A low hiss came out of Harper. “That kill was ours,” she told Thatcher, jabbing her finger in the corpse’s direction. “That creature—or what’s left of her—endangered our son. The Horseman wanted us to know what happened to people who got in the way of his plans. Well, that is what happens to anyone who even plays a part in any harm that befalls my family. And when I get my hands on the Horseman—and I will—he won’t get off so lightly.”
“You call that lightly?” asked Mila, tone mild.
“Her pain is over, isn’t it?” Harper retorted. “His will never be over.”
The Primes studied Harper as if they’d never seen her before. There was a newfound respect in their gazes and, in many cases, a healthy dose of apprehension. Knox suspected the Primes would also be both unnerved and irritated to learn they had totally underestimated her. Though she was strong, they’d never really considered her a threat in her own right—only in the sense that she was mated to Knox and, thus, they made each other stronger.
“I am assuming you interrogated the she-demon,” said Dario, flicking a look at the corpse. “Did she know anything useful that will lead us to the Horseman?”
“Nothing that would lead us directly to him,” said Knox. “But she gave us information that would help—information I’m quite sure the Horseman didn’t know she possessed.”
Jolene gave a slow nod. “He would have killed her if he’d thought she had anything on him, but he apparently didn’t consider her a loose end.”
“Will you not share with us the information she gave you?” Raul asked Knox.
“No, just as I’m quite sure none of you will share anything that you uncover.” Knox was unsurprised when none of them denied it. “Sad as it is, we do not know who we can trust. If the Horseman should learn what I now know, it would give him the opportunity to wipe away any evidence. I won’t risk that.”
Dario sighed. “Very well.”
Exhaling heavily, Thatcher rubbed at his brow. “I’ll send some of my sentinels to collect Sherryl’s body. It is custom in my lair to give each demon a proper burial, no matter their crime.”
“Is it?” drawled Harper, eyes narrowing. “Levi.”
At the one-word summons, Levi stepped out of the shadows and into the camera’s line of sight. He then clicked his fingers, and the corpse burst into cinders that quickly faded away. It was an ability that came with being a reaper. And it made Harper’s inner demon smirk. Now that the entity had vented some of its rage, it was much mellower.
Glaring at Thatcher, Harper said, “There’s no such custom about burials in my lair. Even if there were, that bitch would get no courtesies from me.”
“Nor from me, in your position,” Mila said to Harper. Others murmured their agreement.
Knox ran his gaze over each of the Primes, who—except for Jolene, who looked at her granddaughter with pride—were once again eyeing Harper warily. He didn’t blame them. “I think my mate and I have made our standpoint blindingly clear. I hope you convey this message to the demons within your lairs. We wouldn’t want anyone else getting ideas about targeting Asher, would we?” He nodded at Larkin, who cut the link for the video conference and then closed the laptop.
Harper’s shoulders lowered slightly, and she let out a long breath. “I need a drink.” Or a bottle. Maybe then her nerves would finally fully settle.
Keenan pulled his flask out of his pocket and offered it to her. “Here.”
She didn’t even take a cautious sniff. Just chugged it down. And nearly choked as her throat and the roof of her mouth started to burn like holy hell. She coughed. “Jesus, what is that? Battery acid?”
The incubus smirked. “Everclear vodka with a little something mixed in.”
Deciding she didn’t want to know what that little something was, Harper handed him the flask, still coughing. Knox rested his hand on her nape and gave it a comforting squeeze.
Staring down at her, Tanner said, “You weren’t kidding.”
She blinked at him. “What?”
“You can in fact be terrifying. And no, I’m not teasing you.”
“I don’t think you’ll have to ever again deal with shit from the Primes, Harper.” Levi moved the chair back to its spot near the wall and hooked the rope over it. “It’s fucked up that this gained their respect, but if that respect and fear keeps them from messing with you, that can only be a good thing.”
Keenan knocked down a huge gulp of that vodka, the weirdo. “You still plan on playing a clip of Malloy’s slow-death throughout the Underground?”
