Dead Drop (The Guild #2)(105)

I snorted a laugh. “Tough shit. They had to have been tailing you, though. And why today? Why put such a large team on you today of all days.”

“My guess is that they already knew the data cache was here somewhere and were just waiting for us to find it. Stupid of me to announce I’d found it over the phone where anyone could overhear.” Danny grimaced with guilt. “Regardless, we have it and they’re dead. How long will it take to decode?”

I cast my eyes back to the scrambled mess of code on my screen. “If I was home with access to my office, only a day. But from here? Hard to say. Maybe a week. Per drive.” Then a thought occurred to me, and I speared dickhead with a glare. “Your man put the insulting hit out on DeLuna. Was this team his handiwork too?”

Danny must not have considered that option, because her eyes widened as she peered up at Kai. “I thought you handled Sam?”

Kai glowered, his fists tight at his sides and his jaw twitching. “I did handle him. This wasn’t my team.”

I snapped my fingers. “Yeah, I’m not so sure, Goliath. How would you know? You’ve been here, salivating all over my woman. They could have—”

“I know,” he barked, “because Sam’s dead. I shot him. This was a Guild attack.”

Well, shit, I didn’t expect that. Maybe he isn’t as useless as he looks.

Danny looked genuinely shocked, her lips parted as she stared up at him. Goddamn it, don’t tell me he was getting her pity over killing his disloyal team member? That was just sensible leadership, not something to get his dick sympathy-sucked for.

“Kai, I had no idea…” she murmured, running a hand over her face. She was tired but doing a good job of hiding it. Except in those little moments when her hand passed over her face, or her fingers through her hair, and her eyes turned tired. I wanted nothing more than to take her home to my snow fortress and put her back in the hot tub.

The big asshole’s shoulders sagged, then all of a sudden his posture stiffened, going rigid. “Danny,” he whispered, horror filling his voice, “where did you get that?”

He was pointing at the necklace around DeLuna’s neck, lying against her black top like a shining beacon of disaster. I’d seen it when she came in but assumed she’d found it with the data cache.

The way she paled, her eyes darting to me with regret, told me otherwise. “Kai… where’d you get this? Did you know it was a Guild symbol?” She picked up the key pendant and rubbed her thumb over the twisted metal symbol in such a familiar way.

Kai blinked like he’d just been electrocuted. “What? No. It’s not a—” He shook his head in denial. “That necklace belonged to Charlotte. The girl I told you about.”

Danny winced, her gaze on me not him. “That’s what I was scared you’d say, Kai.”

His furious, perplexed glare swung back and forth between Danny and me as he tried to catch up. “I don’t understand. Why do you have Charlotte’s necklace? What does this have to do with this?” He waved a hand at the pile of thumb drives in front of me.

Danny was still watching me, assessing how much I already knew. Calculating how much I’d been withholding from her.

My phone vibrated in my pocket, and I gave a short sigh as I dug it out. Better to rip the Band-Aid off. Maybe now she’d let me kill him.

“Because, idiot, that’s not Charlotte’s necklace. It’s Layla’s. Shit, hold that thought, this is important.” I quickly answered the call and brought the phone to my ear. The caller was one of my personal employees… one with orders to only contact me in an emergency.

Kai started to blow his top, but I held up a finger to silence him.

“Sir,” my employee grunted, “bad news, I’m afraid.”

Dread pooled in my stomach as I locked eyes with Danny. “How bad, Boris?”

“Arson, by the looks of things. Elevators disabled, fires lit in every escape stairwell. No one stood a chance.” He gave a hacking cough, like he’d suffered some level of smoke inhalation himself.

I swallowed, knowing this development would make my girl feel like she was breaking. She wouldn’t truly break, she was too strong for that, but it’d hurt. “Any survivors?”

Boris coughed again. “None, I’m sorry, sir. No one made it out, my assignment included.”

I hissed a curse, then ended the call.

“What was that?” Danny asked immediately, ignoring Kai’s bewildered glares.

Steeling myself against her inevitable reaction, I put my phone down. “That was Boris, one of my personal mercenaries. I’ve had him watching Jude. Observing.”

Danny went rigid. She’d heard my side of the conversation, so she already knew what was coming. She was smart enough to put it together.

“I’m sorry, mon cœur, Judith is dead.”





45





Static rushed in my ears, and my vision went spotty for a second, then I shook it off violently. Because surely I’d just heard him wrong. Or he’d heard Boris wrong. Either way, this wasn’t fucking happening. No way.

“You’re wrong,” I whispered, unable to tear my eyes from Leon’s face. The depth of regret and apology in his green eyes almost made me choke, though. Leon wasn’t faking shit; he wasn’t hiding behind a mask. He was being truthful… but that didn’t mean he was right.