Page 30 of Fierce Vows

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Istand at the endof the docks before daybreak, my fingers numbed from the familiar predawn coldness and sticky with the air that retains a degree of mugginess regardless of the hour.It was on a night like this one that we found Thalia, and the symmetry of what we’re about to do doesn’t sit poorly with me.

Perhaps it’s an omen of things to come.

“This is a shit idea.”Dom huffs at my side.His hands are tucked into the pockets of the same leather jacket he wore the night we first found her, though Thalia opted to remain back at the compound where they live now.

To any bystander we might look like two friends standing at the end of a dock, talking.

In a disreputable area, before the sun has risen.

When all the things that go bump in the night are still out at play.

But it’s been a long time since I believed in the boogeyman, and almost as long since I became the thing that most children fear that lingers in the darkest of places.

“It is a shit idea,” I agree, scanning the black waters beyond, but my line of sight is obscured by a faint line of mist rolling in.“But it’s my shit idea and until I’m gone, you’ll go with it.”

“Gone as in dead, or gone as in traded?Because if I do the latter, your wife will kill me before I propose to the woman I love, and if it’s the former, I’d like to throw in my chance to kill you first,” Dom grumbles, but there’s no heat in his words, only irritation.

It’s almost enough to cover the fear laced there, and it’s not for himself.

“If my wife returns, I’m sure she’ll have something to say for herself.”I smile and this time, it’s a real one.

“Fucking love-drunk cunt,” Dom mutters to the water.He spits into it and curses some more.

“What now?”I glance sideways at him and frown.

A small boat glides soundlessly out of the encroaching mist, the oars tucked into the sleek sides, one man at the helm, one at the back.

And in the middle stands the enemy I’m ready to skin the way I showed Willow how to do on her first art project in the basement of my house when Luca explained how to use her first knife.

Doing the job without her seems a waste but I’ll do it—after she’s back in my arms.

I only intend to let myself be tradedifI can’t get her back ...and I don’t see my wife anywhere.

“Thank you for coming,” I call to the man with the shortest life span in the area.“You’re a hard man to get a hold of.”

Finding someone who knew him was hard enough and cost me a pretty penny.In the end, both Diego and Dom were right.Many bribes at the docks passed from hand to hand, and blood stained the cement floors a dozen times over, but we got the answers we sought within a handful of hours, each constricting my chest until I could barely breathe.

Everything that led to this moment.

And now she’s not here.Only the man I hate, and a few lackeys who don’t matter enough to harm.

Singleton doesn’t so much as flinch.“Rafael Gallo.I’d say it’s a pleasure but...”He doesn’t laugh when the boat stops well out of my reach but not outside of Sonja’s sniper range.

Roman is undoubtedly nestled away with her in some high place.I can’t keep Willow’s brother safe no matter how hard I try.

“It’s most definitely someone’s pleasure,” I murmur, though my voice and Dom’s muttered undertones carry across the water despite our best efforts.

Tendrils of fog wrap around the boat, drawing the vessel and its occupants into an impenetrable curtain.I strain to see through the bank just feet from me in the darkness that carries the chill of impending death.

Singleton’s laugh reaches me.“You’re too late, you know.I don’t have what you seek.I just wanted to remind you of something.”

I bare my teeth.“What’s that?”You fucking asshole,I add mentally, scanning the area that’s closed in around us in seconds, the temperature plummeting.But Willow isn’t anywhere.

“That you’re an arrogant son of a bitch.”

I laugh.“That’s not a nice way to talk about your mother.”

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