Page 54 of Blind Devotion

“Enculé de sa mère. Merde!” Motherfucker. Shit. He dragged the last curse word out without actually yelling a single one.

My hand tapped about the roof for whatever the stranger dropped off. It was an envelope, slightly longer and wider than my hand. Inside were three pages, each glossy and thick. I couldn’t make out any of it.

“What are these?”

He snatched them from me, his exhales shaking in anger. Whatever they were seemed to have ramped up his fury. “Pictures.”

“Of what?”

“It doesn’t matter. Get in the car, Tessa.”

Considering his reaction, I highly doubted that. “I deserve to know.”

He chuckled harshly, mockingly. “Mais bon dieu, putain, quelle merde dans un bas de soie.” Fucking damn it, what a load of shit in a silk stocking.

“Adrien,” I said impatiently. I refused to be belittled in all this, not after what we just shared.

“Us. Photos of us in a moment that never should have happened.”

I ignored the hurt his words caused.

“All three? He must have just printed them.”

He was angry and upset. I was willing to look past that because it still felt like he was holding something back.

“Why give you these?”

“A reminder I didn’t finish the job and not to forget myself in a woman who has no place in my life.” His scorn burned. My eyes watered, but I faced him regardless.

“Don’t do this.”

“This one”—paper rustled and snapped firm in front of my face. I shut my eyes to avoid any glimpse of whatever it was—“means they know I failed. That tattoo on your ankle has been nothing but a pain in my ass.”

“Why would—”

“Just get in the car, Tessa. Now!”

I didn’t argue this time, too rattled and confused by his shift in attitude. I knew what he was saying. Someone, this Rurik Leontyev, knew Adrien or his team hadn’t finished the job, but I didn’t deserve to have it taken out on me. I wasn’t the one who refused to pull the goddamn trigger. I wasn’t the one who’d shoved me against a building and stuck his tongue down my throat. No, I was just the mistake about to give him an earful.

Except he didn’t slide in next to me in the backseat. The door thudded shut behind me. Seconds later, the driver’s door opened, and a blob I assumed was Adrien hunched over the shape of our driver. He huffed and grunted a bit, the driver disappearing from view, before Adrien settled into the seat and started the car.

“Where’s Jules?”

“He’s dead.”

That was the last thing he said to me before the divider buzzed up into place, cutting us off from each other. Of course, I didn’t realize that was what it was at first. I spoke to him like a ninnyand told him everything I thought of his attitude, cursed him for his silent treatment, and yelled at him for his lack of care. Only after more silence did I realize he couldn’t hear me.

I thumped my fists against the divider, cursing him out in three languages. He had to be able to hear that. Still, he didn’t react. I was fully spent by the time the car stopped outside of what I supposed was his mansion, my arms aching, my throat sore. Instead of facing me like a man, he was gone before I exited the car, leaving Marie to escort me back to my room with a hollowed ache in my chest.

He didn’t visit me that night or the next.

Chapter 20

Almost One Month Ago

TheDreqshovedmethrough the brightly lit passageway. We passed cabin door after cabin door. The lights and colors blended together, too bright, too loud. My head spun. I tried not to misstep. That would only make his anger worse. I’d heard he made it hurt more when in a rage. Why had I been so stupid to get caught?

Cigar smoke lingered among the cloying layers of different colognes and the reek of sex. It seemed to spill from the walls. Behind each door, grunts, cries, and sobbed shrieks filtered through atop the pounding of flesh. Harsh words were spoken in languages I couldn’t understand.