Total pages in book: 104
Estimated words: 94834 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 474(@200wpm)___ 379(@250wpm)___ 316(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 94834 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 474(@200wpm)___ 379(@250wpm)___ 316(@300wpm)
Zade clenches his jaw, refusing to answer, but it’s fine. I’m more than happy to offer an answer of my own. Feeling the confidence soaring through my veins, I lock my stare onto his and let him have the cold, hard truth. The conviction in my tone seems to make him uneasy. “It’s because you’re not man enough to follow through. You can talk the talk, but when it comes to taking that final shot, you don’t have the fucking balls.”
I’m violently thrown up against the wall, Zade holding me up off the ground with nothing but his hand locked around my throat. I try to scream, but not a damn sound comes out, my airway blocked, leaving me desperate for air. “Is that something you’re willing to bet your life on?” he questions, a fierce determination in his eyes.
My hands shoot up, clutching at his fingers, desperately trying to pull them back. I fight against him, my shallow gasps getting smaller by the second. I’m running out of time, running out of oxygen, and I quickly realize just how wrong I am. He does have the balls to do it, and what’s more, he fucking lives for it.
Dark spots start to appear in my vision, and as he stares back at me, I see relentless cruelty in his eyes. He’s not going to kill me, at least not yet, but he’s sure as fuck going to keep playing his twisted little games.
“Zade,” Dalton warns, a scary, low pitch in his tone, his warning clear as day. “We still need her.”
Zade doesn’t even flinch, and it’s as though he doesn’t hear him.
“Come on, man,” Cross says, the snake weaving between his fingers.
The darkness swallows me, consuming my body and sending ice shooting through my veins like venom, and yet he doesn’t relent, his fingers only tightening around my throat.
My hands go limp, falling to my sides, and the fight dies inside me as my lungs burn and ache. The desperation is overwhelming, and I see my whole life flashing before my eyes. I never should have come in here, never should have challenged him.
Then just like that, as I start to fall into unconsciousness, Zade releases me. I fall heavily to the ground, desperately gasping for air, and without a single word, my four captors turn on their heels and walk out the door, leaving me as I slip into a world full of darkness.
Chapter 13
CROSS
“You took it too fucking far,” Dalton mutters as we make our way through the old train tunnels, our footsteps echoing through the darkness as Venom twists her way up my arm. Dalton shakes his head, fury rippling through him. He’s been like this since we left the apartment complex, and honestly, I’m about ready to throttle him.
Dalton said he wouldn’t get attached, and the little bitch is practically drooling over the girl already. He’s putting Zade in a fucked-up position, and in the end, we’re the ones who are going to suffer. Dalton should know that. There’s no way in hell Zade isn’t going to go through with this. He’s worked too hard to get where he is. Come the night of the sixtieth moon, she will die, and Dalton better be ready.
Zade walks up ahead, not wanting to hear what any of us have to say. Tonight rattled him. Oakley might have been way off on her judgment, but something about her delivery got under his skin. Perhaps it was the fire in her eyes. She challenged him like no other woman has, and he didn’t fucking like it.
Zade DeVil has always lived in black and white, but Oakley Quinn has gray written all over her.
I’m not going to lie, the little she-devil has a spark to her, something that has me wanting to know more. I’m curious to see what makes her break, just how far she can be pushed. Not even with Zade’s hand around her throat did she crumble.
She was fucking petrified, but she sure as shit didn’t break.
Making our way deeper through the old train tunnel, we find the door on the right, and Zade steps up toward it, slipping the old brass key into the lock. It looks just like every other maintenance door in here, only this one is different. So fucking different.
Zade turns the key and we all listen for the familiar sound of the intricate locking system within the wall. We have many entrances to our underground compound, but this has to be my favorite. Parking lots of high-rise buildings, church basements, there’s even one below the city prison, but this right here . . . this one was the first.
Empire is the most exclusive society this country has ever seen, home to those who boast power and wealth. Politicians, law enforcement, judges, and CEOs of multi-billion-dollar corporations. How else would we get things done? We’re a system, a partnership, and we have each other’s back.