“It’s the only way to be sure that the Horseman and any minions he might have will get our message,” said Harper. “Besides, everyone needs to be sure exactly what happens to those who go after my family.”
Larkin nodded. “Fair enough. I’ll get on it.”
With his hand still on her nape, Knox led her out of the boathouse and into the fresh, open air. Harper inhaled it greedily, needing to drown out the scents of blood, pain, and hate that seemed to be clogging her nostrils and lungs.
“Are we all thinking that the Horseman was Alethea’s ‘reliable source’?” asked Tanner as they walked back to the house. Mansion. Whatever the beautiful monstrosity should be called. “That he told her she was a target to scare and manipulate her?”
“It seems likely,” said Knox. The others nodded. “We can cross Dion off our list of suspects. The incorporeal said it intended to find and hurt him once it had earned its freedom.”
Levi twisted his mouth. “That leaves us with Thatcher, Dario, and Jonas.”
Holding the laptop against her chest, Larkin sighed. “It’s a crying shame that the only clues Malloy gave us about Alethea’s partner in crime are that he wears a cashmere coat, smokes tobacco, likes Cirque du Soleil, and that the encantada trusted his word.”
“The only person I can imagine her investing any trust in is Jonas,” said Tanner. “But I saw her face when she realized that Jonas wanted an alliance with Lou. If the siblings were working together, would it really have bothered her that he wanted such an alliance? It makes more sense that she suspected Jonas would betray her and try to have the incorporeal destroyed or banished back to hell, just like he claimed. Also, I’ve never known him to smoke. Nor Dario, for that matter. Never smelled tobacco on them.”
“I’ve seen Jonas smoking a time or two,” said Knox. “I’ve also seen Thatcher with the occasional cigar at gatherings, but I got the feeling he only smoked them to look distinguished.”
Larkin drummed her fingers on the closed laptop. “Malloy was one of Thatcher’s demons. He could have turned Alethea’s attention her way—pulled her strings, so to speak. But I don’t think he’s the Horseman. I mean, if he is, he would have just asked Sherryl for the info himself; he wouldn’t have done it through Alethea.”
A thoughtful silence fell. After a long moment, Harper broke it. “The Horseman’s not very hands-on, is he? He likes to use people. And it makes me wonder if he was pulling the strings of the other Horsemen. Sitting back and letting them take all the risks and do all the work.”
Knox’s eyes narrowed slightly. “You think he was their ringleader? That he might have even been the one who brought them all together?”
Harper shrugged. “It’s just a theory.”
“It’s a good one,” said Knox.
Levi rubbed at his nape. “If we go with that theory, it would suggest that Dario isn’t our guy. He campaigned to be Monarch, like Isla. That’s not ‘sitting back’, is it?”
“No, it’s not.” Knox frowned, still feeling like there was something he was missing.
“Where do we go from here?” asked Larkin. “Malloy didn’t exactly give us any useful clues, did she?”
“Maybe she did,” mused Harper, coming to a standstill as something occurred to her. “She said that she and Alethea only communicated through telepathy. It’s an ability that pretty much all demons possess, but it’s not always strong. Some don’t have a very wide telepathic range.
” She turned to Knox. “You’d known Alethea a long time, you must have some idea of how wide her range was.”
Knox thought about it for a moment. “It couldn’t have been very wide. There were many occasions when she called my cell phone. Especially when she was out of the country, which was often.”
“What about when she was inside the country?” asked Harper. “I’m sure you were often invited to her home here, but maybe there were times when she called to say she was near one of your offices and wanted to know if you were interested in hooking up?”
“Yes,” he remembered. “There were also occasions when she called to say she was near the estate.”
“Hoping you’d grant her entry and she could wangle her way into your bedroom, even though you never ‘shit where you slept’, as you once so aptly put it.” Harper snorted. “Okay, and where were you at the time of these calls?”
