by Meghan March
41
Kane
“Are you ready?”
Temperance is dressed in Keira’s clothes and wearing a red wig that matches her boss’s hair. Oversized dark sunglasses obscure most of her face.
I hate seeing her look like someone else. This isn’t how I’ll remember her, I vow. I’ll remember her with her back arched as she screamed my name. I’ll remember her sound asleep in my bed. I’ll remember her laughing and drinking bourbon on my couch. I’ll remember her with an angle grinder in her hands.
No matter what, I’ll remember her.
“No. Yes. I don’t know.” Her voice shakes, and I hate the uncertainty in it. She pulls off the sunglasses and turns to me. “Are you sure there’s no other way?”
I shake my head. “This is how it has to be.”
She inhales a shaky breath. “Then I guess it doesn’t matter whether I’m ready or not, because it’s happening.”
“I’ll get the door.” I open the back of the Maybach. This is the car that V usually drives Keira in, and while I’m not quite as big as Mount’s mountain of a lieutenant, I’ve chosen a boxier suit and used my skills of disguise to come as close as I can to his look. It’s not my first rodeo.
Temperance slides into the back but latches a hand around my wrist before I can close it. “Please find me. Promise me you’ll find me.”
I can’t lie to her. “If there’s a way, I’ll find it.”
She nods. It may not be what she wants to hear, but it’s all I can offer.
I close the car door and move to the driver’s side, catching my reflection the mirror.
It’s showtime.
42
Temperance
I’ve never thought about how it must be for those people who have to go into witness protection with no notice. Having to leave your entire life behind with no planning is both terribly difficult and incredibly easy.
I wasn’t allowed to call anyone. To tell anyone. To pack hardly anything. One small suitcase, and that’s it. But when you’re leaving your heart behind, what do clothes matter?
I exhale on a long breath and watch as we pull out of the warehouse for the last time.
No beanie. That’s how I know this is for real. Kane doesn’t care if I know where the warehouse is because I’m not coming back.
I’m never coming back.
My chest freezes and my stomach tumbles its millionth somersault of the day.
Temperance Ransom, life as you know it is over.
At other times in my life, I would have been thrilled to have someone say that to me. Now, I’m devastated. I’m just starting to figure out who I really am. What I really want. Who I really want.
And now it’s all being snatched away because my brother did something stupid.
At least we’re all going to be safe. I remind myself that it’s the only thing that really matters. None of us are going to end up tortured or dead.
I can live with anything . . . if we just get to live.
I lift my gaze and find Kane watching me in the rearview.
“You okay?” he asks.
“Don’t ask me that.”
His jaw tenses and he rephrases. “You holding it together?”
“Barely.”
“You can do this. All you have to do is take one step at a time. I’ll be right next to you.”
Until I get on a plane and never see you again.
“I can do this.” I say it to appease him, and because I need to hear it myself. What choice do I have? None, according to Kane and Mount.
I look down to see the minute hand on Keira’s watch moving ever closer to seven o’clock, and wonder if that’s how a prisoner on death row feels watching the clock count down to midnight on the day of his execution.
Morbid thoughts.
I push them away.
Kane will find me. He feels this too. He’s just being noble. We’ll have a future. Somewhere exotic and beautiful. Maybe a beach house in paradise.
In the middle of all the pretty lies I tell myself, I realize I never asked about our destination. It didn’t seem important beyond the fact that it wasn’t here.
“Where are we going? The jet, I mean?”
Kane meets my gaze in the rearview again. “I can’t tell you that. I’m sorry.”
“But you know?”
He shakes his head. “Safer if I don’t know. Safer if no one knows.”
“What about a flight plan?”
He tilts his head to the side. “Mount has his ways.”
We fall into silence again, and I realize I’ve completely forgotten to pay attention to where the warehouse is located. Not that it matters anymore, I suppose.
When we arrive at the private airport, I see a few people coming and going, but nothing like the hustle and bustle of the regular airports you see on TV. I’ve never even been to the New Orleans airport, so TV is all I have to compare it to.
Kane parks the car right up front, rather than in the parking lot.
“Are you allowed to do that?”
He turns and looks over his shoulder. “Everything’s allowed when you’re Mount. Are you ready to be Keira?”
Again, my answer is clearly no, but that’s not what Kane wants to hear. “As ready as I’ll ever be.”
“Good. It’s go time. Don’t bow to anyone. You’re a queen now, princess.”
His nickname almost breaks me, but I find my last reserves of strength and force iron into my spine. I don’t have any steel left in me today.
Kane exits the Maybach, and a moment later, he opens my door.
I do my best to walk like Keira. It’s not hard, especially when you consider how long I’ve been imitating her confident stride.
I didn’t even get to say good-bye.
