Page 86 of Close Protection

‘You okay?’ I check.

‘Hmm, aside from the pain it felt quite good actually.’

So, so sexy.

‘That hurt, you b—’

‘I suggest you do not finish that sentence, Ryan,’ I bite out.

She turns back to look at him. ‘What did you want from this house?’

He stays quiet for a moment so Daphne takes my knife and starts lightly tracing the tip down his leg. He still keeps quiet so she increases the pressure until she sees beads ofblood collecting. ‘What did you want?’ she repeats. Again he stays quiet, so she takes a rougher approach.

Moving to his arm, she runs the knife along it from shoulder to finger, slicing. Not so deep he’d bleed out, but deep enough to leave a scar.

Ryan howls. Literally howls, like a wolf. It’s actually quite disturbing.

‘What did you want?’ she repeats, raising her voice slightly.

‘The necklace,’ he spits. ‘I came to get the necklace.’

‘What are you talking about? I don’t have a necklace.’

‘The necklace with the locket. We know it has the formula inside but we don’t know where it is. We tore your house completely apart and still couldn’t find it so we concluded that you must have it.’

‘You tore my house apart for the necklace?’

‘Yeah, now can you please stop hurting me?’

‘No.’ She looks at me, then back to Ryan. ‘Why did they take all the staff and my father?’

‘As collateral. You were the missing piece of the puzzle but we knew we couldn’t get to you because of your guard dog over here.’ He tips his head in my direction.

‘What do you mean, I was the missing piece?’

‘Your dad cares about your staff, but not as much as he cares about you. Even when we threatened to hurt them hewouldn’t give up the location of the necklace, but if we had you and threatened to hurt you, he would.’

‘So did you come here looking for me or the necklace?’

‘Either or. Ideally, I’d get the necklace off you then leave but if you didn’t have it I’d take you instead and we’d threaten your dad by hurting you.’

‘But I don’t have the necklace, I don’t even know where it is.’

‘Well, that’s too bad, because George isn’t telling us the formula and if management does not have the formula in three days they’re gonna kill him and all your other house friends.’

Daphne rears back, dropping the knife to the table.

‘Where are they all being held?’ I jump in, trying to take some pressure off her.

‘I don’t know the current location. They were just about to move them when I was leaving.’

‘Who’s on the management board?’

‘I’m not one of the people who know their identity.’

‘If you got Daphne or the necklace, where would you bring them once you got back?’

‘Her house. There’s gonna be a team waiting for me in a few days to take her or the necklace.’