Page 48 of Blind Devotion (Letters of Ruin #1)

I couldn’t let her leave me. I wouldn’t.

Restlessness itched beneath my skin. I felt myself spiraling, losing control. The need to act, protect, and dominate drove me hard. I had to do something to manage the urges, which was why I was here, in Germany, dealing with this crap, instead of Erel or another one of my men.

I spun my pocketknife around and around on the end table next to the sofa chair I sat in. It was the only sound in the FinTech CEO’s home in Munich, other than his wife’s soft snoring from their bedroom down the hall.

A door shut downstairs, and I smacked my palm onto my knife handle to stop its rotation.

“Heidi,” my prey called out, followed by inane chatter in German.

Bottles clanked. Liquid gurgled, and ice clinked.

As predicted by the Endgame research files we kept, he made himself a drink and emptied it in one go.

The man was a creature of habit. It took him a while to realize his wife gave no answer.

“Heidi?”

I smirked as he headed upstairs just as anticipated. He repeated her name louder, cresting the last step to his upstairs lounge area.

“Shh, she’s sleeping,” I told him.

He froze. Even in the dark with nothing but moonlight to track his path, the widening of his eyes was comical.

“You.”

“Me.”

Two shadows blocked his retreat from behind—my team—but he hadn’t seen them yet. Two more waited in the hallway if needed. I flicked my pocketknife open to keep his attention. The blade gleamed in a ray of moonlight shining through the window wall.

“What have you done to my wife?”

“Nothing but slipping her a sleeping pill. She looked like she needed it after her latest bout of chemo.” His throat bobbed.

Good, I wanted him nervous. He’d be downright jittery if he realized my men drove her home after her session because this slimy fuck was too busy sticking it to his secretary.

“I imagine she’ll be out peacefully for hours.

It’ll let us finally finish our business. ”

Karl Bauer was a skinny man with a long, rectangular face and droopy eyes.

He looked like he probably had not seen the inside of a gym for decades.

Online and over the phone, he might have had the guts to defy me, but in person, he was just another overwrought, skittish businessman with very little holding him together.

He darted to his left to the console where he kept a particularly sharp letter opener. One of my men from down the hall stepped in front of the furniture piece, blocking his path. Karl veered about and flipped the nearest light switch on.

A smart move with the floor-to-ceiling windows if I hadn’t turned off the light breaker to this portion of the house. No lights, no cameras, no trace. No one to see what happened in this room.

I leaned my chin on my clasped hands. “Tonight, you’re going to sign your company over to me.”

The man nearest the console slammed a contract and pen in front of Bauer. He jumped like a flighty little mouse, and we hadn’t even done any damage yet.

Bauer sucked in a shaky breath. “Is this why Gaspard Barrot is dead? He refused to step back on what you believe is yours?”

“It is mine.”

I didn’t see the advantage in correcting him about Barrot. I quite enjoyed the fear quivering through each of his limbs. Barrot did mess with what was mine, but it had little to do with FinTech. From the pictures Thibault showed me, Barrot suffered greatly before his death weeks ago.

“It always amazes me how similar all you pompous self-righteous idiots are,” I said. “You never understand how the game works.”

“How’s that?” he asked hesitantly.

“You don’t fuck with me.” I rose from my seat and pocketed my knife. “Now, you want to sell your business. I want to buy your business.” My gloves squeaked as I flexed my fists. “But by all means, challenge me some more. I’m in the mood to spill some blood.”

By the time we made it back to the hotel, I was no less agitated.

This was supposed to have served as a tension release, but Bauer gave in easily, too easily.

Not a gram of fight in his weak frame. It was tedious.

I should have stayed home and thrown javelins and shot balls until my arms shook instead of traveling to Germany.

When Erel informed me this morning, after my argument with Persetta, that Bauer signed a letter of intent to sell FinTech to another third party for the second time in a month, I jumped at the chance to settle this once and for all.

I stared aimlessly at the lined-up bottles in gaudy lit-up displays behind the hotel bar, nursing a gin on the rocks. This day just needed to end.

A woman sat down on the stool beside me. I raised an eyebrow at her. Every other barstool stood empty.

“Do you always drink alone?” Her sultry timbre in English, accentuated by her German accent, did nothing for me. She leaned toward me, the off-the-shoulder straps of her fitted dress allowing a generous view of her cleavage. “Or is this your way of asking for company?”

“Not interested.”

“Oh, come on, handsome.” Her hand grazed my neck, trailing down my spine. “Buy me a drink.”

