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Lesson In Forgiveness

Club Serenity: Book Two

Tabitha

Sandwiched between a mortally obese woman and a man who smelled like a skunk’s ass, Tabitha Fairfax was not a happy assassin. After a hellish time in Ireland, thanks to the Gardaí sniffing six paces behind her, all she’d wanted to do was kick back in her first class seat, have a glass of champagne to celebrate the rather spectacular kill she’d left behind in a room at The Merrion, and relax for a few hours.

Her cover—the identity she’d needed for that first class seat—had somehow been compromised, which meant she’d had to take a few extra days dodging the fucking police while securing a fresh passport and identification.

It wasn’t hard to figure out who was responsible for putting her in such an untenable position; her phone had blown up only a handful of hours after she snatched up a lucrative contract from a member of the Irish mafia.

Anarchy and Olivia.

Her brother’s wife and the woman she’d taken on as a pet project, so to speak.

Fairfaxes weren’t allowed pets. Anything small and furry was considered a waste of time, soft and frivolous, and a tool to be used as a training device.

Serial killers all started with murdering the cute stuff first, right?

That was one test she’d passed with flying colors. By the time Tabitha was six years old, she’d been beaten—physically and mentally—to the point where her emotions were already dead and buried.

The next test… well, she’d failed that one miserably.

Resisting the urge to slam her fist into her neighbor’s flowery midriff for taking up so much of her personal space, Tabitha drew in a calming breath—through her teeth so she didn’t have to inhale the sick scent of body odor—and tried not to imagine massacring the entire plane.

Sometimes, if she thought about doing something and zoned out enough, that something became horribly real.

Instead, she recalled the brief directive she’d seen posted on the dark web site she most often used to find her next hit. Nothing fancy, nothing particularly exciting, but taking it meant she could go home for a while.

Mitchell. E. Denver, CO. Two-fifty.

Two hundred and fifty thousand was a hefty sum for a simple hit, which roused her suspicions. The brief search she’d done on one Elias Mitchell didn’t come back with much; no social media presence, no overtly active social life. The guy was the right-hand man to some construction magnate, kept his head down and out of trouble, and was apparently just a nice, British citizen making a decent life for himself in the US.

She smelled a rat.

Sliding her eyes to the right, she glared at the odorous prick beside her, wondering if her thoughts were being influenced by the smell coming off him. Dead rat, she decided, rotting in his colon. She’d smelled corpses which were less offensive.

When he actually lifted his hip and farted, it was all she could do not to yank the ribbon from the ponytail she’d fashioned her stupid brown wig into, and wrap it around his neck. It would be most satisfying to pull it tight, listening to the choking sounds he made, watching his eyes bulge until the tiny blood vessels popped, seeing his face turn from red to purple to ashen gray.

Tabitha felt the itch begin beneath her skin, a warning sign she was becoming overwhelmed and overstimulated. She didn’t cope well with people touching her, breathing her air, invading her sense of self.

Dominic had done all that and more.

Fisting her hands, she forced herself to step away from reality, shutting down all but the most basic functions she required to keep breathing. Stepping away from the situation so the urge to kill every single living thing on the damn plane didn’t escalate.

It was going to be a long fucking flight from Dublin to Philadelphia.

She just hoped the bounce from Philly to Phoenix didn’t suck as hard.

*

Grit

“You want me to go to Denver.”

“Yes.”

“It’s fucking cold in Denver, Atticus.”

His boss smirked. “Think you’ve got a few more months before the snow hits, Grit. If you’re worried about maintaining your tan, I don’t think that’ll be an issue for a while.” He tapped his fingers on the desk. “I need my best guy on this.”

“Christophe’s your best guy,” Grit ground out.

Something flickered in the dark green eyes watching him, a shadow of concern. A whisper of pain. “Christophe’s head isn’t in the game. For the foreseeable future, he’s benched.”

Well, shit. It wasn’t a shock, really; after the original Alpha team had been slaughtered on a mission, Christophe had blamed himself, as though his presence there might have been his team’s saving grace.

Grit had watched the body cam footage several times, and it was obvious that no matter who’d gone into that house, no one was walking out again. His friend simply couldn’t understand that. “He’s getting help?”

“He’s refusing to admit anything’s wrong,” Atticus told him gravely. “Another reason why he isn’t suited to this assignment. This is a protection detail. I need someone who has his wits about him, a keen eye, and won’t hesitate to take down the threat.”

Grit cast his gaze over to the man sitting beside him. “Is she going to kill me?”

