track down.

Jackie inhaled and lowered the letter to her side. She stepped up and flicked a finger along the top of the file in my grasp. "There was blood on the knife—hers and his," she said. "She left you a note—Gaven, you're a fine man. Handsome. Skilled.Powerful." As she emphasized that last word, I narrowed my eyes on her. "My sister never wanted to marry you." I'd known that. I hadn't cared. "She wanted anormallife … is it really difficult to understand what happened?"

"Why don't you spell it out for me?" I offered in a cold voice.

Jackie's hand lifted from the file and moved to my chest. I willed myself not to fling her away. "She must have been quite distraught by the events of last night," Jackie surmised. "I assume she came in here and found our father. She might have thought he could do something about ... well, she might have regretted..."

“Spit. It. Out.” I gritted my own words out.

Jackie tilted her head to the side. “The knife found was yours, Gaven,” she said. “Who else had access to your things?”

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