Page 143 of Taming Seraphine

The entire room washes away, leaving me panting hard and clinging to Leroi like he’s my lifeboat. He holds me tight as I ride out the waves of pleasure, my body shaking with each delicious ripple.

“You were so beautiful, angel, coming apart in my fingers.”

As I finally come back to reality, I rest my head against Leroi’s shoulder and sigh.

He kisses the top of my head. “Good girl.”

“That was incredible.” I whisper, my heart still pounding with enough force to wake the dead.

Leroi pulls away just enough to look into my eyes. He brushes a strand of hair off my face and gazes down at me with a tenderness that makes my heart soar.

His phone buzzes once more.

With a groan, he gropes around the sofa and picks it up. A second later, his muscles tighten. “Shit.”

“What’s happened?” I ask, my eyes still half-lidded, my mind still drowsy with bliss.

“It’s Rosalind. My cousin took her back home, and she tried to inject him with poison.”

I sit up, my eyes widening. “Wait—what?”

“He knocked her unconscious, opened her purse, and found a bunch of syringes. He used her Face ID to open her phone and found pictures of the Montesano brothers. And me.”

My breath catches. “Don’t tell me she’s like me?”

“No,” he mutters. “Rosalind is apaidassassin.”

FIFTY-FIVE

SERAPHINE

Leroi wanted me to stay behind while he dealt with the Rosalind situation, but I insisted he bring me, reminding him of his promise to not leave me behind. He tried to argue that it’s not the same, but I can’t sit in his apartment, fretting about another hitman running around wanting to kill him and his family, when maybe there’s something I can do to help.

After throwing on some clothes, I put in my colored contacts and we head across town to Alderney Hill. This district is fancier than Queen’s Garden, with every street lined with dense juniper trees that shield its mega-mansions from prying eyes. I remember Mom calling this the old money part of the city because it’s where the original settlers built their homes. It’s also the location of the Montesano estate.

Leroi’s jaw is set, and his grip on the steering wheel is so hard, his knuckles are white. Tension raises his shoulders, and the veins on his temple stand on end. I reach over to the driver’s seat to offer some comfort, but he barely responds.

As we drive through streets that wind upward through a conifer-covered hill, my stomach coils with dread. I’m about to meet the sons of my first target, Enzo Montesano.

“Will they recognize me?” I whisper, a shudder running down my spine.

The guard who served me drugged champagne would have remembered laying me on that bed, and there might have even been cameras.

He shakes his head. “We all thought Uncle Enzo died of a heart attack. Even if they suspected he was murdered, you’re no longer a blonde-haired, blue-eyed little girl.”

I nod, but it does nothing to ease my churning stomach.

Finally, we reach the top of the hill, which has been flattened to create an estate surrounded by a wall of tightly packed conifers. We stop at a tall iron gate manned by armored guards and Leroi winds down the window.

A man in a visor peers in, his gaze assessing Leroi before lingering on me. My breath stills, and I sit straighter in my seat.

“Who’s the girl?” the man asks.

“She’s with me,” Leroi growls.

“Let them in,” says a voice from the guard’s walkie-talkie.

We pass enough men to form a small army, and submit to a few more security checks before we finally pull up to a mansion that looks built for a Roman senator. It’s a huge, white villa that’s half covered in ivy with a palazzo-style front porch of marble pillars. Coming here reminds me of how Dad used to rant about how Enzo Montesano thought he owned New Alderney.

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