Page 19 of Savage Hunter

“Wolfe,” I say softly and look to the guard keeping me captive. “I’ll get in the van. I promise. Just let me say goodbye.” He looks to my mother for approval and she nods.

I cross to Wolfe and throw my arms around his shoulders. “Let me go, Wolfe. Don’t let your sister pay for our sins.”

Bloody lips touch mine. Our foreheads meet. “I love you. I’ll die for you.” He’s breathing heavily and bleeding. His ribs took a pounding. Fear grips my insides, but no matter how scared I am, no one deserves to die for our love.

“I’ll find you.”

“This is all so sweet.” Another snap and men are moving in, orders barked.

I see Wolfe’s lips move, but the fist in my hair pulling me away shatters my focus. What did he say? I want to run to him, but I know I can’t.

Tears fall down my cheeks. Numbness sets in. A quiet sob slips past my lips. I want to give into a burst of ugly rage, but Wolfe’s strength feeds into me. Rage distorts his handsome features. Blood stains his shirt and more spills from his mouth. And yet he still fights the men who try to grab him on either side. He shakes them off and tries to get to me. I can’t bear to see him hurt because of me. A switch flips inside me and I go from disbelief to resigning myself that this is truly happening.

My mother is betraying me.

And for what? Power and money? She never cared about me. She murdered my father and now I am nothing more than a tool in her chest to push her higher up the invisible ladder of hierarchy of her dark sinister world.

“I’ll go. But please don’t hurt him. I’ll go.”

Rough hands push me into the back of a van and I willingly climb over the edge and do nothing to keep the stranger from locking my wrists in cuffs.

Wolfe fights against the men holding him. Another jumps on his back as he fights one off and then another. Fists connect with bodies as he struggles to get to me.

I look at my mother standing off to the side looking triumphant. I’ve seen her garden statues show more emotion in their chiseled faces than she has etched into her blank expression.

Narrow shoulders pin back from a full chest. She holds her head high as the stranger slips a ring onto her finger, bends and kisses the ruby.

“Welcome to Society 69, Queen Primrose.”

Four

Wolfe

For the first time in my life, fear kicks me in the balls.

Blood runs down the side of my face. It burns my eyes. Its pungent, metallic odor forces bile into the back of my throat. I imagined I would die by violence. My life as a mafia enforcer dictates I won’t go peacefully off into the night.

I never thought it would be over a girl.

Hearing the screams from the guests as I entered the courtyard was one thing. But seeing my Harmonia holding a gun on her mother nearly drove me to my knees. Until now the distant coolness of Harmonia’s mother was never something to fear. It broke my heart for the tender girl I crave more than the air in my lungs, but I never thought her mother would use her for power.

My heart falls to the ground as I watch them drive off with Harmonia chained in the back. Glowing taillights fade into the night. I meant what I said. I will burn the world to ashes to find her.

“Kill him.”

I slowly turn to look at the new queenpin of Society 69. Feeling as though I’m swallowing broken glass, I work to keep this casual while I work on an exit strategy. I can’t save Harmonia if I take a bullet to the head.

“Everything you had me setting up over the last year was for this night, wasn’t it? The shell corporations. The payoffs. The blackmailing of high-powered officials.” Her tight-lipped expression and pursed lips tells me what I already know.

Primrose takes my face in her hands and swipes a thumb through the blood oozing from my busted lip. Fucking brass knuckles from the pussy ass guard too scared to take me on man to man, hurt like a motherfucker. I’m not the least bit sorry I put two rounds in the bastard’s head. You want to fight, you better be able to hold your own—fist to fist.

I look on in disgust as Queen Bitch licks my blood off her thumb and then leans in and presses her cold lips to mine.

“You’ve served your purpose. I want him buried with the Italian. You’ll find him in my office. See to it no traces of either are left behind. I want it as if neither ever existed. Let it be a lesson for all of you. Cross me and I will erase you. You knew this from the first day.”

I sense more than see shadows move in, surrounding me. Their mistake. My hand flies to my guns only to remember the girls are empty and on the ground.

Fuck.

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