Page 67 of Devil's Bride

“She did.”

He nodded. I could tell he wasn’t thrilled, but accepted she’d had every right to make that decision. “They managed to knock out the cameras long enough to breach the exterior. We never saw them coming.”

“Typical,” I told him. This had been planned.

“Sissy!” a girl’s voice called from the hallway.

Genevieve jerked her head up then toward me.

“Go to her. I’ll find out what we’re dealing with,” I told her.

She nodded, silently issuing a thank you before walking both herself and her brother from the room.

I waited for a few seconds before heading into the hallway. Navarro came in from outside, his shirt covered in blood.

“From what I can tell, four of her men are down, one of ours, and eight enemy soldiers. But I think a few got away.”

His statement only boosted my anger. “They’ll return. Now that they have a taste for blood, they’ll hunger for more.” For a moment, I was taken back to the first time my father had forced me to watch as he’d interrogated a traitor. It had been the single time he’d done so inside our home.

The young man’s scream had remained with me for weeks. Only I’d been angry I hadn’t been the one who’d caused the asshole’s anguish.

“What do we do?”

“We get the Morales family to safety. We’ll take them to the other estate.”

The other estate was one I’d inherited from my grandfather and had been in the family for generations. It was a glorified castle built several hundred years before. What I hated was the oppressive feeling of being there, although it had been completely renovated. The reason I kept it was that it wasn’t registered on any documents that could be found and was perched in a location on a knoll that allowed for additional security.

For now, it would be our location of operation until I had a better handle on how the fuck to deal with this.

And where Genevieve’s loyalties remained.

I moved through the house, finding the soldier she’d likely killed. The fight had been brutal, the kitchen nearly destroyed. I stood in the center surveying the room and felt more than just a twinge of admiration. The woman could fight. I’d give her that.

Another strange feeling washed over me. I’d been worried about her and not just about the business or the opportunity. Her. The woman who grated my last nerve.

“A fucking mess,” Kruz said as he walked into the room.

“This was planned.”

“Obviously.”

“I think the Turks were sent to the warehouse to drive us away.” That meant either expectations that we could form an alliance had taken hold or our tenuous alliance had been leaked.

“What do you want done with the bodies?” Navarro asked. He was leaning against the doorway, his arms crossed.

“Start a bonfire. Afterwards, have the house cleaned.”

He nodded, his expression grim. He was the master at cleansing any property, which often unnerved me. With no conscience and no sense of remorse, he made the perfect soldier.

“At least she held her own.” Kruz seemed reflective, which wasn’t like him. I had a feeling it was based on his surprise that Genevieve had managed to remain alive.

“Yes, she did.” I eyed the man heading into the room. He wasn’t happy to see me, immediately storming toward me with venom in his eyes.

“You shouldn’t have come,” he said.

“Who are you?”

“Antonio Perez.”

---