Page 156 of Wicked Little Lies

TWENTY-EIGHT

HENDRICK

Jac’s pointing the gun at Leandra, but he’s not going to kill her. I don’t think so, anyway. Not yet. We need to keep her alive, with Francis, until justice is served.

Then Cat’s face registers.

Shit. Fuck. “Magdalena?”

“Y-Yes?”

“Come over here. This isn’t for you. This is for her.”

On shaking legs, she rises and sits between me and Maximo. It’s a piece of theatrics of letting the other woman know she alone is facing the fates of the Quinate. I thought Cat would have seen that.

But…my gaze falls on the stolen items from the Quinate members. Perhaps those things might have been playing a little too hard in her head for her to see the intent.

Cat’s not a trusting soul.

Even though I thought she’d trust me and Jac a little more. After everything.

“Ivan?” I gesture for him to take over.

Nodding, Ivan he stretches out as Jac keeps the gun trained on the woman. “You had a Quinate killed, and worse, set it up foranother Quinate. Jac and Hendrick are both lucky this happened in transition mode. Or else…” He smiles and it’s utterly chilling. “Or else it would be so much worse. As it stands, your family’s going to be wiped off the face of the planet. Close friends. Business partners who are in too deep with you. The children young enough…”

Cat’s eyes snap to me.

Like she knows that this sentencing came down from me. I wanted another Quinate to state this to her. I thought if Ivan said it, she wouldn’t know it was me.

I guess she knows me better than I thought.

This isn’t to protect us, but to make sure others know we’re a unit. No matter personal feelings, we won’t be broken. We stand together. And we keep the peace as well as bring down acts of war.

The kids? I’m not interested in killing kids. Jac…no, I don’t think so either, but we want this fucking bitch to squirm. She’s caused so much fucking pain.

To Jac.

To me.

To Magdalena.

For her, this is something I’ll never fucking forgive.

“Those children will live, but not as Gimbonis. Not as Lucases. We’ll choose your greatest, biggest enemies outside of us, and they’ll grow up there. Or poor. And you and Francis will die last,” Ivan says.

Maximo looks at me and Jac. “Which one last?”

“Her,” Jac says. “For my father. And for not curtailing that cunt Francis.”

Putting his gun down, he finally sits, and I say, “Take her.”

Declan presses a button on his phone and two of his men come in and remove the woman. She may not be leaving this building alive, but she has until we kill the rest. Her grandson’sgoing to be first. He worked with Francis from the evidence handed to me this morning before we left the mansion.

She’s yelling about the jewels, and what they mean as the door shuts and cuts off her voice.

“What does this mean for me,” Magdalena asks, glancing at the men around the table. “I did steal from all of you.”

“We know, darlin’,” Declan says with a wink. “We know you were made to steal from us. And you handed them to Hendrick.”

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