Page 93 of A Knight’s Revenge: The Complete Series

CHAPTER NINE

ZACH

T his motherfucker was about to die.

He eyed my Princess up and down like he was imagining her hot, tight body naked, and his cocky fucking smirk said he thought he had an actual shot at making that a reality.

“Let’s hear it then, Raif,” Jojo replied, reaching between her legs where my grip on her thigh had tightened possessively to give my hand a little squeeze.

I did not loosen my grip.

“Well,” he drawled. “First off, I was hoping you were still taking applications for your roster of hot, rich boyfriends? As the City’s most powerful Heir, not to mention its most beautiful woman, I really don’t think you should be limited.”

Nope.

Before I could swipe Jojo’s knife from her boot with every intention of climbing over her to stick it right in that asshole’s abdomen, Bennett had jumped from his chair, grabbed Raif by the collar of his stupid fucking baby blue polo shirt, and slammed him up against the wall behind our table.

Jojo squirmed in her seat, squeezing her thighs together around my hand. I let out an amused hum, leaning in to whisper in her ear, “Something got you hot, baby girl? ”

“Shh,” she hissed, laser-focused on where Bennett was now snarling in Raif’s face.

“Oh, come on, man,” Raif was saying as Bennett wrapped his large hand around Raif’s throat. “The violence is unnecessary, especially in the library .”

Noah and I both chuckled at that. Little did he know.

Bennett was unmoved. “You will keep your filthy fucking eyes off her,” he growled.

“She is not open for business. She is not some exclusive fucking club you can buy or charm your way into. She’s mine, she’s Noah’s, and she’s Zach's. It has been the four of us since the day she was fucking born, and it will only be the four of us until the day we all stop breathing. If I catch you staring at her like she’s your last fucking meal ever again, I will end you. Do you understand me, Montgomery?”

The low moan that Jojo smothered in her throat had my dick twitching in my pants. I met Noah’s amused stare with one of my own.

Finally having Bennett fully in this thing with us was both a massive relief and unexpectedly entertaining.

Mari fanned herself dramatically. “Okay, I understand now, chica. Even I felt that in my lady parts.”

Jojo let out a pleased sigh. “Right?”

“Okay! Okay! I got it,” Raif muttered, raising his hands in surrender. “I actually do have something to propose that might help Jolie in her… current adversarial position against the Families.”

Bennett glared at him, not moving a muscle, until Jojo finally called him off. “Let him down, Bennett. People are staring, and I think we all know Montgomery Star Media could be useful to us, if that’s where this is going.”

With one last threatening look, Bennett released Raif, who sagged in relief against the wall while Bennett strode back to his seat like nothing at all had happened.

Raif, who’d apparently decided to stop being a dumbfuck, took the open chair next to Noah. He now sat a comfortable distance from our Princess, who just eyed him with a look that said he’d better impress her with whatever he’d come to say.

“Right, well,” he said, swallowing nervously, all that idiotic bravado from earlier vanished.

“As you all are aware, my family has kept a very loose affiliation with Ferrero, but we’ve operated as independently as is possible in this City.

Obviously, the current state of… unrest within the Families is starting to become public knowledge, and we’re ready to break completely. ”

Interesting, and not unexpected. It wouldn’t be a huge loss for my mom because Montgomery hadn’t been that useful to Ferrero to begin with, but every little thing helped in this fight.

With a dubious look, I asked, “And what do your parents want in return for Knight’s support in this break from my mom? ”

He shrugged. “Honestly? To be left alone. They don’t want to be taken over by Knight or owned in any way, despite the potential… monetary incentives.”

Jolie stared at him in silence. I knew she gave zero fucks about Knight taking over a media company unless it would cause a direct and devastating hit to the Families, but I could see her mind whirling nonetheless.

“Knight isn’t interested in owning the whole City, Raif.

Tell your parents they’re clear to bail on Andrea, and we’ll back them.

But I suspect you have something else you’re offering for this alliance? ”

He nodded. “You want to wage war in the press? Every one of our media properties is available to you. Sit for an interview with my mom. Have the Heirs with you, and we’ll run it on every platform we’ve got.

The Saint Gabriel Star Today news and culture blog is the most trafficked website on the entire East Coast. My mom has ten million followers on social media.

We can help you tell the world anything you want about the Families. ”

I looked around the table at my brothers, my girl, and Mari—savvy in her own right in the City’s culture circles—and all of them looked as encouraged as I felt.

