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The pain was excruciating. Roman struggled to stifle his moans of agony as Tesiera screamed at the top of her lungs.
“Shut your mouth, you little brat!” Another member of the group advanced, pulling Tesiera away from behind her father. His grip on her hair was so tight that strands ripped from her scalp.
“No!! Please, don’t hurt my daughter.” Roman rushed forward to protect his little girl, but the teenager blocked his path, smirking.
“Your daughter is quite pretty. It’s a shame she’s so young,” Jaden tsked his disappointment.
“We haven’t had any fun in a while,” another one said, hope in his voice.
“How about we have some fun with these two?” Jaden smiled. The men behind him chuckled.
That was the last thing young Tesiera remembered.
She woke up in an abandoned house. They had tied her father on the floor, spread-eagle, naked, and brutally beaten. Tesiera’s eyes widened at the sight of blood oozing from her father’s battered body.
“Leave him alone!!!” she screamed, pleading.
The four of them laughed. Tesiera looked up, finally noticing them. Their faces were unmasked. The teenager locked eyes with her as he plunged a knife into her father’s arm and dragged it across his flesh, leaving a long trail of blood, carving into him like a chicken.
Young Tesiera screamed and then passed out in horror. She didn’t know how long she remained unconscious. But she subconsciously heard her father’s screams.
Then, she heard chilling words...
“Shoot him.”
Her eyes snapped open, and she looked at where her father had been. Tesiera could no longer recognize him; he was nothing more than a broken, bloodied figure.
“Shoot him,” Jaden said again.
The teenager pulled the trigger.
Tesiera screamed. Her father was no longer breathing. The teen pointed the gun at her face when, suddenly, the sound of sirens filled the air.
“Damn it! Let’s get out of here!” one of them shouted, already making a run for it. The boy swiftly stowed his gun in his pocket and fled with the rest, leaving Tesiera alone with her father.
“Daddy...?” Tesiera cried and fell to her knees, shaking her father. Why wouldn’t he open his eyes? Why wouldn’t her daddy look at her? “Daddy!” she screamed.
Tesiera continued to scream her father’s name until the police arrived and pulled her away from his lifeless body. She screamed his name when the ambulance arrived, during the ride to the hospital, and when he was pronounced dead in the trauma room. She screamed his name over and over again until her voice grew hoarse, and her eyes became as puffy as a winter coat.
And night after night, the faces of his killers flashed in her mind, until the image of the four of them was embedded into her soul.
The universe does not always have a way of working things out. Sometimes it gives, and other times, it takes.
This time, it took away her father, the most precious person in Tesiera’s life. The only family she had left in the entire world.
CHAPTER 1 MESMERIZINGLY BEAUTIFUL. LETHALLY DANGEROUS.
Twenty years later
The door to Vicker’s lounge opened and his assistant, Oliver, stepped inside. Vicker had been pacing around the room, lost in thought. He was particularly worried that the informant he had finally managed to capture after years of searching had refused to talk, even after being kept in the basement and tortured for four days.
It seemed he had reached a dead end.
“Good evening, sir. I wanted to inform you that—”
Vicker had no time for small talk or whatever Oliver had to say at this point. All he wanted were results. “Has he started talking yet?”
Oliver shook his head in disappointment. “No, sir. He still refuses to say anything.”