“Various places. I was rarely ever home. I worked a lot.” Knox searched his memories, eyes narrowed. “I remember I once agreed to meet her in the bar of a hotel on the strip. I was running late, so I tried telepathing her to let her know. I couldn’t reach her, so I had to call her.”
Harper took a small step toward him. “And where were you at the time?”
“In a hotel further along the strip. Four kilometers away, at most.”
“Then her telepathic muscle didn’t stretch very far,” Harper mused. “But she was in regular contact with Sherryl Malloy, who lived smack bam in the middle of North Las Vegas.” Which meant that … “Motherfucker, Alethea must have been hiding in North Las Vegas all that time—the last place anyone would think to look for her.”
Levi bit out a harsh curse. “So close yet so fucking far. If she was relying on Malloy for info, she wasn’t getting out of her hideout much. She holed herself up somewhere.”
Keenan nodded. “Still, she would have caught someone’s attention. She was a sex demon. Encantadas easily entrance humans.”
“I should get my family on this,” said Harper. “They can show her picture to people and ask around. We may just be able to find out where she was staying.”
“The Force can do that,” said Knox.
“Yes, but my family knows the area better than they do.” Pretty much all of the Wallis imps lived there. “People are more willing to talk to them than they are to any of our lair.”
Knox inclined his head. “We’ll still have our Force make enquiries. The more people working on this, the better.”
Harper gave a satisfied nod. “The odds are good that he cleaned wherever she was staying of anything that could implicate him, but someone will have seen something. People mind their business in shady areas, but they stay alert, too. If they saw a stranger walking around, they’d have gotten a good look at them.”
Feeling a tingle of optimism, she wasted no time in telepathing Jolene and bringing her up to speed as she walked back to the house. Her grandmother offered to assist in questioning people in the area before Harper even got the chance to ask. With the combined efforts of their lairs, they would surely learn something important.
Entering the foyer, she asked her grandmother, How’s Ciaran?
Jolene sighed. Outraged would be the best word. He wasn’t serious about Sherryl, but he’d considered her a friend, if nothing else. He’s mad at himself for not seeing what she was doing—which is dumb, of course, and I’ve expressed this to him several times. He’ll be all right. I wish you’d told me about Malloy before you killed her. It’s not fair that you got to have all the fun.
Sorry.
Jolene gave a soft, almost delicate snort. No, you’re not.
No, I’m not.
It’s a good thing that the other Primes got to see what you’re capable of. It’s also good that they saw you’re not someone who will hide behind Knox or leave the dirty work to him. You could have left the punishment to him, who would certainly have made Malloy suffer. But you didn’t. Nor did you invite him to get in on the fun—which does make me feel a little better about being left out. Instead, you took care of it yourself, and you did it in a way that conveyed a very powerful message. They’ll highly respect that.
Hopefully the message would be heard loud and clear, Harper thought, as she followed Knox into the living room. Asher was nowhere to be seen, so she figured Meg had him with her somewhere. Gotta go, Grams. Speak soon.
Take care, sweetheart.
Breaking the connection with her grandmother, Harper turned to Knox, who was watching her closely. She also realized they were alone. “Where’d the sentinels go?”
“To their respective cars.” Crossing to her, Knox cupped her hips, fighting the urge to eat up every bit of her personal space and hold her tight. “You okay?”
She placed her hands on his chest. “I’m fine.”
“You’re not feeling bad for what you did, are you?” he asked, searching her eyes and getting caught up in the way the chocolate-brown color swirled, faded, and then settled into a warm honey shade.
“No.” Harper jutted out her chin. “She deserved every second of pain she got. I don’t need to go journal about it or cuddle a teddy bear.”
“But it unsettles you that you can deliver such pain and feel no remorse for it.”
She shrugged. “Maybe.” When he just looked at her expectantly, she sighed. “Okay, yes, it unsettles me that I have that kind of cruelty in me.”
