Page 4 of Empire of Dark

His mouth pulled to the side and then he nodded. He straightened in his seat, brushing crushed glass off his dark sleeve.

It didn’t take long before we pulled up to the hotel nestled just outside of the mountain village.

We both got out and I rushed ahead of him. Knowing he would have to regroup with his men, I glanced at him over my shoulder as I headed toward the elevator. “Night, Tri, see you in the morning.”

He stared at me, not saying a word. I pretended not to notice the definite tic along his jaw at my words.

I knew he could see how nervous I was. How much I needed to slip away from him before he deemed me unfit for the mission.

But I had to escape him. He couldn’t see me like this. Couldn’t see what could happen. He wouldn’t send me into the Folotto compound if he did.

I couldn’t let him question me.

Because I needed this. Needed to be the one on this mission.

My foot tapping, I waited for the elevator doors to close before I collapsed back against the rear mirrored wall, the pain stabbing through my head, blinding me.

I just needed to get to my room.

Into my room and I could curl into a ball and let the pain have its way with me.

I’d be in control of it by the morning.

I had to be.

Chapter Two

{ ADA }

Resist.

Resist at all costs.

Easy enough, as I hated all of the Folotto family.

Hated.

A strong word and I didn’t hate all malefics—I couldn’t. That would be an insanely ridiculous amount of hate to manifest on a daily basis and I had much better things to do with my time. Some malefics even had a modicum of decency about them, though those were few and far between.

But the Folottos?

Hate was not a strong enough word for what I felt for them. Even after all these years.

Despise. Loathe. Abhor. Detest. Repulsed.

That was a nice collection of words, and that was without pulling up a thesaurus to help me.

Resisting would be easy, even if I was about to embroil myself with the leader of the Folotto clan for a year.

Hate would get me through.

The SUV I sat in the back of next to Triaten turned onto a rough one-lane road, cobblestones thumping under the tires asthe road started to weave back and forth along the edge of the mountain.

The trees at this elevation were starting to grow sparser and my lips parted as I heaved a breath into my lungs.

Summer to summer.

Only one year.

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