Page 137 of Vicious Little Princess

No.

It wasn’t possible.

Somebody had breached my network.

It shouldn’t—no.

I rapidly disconnected from the internet.

Fuck.

I needed to put a poison pill into the system to—

Movement in my peripheral vision over by the patio doors caught my attention a second before one of the doors shattered as something was lobbed through it.

I darted back from the island a second before it erupted and thick, heavy smoke filled the area, making me choke.

It filled the room in moments until it was near impossible to see a fucking thing.

I managed to lunge at my laptop and shut everything down with a single emergency command, just a second before a hand wrapped around my throat and yanked me back.

I landed on my hands and knees on the tiled floor, and a boot smashed into the side of my head in the next second, ripping my earpiece off. Another one came, driving right into my face then, the force of it knocking me onto my back.

I tasted blood on my lips, and the monster in me sparked to life.

The very fucking thing I was trying to tamper down.

That was made all the more difficult when I strained through the smoke to see three guys decked out in heavy tactical gear with gas masks strapped to their faces crowding me and moving in.

Son of a bitch.

“Santino wants a word with you,” one of them spoke.

He’s gonna force you to return what you stole and then he’ll do what he should have done a long time ago and bury you.

“He can go to hell,” I spat back.

One of them snapped their fingers, and another strode out through the shattered patio door, then reappeared, dragging two of our security guards, their skulls now blown to shit.

Oh my God.

“You want to suffer the same fate?”

I swallowed and looked away from Nico’s poor soldiers, then glared up at the asshole talking to me. “He’s gonna kill me either way the moment you take me to him. But not before. He can’t recover those funds without me. No matter how good your hackers are, it won’t make a difference.” Not with the way I’d hidden the money. “That’s why I’m not already dead, isn’t it?”

In the next second, they moved in.

I thrust my boot into the closest one’s face, blowing him back.See how you like it.

It gave me just enough room to rear back and spring to my feet.

I’d barely landed stably when I had to dodge out of the way of an incoming punch. I snagged the guy’s wrist, then shoved my knee into it, hearing a grunt and a crack simultaneously as it went limp in my hold, then I used it to haul him into the other two, forcing them back.

Unfortunately, it didn’t last long, and they recovered far too quickly, lunging at me.

I vaulted over the island just in time to avoid them making contact.

I went for the knife block on the counter.

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