The shock and pain from her touch hit me full force. I twisted around and grabbed her wrist.

She hissed.

“Touch someone unwilling again, and I’ll cut it off.”

The fear in her dull brown eyes was immediate.

She snatched her hand back and scuttled away, her body trembling.

No fire, no push back. She was nothing like ma tigresse .

No one was. Tessa was that one-of-a-kind woman men spent their whole lives searching for.

I couldn’t let her slip through my fingers.

I sighed and gazed up at the pointless over-embellished crown molding and coffered ceilings.

Telling Tessa the truth about what happened between us was unavoidable.

She wasn’t going to drop it. If I continued to keep it from her, the wedge between us was going to grow and grow until it swallowed us whole.

The problem was that I had yet to find an immediate solution to keep her chained to me when she found out.

I hated not having a solution. Long-term, I hoped to have her tied more strongly to me before revealing anything.

A wedding ring on her finger. A baby in her belly.

Come to think of it, we needed to discuss her IUD.

I swallowed down the last of the gin, sucking air between my teeth from the burn. There was no world where I didn’t stay with her. If she left France, if she tried to leave me, I’d follow. Nothing came before her, not anymore. Not the Milieu, not the duty to family, not my pride.

I dropped money on the bar and left, cranking my neck from side to side, still reeling from that woman’s touch.

Stepping out of the elevator to my floor, I pulled my phone out and turned it on—we never left them on during missions—with the intention of calling Persetta, only to realize she had no phone.

She had never needed one. Either I was with her or she was with her bodyguards, whose numbers I had. I dialed Erel instead.

“About time.”

“It’s handled.”

“Tell me that means something different than it did with Persetta.”

“Funny guy.”

He chuckled. “At least this is finally settled and put to bed.”

“We’ll need to come back by Thursday to notarize the contract, but after that, the Milieu will have officially expanded into tech. Any problems at any of the docks?”

“None. Quiet day, even for the gangs. But catch this, Franc and his team identified several prominent Bratva members landing in Nice earlier this morning before boarding another flight.”

I froze in front of my door, keycard halfway out.

“Which Bratva?”

“Leontyev’s.”

Shit. I rolled my stiff shoulders and neck. Maybe this was exactly the fight I needed all along.

“Michel on duty at the house tonight?” I shoved the door open to my suite.

Leontyev hadn’t refused the money we returned when we voided the contract. There had also been little to no chatter against Endgame or me in the weeks since. However, this could have been Rurik’s plan all along. The man wasn’t known for his sanity, only his brutality.

“Yes, he’s already aware to stay vigilant. Persetta’s safe. I’m just pulling up to the property myself. I’ve mustered all the men here. If needed, our other two Endgame teams are on standby.”

It was going to be a bloodbath if Leontyev got within even ten meters of her.

I started packing up my few belongings. Normally, in a rush like this, I’d leave it behind for someone to pick up later, but if found by anyone other than my men, the number of knives stored within my carry-on would arouse too much suspicion.

“My mother? Alizé? What’s the detail on them?”

“Océane is at the guesthouse. Alizé took the helicopter to Lyon earlier today, soon after Franc flagged the Russians’ arrival, but she took four guards with her without protest. I doubt she’ll have a problem.”

“Lyon? What the hell does she have—”

Tessa’s audition. Tomorrow was the second of July. Shit, I forgot. Completely and utterly forgot. After all the favors I called in to get her that audition, just to have her smile, and give her another reason to stay in France. There was no way she was going to choose to miss it.

“Erel,” I said with renewed urgency. “Tessa’s not at the house.”

I zipped up my bag and exited the room.

“There’s nowhere else she could be. She didn’t make any requests for a car.”

“She’s with Alizé. Alizé took her to Lyon. Call her guards and locate my sister’s tracker.”

After Yannick’s and my kidnapping, my father mandated we always wear one in some way or another.

Mine was implanted into my hip. My mother’s was in her earrings.

My sister Maribelle’s, who lived in Chicago, was in a necklace.

Alizé’s was in her belly ring. Tessa’s was set into the engagement ring I had yet to give her.

“I’m headed to the airport now. Barring air traffic complications, my pilot should have me in Lyon within two hours. Mobilize the Endgame crews to Lyon and pull half my men there now. We move on Alizé’s position. There’s not a moment to lose.”

“It could all be a coincidence.”

“When have we ever believed in that? I can’t lose her, Erel. Not again.”

“I know. We’ll get to her.”

I never should have left her back there. I was supposed to be the one taking her to Lyon. Instead, I failed her. Again.