Pale, ice-blue eyes regarded him seriously. “I can’t say she won’t. Tabitha has her own moral code, personal and professional. We were taught not to let anything or anyone get in the way of completing a hit, but once she got out from beneath Dominic’s reign, I imagine she restructured some of what she learned simply to spite him.”

Fantastic. “She hasn’t made any contact at all with Archie or Sonic?”

“No. That tells me she’s traveling, likely on her way back to the States. Archie did some hacking, found the alias Tabitha was using in Ireland, and blacklisted her for flying. That was three days ago; I don’t know who her contacts are over there, but I guarantee she’ll have a new ID for coming home by now.” Jasper rubbed his thumb thoughtfully over his lip. “She might be slightly insane, but she isn’t stupid. Far from it. She’ll know who interfered.”

“Does that put Anarchy or Sonic in danger?”

“I doubt it. Tabitha loves them, as near as she can manage. Love isn’t something we were programmed to feel. We were stripped of any emotion that was counterproductive to the goal.”

“How lethal is she?”

Atticus and Jasper exchanged glances that were not reassuring. It was evident he wasn’t going up against some hardass female he’d be able to neutralize with a few bruises to show for it.

“If she’s of a mind to make things difficult, you’ll have the fight of your life on your hands,” Jasper told him honestly. “We weren’t just put through our paces with different fighting methods and styles; we were physically forced into mastering them. Hundreds of hours of practice, with weapons and without. Dominic expected us to be killing machines, and that’s what we became.”

“Well, not you,” Atticus murmured.

“Just because I don’t use that training doesn’t mean it’s not in here.” Thumping his fist against his chest, Jasper frowned. “Tabitha and my brothers were set on this track, and they’ve stayed on it of their volition. It’s all they know, which means Tabitha in particular is at the top of her field.”

“All right.” Pinching the bridge of his nose, Grit mulled that over. The assignment was pretty simple, all in all. Stop the insane assassin from murdering Elias Mitchell. “Does Elias and his family know he’s getting protection?”

“They’re aware.”

“Uh-huh. Cooperative aware or pain in my ass aware?”

Atticus grinned. “Possibly both. I assured them you’d be as unintrusive as the situation allowed. With any luck, this assignment will be over in a week, two tops. Tabitha’s reputation is for recon, then the strike. She doesn’t mess around.”

Now came the question he didn’t really want to ask. “Lethal force?”

Jasper grimaced, but it was Att who answered. “I trust you to make whatever decision you feel necessary, Grit. Tabitha is family, God help us, but you both have a job to do. I’m not going to dictate to you how to defend yourself if it comes down to that. This isn’t exactly a normal assignment.”

It would be if his friend’s sister wasn’t his adversary, he thought. Kill or be killed wasn’t a laughing matter. Hell, killing for the sake of it wasn’t his MO anyway, but he knew that there would be tough decisions ahead if he and Tabitha came to blows.

“Okay, then.” Inclining his head toward Atticus, he sighed. “What time’s my flight?”

“Hayley has all the details waiting for you at the desk. You fly at four.”

Grit checked his watch. Being prepared for immediate dispatch came in handy more often than not; his go-bag was in the bottom of his locker. “Anything else I need to know?”

“Just be careful.” Jasper looked him square in the eye. “Don’t turn your back on her.”

Rising, Grit nodded. “I’ll let you know when I’ve landed and made contact with Mitchell.”

“Any problems, or if you need backup, just say the word.” Atticus stood and shook his hand. “I’ll reiterate Jasper’s sentiments, Grit; be fucking careful.”

“Always, boss.” Snagging his Stetson off the back of his chair, Grit left the comfort of the office and headed straight to the locker room to collect his gear.

There was a nagging feeling in his gut warning him that this assignment might actually be the death of him.

*

Tabitha

Nighttime was her time.

After landing in Philadelphia and reluctantly catching the layover flight to Phoenix, Tabitha was too hyped up to even think about the contract. Hours of endless farting from the disgusting prick on one side, and the pneumatic snoring from the woman on the other, meant her temper was still dangerously frayed hours after they parted company.

She wanted a shower to wash the smell off her, although there was nothing to rinse it out of her nose, and her body insisted it was starving. Tiredness dogged her heels, a result of jetlag and the stress of this clusterfuck of a journey.

The first thing she actually did was hire an SUV and drive it to the nearest shooting range. For the safety of the general public, she needed a violent release before she attempted to mingle with another crowd.

The noise in her head wouldn’t be quiet, even with the ear protectors muffling the sharp crack, crack, crack of gunfire. The voices wouldn’t shut the fuck up despite the kick of the gun in her hand, the hard jolt running up her arm with each precise squeeze of the trigger.