Given the new information we had about exactly what our parents had been trying to do when they murdered the Knights and the very real evidence Jolie now had her hands on in the form of her dad’s research, this actually had the potential to ruin the Families in the eyes of not just the City, but the entire world.

“Schedule it for tomorrow,” Jolie commanded, not fucking around now. “My people will be in touch.”

Then she stood up, effectively dismissing Raiford—that useful little weasel—and she grabbed her backpack, ready to work.

“Let’s go, team. We have a lot to do before tomorrow.”

I yanked at my collar for the twentieth time since I’d donned my suit earlier this morning.

“I hate playing Heir,” I griped to the room.

“You look sexy, Zach,” Jojo said from her spot in Montgomery Star Media’s hair-and-makeup chair. She dragged her eyes across all three of us where we stood, stiff and on high alert, along the wall of her dressing room. “You all do,” she added with a sultry smile.

“Seconded,” Max quipped from his spot on the opposite wall. Unlike Bennett, Noah, and me, who were all dressed in our finest suits, he got to be here in his tactical gear. “I do love me some rich pretty boys. Big Man fills out that Tom Ford so deliciously .”

Bennett sighed irritably, and Noah pouted next to me. “Does he really need to be back here, sweetheart? The three of us are packing, and I know you have your gun strapped to your thigh under that dress.”

She uncrossed and recrossed her legs, and my eyes darted like a heat-seeking missile to the sexy-as-fuck thigh holster she wore under her deep purple dress, her gun just visible through the slit in the fabric.

She tutted at us. “I know you guys are plenty deadly. Max is just here for a visible show of muscle. Get along, please.”

“You heard her, Nikko,” Max added with a shit-eating grin.

Noah sighed and banged the back of his head on the wall.

The quiet woman putting the finishing touches on Jojo’s makeup had been fastidiously ignoring all of us like a pro, and it was only her presence that had prevented me from booting Max out into the hall and bending my Princess over the dresser while I showed her other boyfriends how to make our girl scream.

A knock sounded at the door before a polite voice called, “Sound check in five minutes, please.”

The makeup artist released Jojo from her ministrations, and our gorgeous girl unfolded from her chair, smoothing her dress and standing tall on her designer heels. She grinned at us. “Let’s go ruin the Families, shall we?”

Bennett eyed her with that obsessed look of his before he shoved away from the wall, grasped her chin in his hand, and stole a raw, possessive kiss. “You look beautiful, Angel. Don’t hold back out there. ”

“Stop it, I’m swooning ,” Max crooned, and all four of us rolled our eyes at him.

We made our way into the quiet hallway and headed to the spacious, brightly lit studio where Montgomery Star Media conducted its interviews with City VIPs.

The Tier One company owned the bottom ten floors in a modern high-rise that sat along the river several blocks to the northeast of Knight Tower.

It was quiet today, with only a skeleton crew working on this Sunday for the hastily scheduled interview with the resurrected Knight Heir who was shaking up the City.

I laced my fingers through Jojo’s as we walked, and she hummed happily when I brought her wrist to my lips for a soft kiss. I whispered, “I love you, Princess. I’m so fucking proud of you.”

I was so taken in by that adorable blush that hit her cheeks—the one that only Bennett, Noah, and I could elicit from the stone-cold, badass bitch that was our girl—that I almost missed the weird fucking look the passing janitor had fixed on Jojo.

Just as he made a sudden, jerky move to grab something from the front of his cart of cleaning supplies, I moved.

“Get down!” I shouted, tackling Jojo to the ground just as the janitor ripped a pistol from the cart and fired.

The bullet hit the wall above our heads, and Max and Noah had both already pulled their own weapons and fired in the “janitor’s” direction. He dove behind his cart, wheeling it back down the hall toward the stairwell and shielding his body as he returned fire.

Max, the only one of us wearing a Kevlar vest and a helmet, ran after him. “Go! Get Jojo out of this hallway!”

“Fuck that, I’m going to kill that cowardly little bitch,” Jojo seethed as we rolled to our feet, keeping low.

“Princess, if this was a Family hit, there’ll be more coming,” I said, pushing her along the wall. “Spencer still has quality Enforcers at its disposal.”

“And this gutless bullshit reeks of my father,” Bennett spat as we ran for the studio.

“Incoming!” Max shouted, his heavy boots now pounding behind us. “Hargraves, help me out here.”