Page 86 of Empire of Dark

She followed the line of my finger, stared at the two men for a long moment, and I could see her mind working, memorizing their faces. “This may work in our favor. If your brother is here, then we might be able to find Len sooner rather than later.”

The two men dropped their cigarettes and crushed them under their boots, then headed toward the front door of the building.

Ada noted their movement as well and looked at me. “Your men are in place and you are entering through the rear, correct?”

“Yes.”

Her hand went to the door, pulling the handle. “Then I have my first marks.” She motioned to the tiny earpiece hidden well under her hair as she set her right foot outside the SUV. “Keep your ear tuned to me.”

I grabbed her arm to stop her before she exited. “You remember the warehouse we passed back there as the meeting spot? The second something goes crooked, you get the hell out of here.”

She flicked her finger at her own arm. “Magic skin, remember?”

“Too well. But we both know you can be hurt in other ways and I really don’t want to have to rip the world apart to find you should one of those assholes inside decide they want to take you home as a treat.”

She leaned back in, her hand sliding in along my cheek, and she kissed me. Fire on her lips, her mouth opened so she could tangle with my tongue. Sweet and ravaging at the same time, this minx of contradictions.

Bloody hell, she was going to be the death of me.

She pulled away, wiping the side of her lips and the lipstick that had smeared. Looking just disheveled enough that she would be nothing but catnip to the malefics inside.

This was a bad fucking idea.

Before I could stop her, she was out the door, her sights already set on Eustice’s men that were disappearing into the club.

Forcing myself to sit still in the SUV, I watched her hurry down the sidewalk and make her way into the club with a quick nod from one of the bouncers at the door.

I dropped the privacy window to the front seat. “The men in place?”

Albert nodded, then started driving. “Positioned from here to six streets outward. Four men are already at the back, waiting for you.”

“You and another four are still on Ada?”

“Yes, sir. The other four are already inside.” Albert pulled around the next street and put the SUV in park. I’d hoped to leave him with the contingent protecting Venetia, but no one coordinated a team of men this big as well as Albert did.

“Good. Let Ada do her work and don’t get close unless it’s necessary. She doesn’t know you’ll be in there on her.”

“Yes, sir.”

I stepped out into the balmy air and took a lung-filling breath of the humid air. A salty brine deep into my lungs. Thick. Not like the clear air on the mountain.

I didn’t mind the sea as so many malefics did, with the possibility of watery purgatory ever haunting us. We could drown, but still be alive, never able to move from the seabed.

That was what I did with the worst of the worst. Sink them to the bottom of the ocean. Never to die. Never to see the sunlight again. Fish nibbling on their rotting flesh, only for it to regenerate and get gnawed off again and again for all eternity.

Moving toward the black door that blended into the night, I glanced to my left at the loading dock and the worker moving out of a doorway holding a large case of liquor. I waited for him to move ahead of us into the rear of the club before I nodded to my men waiting for me and we entered the club.

Through the dark hallways, I headed straight toward the rear entrance of the largest of the elite lounges. That was where Genora would be.

We passed a man on his way toward the back of the club and he stopped, surprised, when he saw me.

Genora’s nephew.

“Folotto. You are here.” Sylas Genora gave me a stiff nod.

“Of course I am. You don’t think I would let Eustice have this meeting without me, do you?”

“No.” Sylas heaved a sigh and I could feel the animosity sloughing off of him in waves. “Does this mean he stole Lenora with your approval?”

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