Everything you are is a lure to your prey, Tabitha. Your looks, your voice, your eyes. This body…

A shudder ripped through her spine as the memory resurfaced. Skin shivering as though Dominic’s hands were stroking down her twelve-year-old arms, she clenched her jaw until her teeth ached, and pumped the trigger until the pretty Beretta 80X Cheetah was empty.

Your body is more than an incubator. I’ll teach you how to use your wiles to hook your target, blind them to the blade at their throat. Sex is not an expression of love, do you understand? It’s a weapon, nothing more.

Hands shaking in a way she hadn’t experienced in years, Tabitha fumbled to reload. She remembered all too well the lessons he’d taught her—Dominic and his wife hadn’t just taught her how to read, write, and do all the educational shit they insisted made a well-rounded killer. They’d gone beyond teaching her how to attack and defend through martial arts.

When her next volley of shots missed the heart of the target by a mile, she snarled and resisted the urge to throw the pistol instead.

This was all Anarchy’s fault, she thought viciously. If her interfering sister-in-law hadn’t stuck her nose in where it didn’t belong, she’d have flown home in first class where her personal space remained unviolated.

There wouldn’t be this itch under her skin, her boundaries would be intact, and she wouldn’t feel as though something vital had shifted under her feet.

In her mind, the fault needed to be fixed.

Immediately.

Returning to the weapons locker, Tabitha set the gun down on the counter, slapping her hand down on it when the muscular guy behind the safety glass tried to take it. Flashing him a smile that wavered at the edges, she flirtatiously swept a lock of faux hair behind her ear. “This is some gun.”

Brown on brown, about six-one, biceps like Christmas hams. There wasn’t much intelligence sparking in those dark eyes, which suited her just fine. “Boss likes his Berettas.”

“Mmm, a man of good taste.” Fuck, she hated acting like a simpering, no brained female. She traced a fingertip along the barrel. “He attached to this one?”

“Doubt it. Keeps his favorites stashed in the office safe.”

“I bet.” God spare her from witless fools. “Think he’d sell this one?”

The beefcake scratched his head. “Guess so. Gonna need ID and a background check.”

“Now that’s a shame. I’m only here until tomorrow.” Licking her lips suggestively, she hummed softly, then reached into the small travel bag crossed over her body. Pulling out a wad of cash, she placed it beside the gun. “Why don’t we say that this is a private sale? There’s fifteen hundred dollars here; a thousand to cover the cost of the gun, and five hundred for a guy who knows a good deal when it’s in front of him.”

“Well, I dunno if that’s legal.”

What the hell was this imbecile doing working in a shooting range? Sure, it was the night shift, but as slow as business was, it was still damned irresponsible to have someone like him watching over things.

“Arizona law states that a private sale doesn’t require a background check. Only a commercial firearms dealer needs one, and this isn’t a commercial dealership, right?” Trying to keep her sickly-sweet tone light and convincing, she batted her fake eyelashes at him.

Beefcake looked at the money, then at her. Shrugging his hefty shoulders as though he didn’t give a shit one way or the other, he slid the wad of cash under the glass. “You want ammo with that?”

Oh yes, she thought darkly. Yes, she really did. “If it’s not too much trouble.”

Ten minutes later, she tossed her bag—now stuffed with a handy box of ammunition—onto the passenger seat of the SUV, and shoved her shiny new Beretta into the glove box. Starting the engine, she let it idle for a few moments before strapping herself in, taking a deep breath to try and quell the unsettled feeling she couldn’t escape.

Muttering to herself, she scowled at her reflection in the rearview mirror. She swiped the wig off her head, throwing it into the backseat. The eyelashes were next; she’d have to wait to change back into her usual clothes.

The sooner she got rid of everything Irish out of her system, the better.

*

Clamping her hand over Anarchy’s mouth, Tabitha swiftly straddled her hips and grabbed the wildly flailing hands trying to reach for Jasper. “Do you know what I do to people who fuck with me, naughty girl? Do you have any fucking idea how much I want to hurt you right now?”

Three a.m. was an unsociable hour, but she preferred to strike in the dark. Days spent locked in a lightless prison, fighting the men Dominic sent in with night vision goggles, had honed her appreciation for the light while giving her an advantage for working in utter darkness.

Her brother’s security was, quite frankly, disgustingly lacking. To say both he and Anarchy worked for a security firm, Tabitha thought their inattention to their home system was a crime. She’d cracked it in under three minutes with ease.

After an hour of driving around the city, struggling with her demons, she’d finally decided she was calm enough to tackle the root of her issues. She’d kept her temper under wraps, simply because letting it loose meant speeding through the streets, drawing attention she really didn’t need.