Knox couldn’t relate to that, because he never experienced any such guilt—that wasn’t something he was proud of, though. “You are not cruel, Harper. You didn’t hurt Malloy because you’re heartless or sadistic. You did it because she was partly responsible for what happened to our son. That primal, mama bear protectiveness in you was never going to let that go. Nor was it going to be satisfied with anything other than her death. The very fact that you’re unsettled by your lack of remorse shows that you’re not a bad person.”
Harper swallowed, comforted by his words, and walked into his arms. He held her close, stroking her back and pressing gentle kisses to the side of her face. She sighed, content. “I was kind of looking forward to our day out.” Malloy had fucked that up.
“Some quality time on the island will make up for it.”
“You still want to leave tomorrow?”
“Yes, I do.”
“Then I’d better get packing.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Sitting in the inflatable paddling pool, Asher again tried pouring water over his head with his plastic sieve. Once again, the water dripped through the holes of the sieve before he could get it near his head. “Ma!” he practically barked, frustrated.
Sprawled on her stomach on a sun lounger, Harper leaned over and handed him a fish-shaped tub. “Use that instead.”
Asher took it, studied it carefully, and then tossed it aside in favor of the sieve.
Harper sighed, shaking her head. She wished there was some room in that inflatable pool for her, because she was seriously freaking hot. The heat was prickly and smothering, which was why they were sticking to the cabana on the deck that overlooked the rippling turquoise sea. The sand was simply too hot for him to play on this early in the day, but Asher was having an absolute ball in the paddling pool, stomping and splashing like he’d never seen water before.
“Ma!” he barked again, utterly exasperated, when he once more failed to drench his head in water.
“So use this.” She held out the fish-shaped tub again. Asher began furiously shaking his head back and forth. Honestly, she didn’t know how it didn’t leave him dizzy. “You’re just like your father—determined to do everything your way.” Which just made her smile.
They had been at the island for a week now, relaxing, sunbathing, swimming, and even venturing out on Knox’s new mini yacht. Asher loved it there. He’d also loved their time on the private jet. For the first ten minutes. Then he’d gotten bored of looking at clouds and simply played with the toys she’d brought in his bag.
He’d seriously enjoyed the mini trek
through the jungle, though, as they’d walked from the jet to the villa. His beautiful dark eyes, sparkling with fascination, had drunk in the thick lush canopy, colorful birds, rough ropy vines, and meandering stream. Every sound had tugged at his attention—the calls of the birds, the trickle of the stream, the chirping of the crickets, and the distant hoots of the monkeys.
Harper had heard the occasional chuffing that made her think of a large cat. She also hadn’t failed to miss the shadow in her peripheral vision, following and watching them. “I’m pretty sure we’re being hunted by something,” she’d said.
Knox had glanced at her over his shoulder and said, “It’s just curious. A predator always senses other predators. It’ll have more sense than to try to attack.”
He’d been right, luckily. Nothing had followed them to the villa. Two-stories tall, the spacious building was all bright walls, high windows, and gleaming marble floors. It also had a private pool and was surrounded by palm trees and white sand. With the housekeeper and maintenance guy—both of whom were members of their lair and natives of the neighboring island—the place was always pristine and there was no need to cook. Knox would make a mint if he rented out the island, but he was much too territorial to share what was his.
Resting her crossed arms on the lounger, Harper propped her chin on her hands. Even with the jet skis thundering by—Tanner and Levi were currently racing, and neither appeared to be winning—she could hear the peaceful sounds of waves crashing into rocks and tumbling onto the shoreline. It was the first time in a while that she’d felt truly relaxed. Maybe that was because she also felt safe. Knox had been right—they needed this. And how could she not love having quality time with her guys?
Speaking of her guys … Knox was padding up the narrow wooden walkway that led from the villa’s deck to the shoreline, bucket in hand. Well, damn. Little drops of water were sliding down all that hard muscle and sleek tanned skin, making her want to lick it all up. He was as mouth-watering and magnetic as he was intimidating.
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