Pushing the gut-wrenching thought away, I adjust my sunglasses and stay next to Kane as he leads me through the sliding doors of the airport.
The inside is open and airy. Instead of being jammed with people, the lobby is almost empty. A woman waits in a leather side chair, and a man speaks to an employee behind a large wooden desk. Out the big glass windows ahead of me, I see small jets parked on the runway. There’s a sleek black one directly out the next set of sliding glass doors with a red carpet leading to the steps.
“Is that it?” I whisper. “The plane?”
Kane nods. “Yes.”
“And where’s—”
He reaches out to grasp my elbow and gives it a quick squeeze, reminding me not to say Rafe’s name. I go quiet and search the lobby for any sign of my brother, all the while feeling like my heart is cracking in my chest.
Then I remember he’s going to be dressed like Mount, because we’re impersonating them.
Kane squeezes my arm again and silently indicates I need to turn around. I follow the command, and my heart thuds to a screeching halt when I see a man in a three-piece suit walk with a swagger through the sliding glass doors.
I’ve never seen my brother so dressed up in his life. Or with neatly trimmed facial hair. He almost looks upstanding, which is ironic considering who he’s impersonating.
I take a half step toward him, but Kane’s fingers clamp down tighter on my arm and I freeze.
As soon as Kane drops his hand from my elbow, he looks at me, his expression stricken. “I’m sorry. This was the only way.”
One moment his hand is empty, and the next, he’s holding a gun and it’s pointed at Rafe.
He pulls the trigger.
Chaos explodes as a deafening shot echoes in the lobby of the airport. Everything goes quiet in my mind when I see Rafe grab his chest, a look of shock on his face.
I can’t hear myself screaming.
I can’t hear anything.
Another gunshot shatters every dream I had for the future as my brother’s body jerks again and he collapses, lifeless, on the carpet.
* * *
The Savage Trilogy concludes in Rogue Royalty. Now available for preorder by tapping here.
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Have you met the Ruthless King of the city? Keep reading for a glimpse of my dark and dirty alpha, Lachlan Mount, in Ruthless King.
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If you’re wondering where you can read more about Valentina, Yve, or Ariel, you can find them—and their deliciously addictive alphas—in the Beneath series. Start it today for free with Beneath This Mask!
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Each book in the Beneath series is a standalone. Find out more by tapping on the titles. Keep reading after the Ruthless King preview for a special sneak peek of Beneath the Truth as well!
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Beneath This Mask (Book #1 - Simon and Charlie)
Beneath This Ink (Book #2 - Con and Vanessa)
Beneath These Chains (Book #3 - Lord and Elle)
Beneath These Scars (Book #4 - Lucas and Yve)
Beneath These Lies (Book #5 - Rix and Valentina)
Beneath These Shadows (Book #6 - Bishop and Eden)
Beneath The Truth (Book #7 - Rhett and Ariel)
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Preview of Ruthless King
Get ready for the darker and dirtier side of New Orleans with an epic alpha romance from New York Times bestselling author Meghan March.
* * *
New Orleans belongs to me.
You don’t know my name, but I control everything you see—and all the things you don’t.
My reach knows no bounds, and my demands are always met.
I didn’t need to loan money to a failing family distillery, but it amuses me to have them in my debt.
To have her in my debt.
She doesn’t know she caught my attention.
She should’ve been more careful.
I’m going to own her. Consume her. Maybe even keep her.
It’s time to collect what I’m owed.
Keira Kilgore, you’re now the property of Lachlan Mount.
* * *
ONE
Keira
Are those footsteps?
I freeze outside the door to my locked office and stare at the handle like it’s tainted with anthrax.
My younger sisters wouldn’t dare. They know my office is off limits. My parents are 700 miles away in Florida living it up as retirees on the monthly payments I make from the dismal profits of the distillery. It’s barely hanging on, even after four generations of clinging to life making Irish whiskey in New Orleans.
This basement isn’t haunted. This basement isn’t haunted.
I repeat that truth like a chant until my heart slows to a semi-normal pace. My dead husband’s ghost better not be inside, or heaven help me, I’ll kill Brett again myself.
Summoning the same iron will it has taken to dig this company out of the trenches, I grasp the handle, yank it open, and fling myself inside, attempting the element of surprise. Or false courage. Or… something.
“Trying to make an entrance?” The deep voice that comes out of the dark chills me to the very marrow of my bones.
I’ve only heard it once before, through the battered wood of the same locked door I just barged past, but it had been delivering threats I didn’t understand, not asking a question in that cool, controlled manner.
There’s no way I want to be in the dark with this voice.
He’s not a ghost. He’s worse.
He’s the friggin’ boogeyman.
Whispered about in the shadows, but never mentioned in polite company, almost as if saying his name will make him appear—and no one wants that.
I’ve never said it.
I don’t even want to think it now, but my brain conjures it anyway.
Lachlan Mount.
I fumble around, slapping the concrete wall to find the switch, but when I flip it, nothing happens.
Oh Sweet Jesus, I’m going to die and I won’t even see it coming.
My antique desk chair creaks just before the dim glow of my lamp clicks on.
I see his massive hands first, then darkly tanned forearms with white cuffs rolled up. The light doesn’t reach his face.
“Shut the door, Ms. Kilgore.”
Swallowing back the saliva pooling in my mouth at the fact that he knows my name, my hand moves as though directly responding to his command. I grope for the handle behind me, when all I really want to do is turn around and run.
To the police.
Maybe they could… I don’t know. Save me?
I glance over my shoulder, clutching the knob as the door creaks shut, the urge to flee growing as the dim light of the hallway disappears from sight.
“Take a step in that direction, and you’ll lose everything.”
My feet freeze to the cracked cement floor as a bead of sweat rolls down my chest. Normally I would attribute it to the sauna-like conditions produced by the stills, but not tonight.
“What do you want?” I whisper. “Why are you here?”
The chair groans as he rises to his feet, those wide fingers refastening the button on his suit, but his face never coming in to the light.
“You owe me a debt, Ms. Kilgore, and I’m here to collect.”
A debt? My mind scrambles to think of how in the hell I could owe him money. I’ve never met him before. Hell, I’ve never seen him before, only heard his voice while I eavesdropped. My kind doesn’t mingle with his kind, well, at least most of my kind. A few rumors have circled that he kept Richelle LaFleur, a girl from our church, as a mistress until she went missing a year ago. I shut that path of thinking down completely.
“What are you talking about?” Somehow I manage to form the question.
Two fingers push a document titled Promissory Note across the scarred wood of my desk into the watery pool of light. My eyes rivet on the papers, but I’m too terrified to step any closer.
Oh sweet Jesus, Brett. What did you do? My heart slams against my ribs.
“Don’t you want to know how much your husband was willing to risk to save this place?”
“How much?” I ask, inching his way against my will.
“A half million dollars.”
I suck in a shocked breath. “You’re lying.”
With both hands on the table, he leans down, exposing his face in the dim light. Hard features carved from granite, piercing eyes, and an unrelenting stare contrast with the relative civility of the suit that fits him to perfection.
“I never lie.”
A half million dollars? No way. “I would’ve known if Brett had sunk five hundred thousand into the distillery, and let me tell you—he didn’t.”
He shrugs as if the information means nothing to him. And maybe it doesn’t.
“His signature says that he did, and this debt is overdue.”
My eyes zero in on the papers on the desk. If he really did this… The effects would be catastrophic.
Four generations of Kilgores had dedicated their hopes, dreams, and fortunes to keeping this legacy alive. It couldn’t end with me.
“I don’t have the money.”
“I know.”
His response throws me back on my heels. “Then why—”
He moves out of the light and comes toward me. I shrink back against the wall as he advances.
“Because there’s something I might be willing to take on trade.”
It takes everything I have to keep my voice steady. “What?”
He stops a foot from me, and his full lips form a single word.
“You.”
* * *
Welcome to the darker and dirtier side of New Orleans. Ruthless King is live and Mount is coming to take what he’s owed. The complete Mount Trilogy is now available! Ruthless King is available for purchase by tapping here.
Preview of Beneath The Truth
I used to believe there were lines in
life you don’t cross.
Don’t lie. Don’t cheat. Don’t steal.
Until I learned people don’t always practice what they preach.
I turned in my badge and gun and walked away from everything. Then I got the call no one wants, and I’m back in New Orleans.
What I don’t expect is for her to be here too.
Another line you don’t cross?
Don’t touch your best friend’s little sister.
She’s always been off-limits.
Too bad I don’t follow the rules anymore.
* * *
Beneath the Truth is the final book in the Beneath series, but may be enjoyed as a standalone.
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ONE
* * *
Rhett
Get home right the fuck now.
After the last year, I had become a pro at ignoring texts and calls. When you walked away from everything and everyone you knew, it was a skill you honed until it was sharp enough to slice the bullshit from your life.
Before my world fell apart, I was all about my brothers in blue. Nothing was more important to me than family, honor, and justice. And then betrayal ground those rose-colored glasses beneath its boot heel until my old way of life was nothing but dust.
My life was different now. No badge. No brotherhood. And what the hell was justice, anyway?
All I cared about was collecting fees from my PI clients. I didn’t get involved, didn’t let myself get invested. I turned it all off and did the job. No more. No less.
I looked at the screen of my phone again, and the gallon of coffee I’d downed to keep me awake to finish this case churned in my stomach with the burger I’d eaten.