But now, with that root squirming helplessly beneath her, her temper flared like the ass end of a rocket. It would be so easy to suffocate her friend. Snap her neck, strangle her, do all manner of nasty things to end Anarchy’s life.

Do it. She’s nothing to you, a pawn in a wicked game. Kill her and bring Jasper home. Kill her, and all your pain will go away. Not Dominic’s voice this time. There was only one other voice in her head, and it belonged to the woman she hated most. Didn’t I teach you how to kill the rabbit? It’s just that simple. She’s not your first; won’t be your last.

That was true. The number of dead on her soul was too many to count; it would only grow as time went on. The nature of the beast, and all that—her tutors hadn’t just created the monster inside her, they’d fed it with torture and praise, nurtured it until it consumed the innocent girl she’d been for a short few years, and given it free rein to be exactly what they intended.

A muffled voice against her palm broke her out of distorted thoughts.

“I am so fucking angry with you,” Tabitha hissed.

“Nowhere near to how angry I’m going to be if you don’t get off my wife, Tabitha.” Cold, clear, and alert, Jasper’s tone indicated he was deadly serious. “Your problem is with me, little sister. Not her.”

The lamp flashed on, blinding her for thirty long and vulnerable seconds. Her twisted emotions almost made her lose her focus and lunge for him, but her logical brain clicked back into place before she did more than tense.

There would be blood shed if she attacked him. On both sides; she wasn’t arrogant enough to believe that a life away from the one Dominic wanted for him had tamed him. Being a family man—a husband, a father—only made him more lethal.

No, her safest position was exactly here.

They both knew she could harm Anarchy before he moved, and because he was a slave to the emotion called love, he wasn’t about to risk his wife.

“My problem is with all of you! Ring, ring, ring,” she snapped. “Missed messages, missed phone calls. Blacklisting me from flying was a bad decision,” she growled, returning her attention to Anarchy. “Don’t ever do that again.”

“It wasn’t personal, Tabitha.”

“It’s personal to me,” she fired back. “I ended up in a goddamn cattle crush, flying coach. Coach, Jasper.” Her arms trembled, the itch intensifying. “I don’t like being touched. I don’t like people.” She released Anarchy’s mouth to drag her nails down her arms. “I can’t get them out from under my skin.”

“Stay still, Archie.” Jasper murmured, sitting up slowly. “Tabitha, they’re not under your skin. It’s Dominic, you know that. It’s part of the conditioning he put us through. Tolerating touch long enough to get the job done, no more. He numbed our emotions until they were dead so we couldn’t feel remorse or sympathy.”

Her lip curled with disdain. How the hell did he know what it felt like to be her? He’d escaped from the hellhole where they’d been raised. Not unscathed, but nowhere as damaged as the rest of them.

As far as she was aware, neither he nor their brothers had spent their twelfth birthday being taught how to use sex as a weapon. They hadn’t been held down and forced to use their training to extricate themselves from the situation.

They hadn’t failed repeatedly and faced the consequences of that failure.

No, Jasper had no idea what it felt like to be her.

If he had any inkling of how insane Dominic’s actions had driven her, Jasper would kill her here and now.

Maybe she’d welcome it.

“The man you’ve been hired to murder is a friend,” Anarchy said quietly. “He’s a good man, Tabitha. I promise, he’s done nothing wrong to warrant being targeted except be born to the wrong father. You understand that, right? Being punished for the sins of the father?”

“Be quiet.”

As usual, the little blonde didn’t listen. “He’s newlywed. He has a husband, and they have a Little. Callie’s been abused all her life, Tabitha. Her father beat her bloody with a belt every Sunday, driven by the hand of God, and then she trusted a Dom who betrayed her in the worst way. She doesn’t deserve to lose her Daddy, does she? She’s finally found happiness.”

The earnestness in that sweet voice was akin to nails on a chalkboard. Hurting her. What did she care for someone else’s happiness when she couldn’t find her own? The only joy she ever seemed to find was that brief moment when she claimed a life, taking one more bad guy down.

“They’re trying for a baby,” Anarchy continued. “The three of them want to make a family. You saw what losing Wyatt did to Liam and Sierra, Tabitha. That was Dominic’s doing. Do you really want to follow in his footsteps and bring another innocent family to its knees?”

With a cry that was part rage, part loathing, and a whole lot of pain, Tabitha scrambled off the bed, yanking at her hair. She began to pace, feeling trapped on all sides.

“Archie, go check on the kids.”

“But—”

“Now, kitten.”

Tabitha made no move to stop the woman as she darted past. This was a stupendously big mistake; she needed to get out of here before she made another one.

Jasper walked around to sit on the edge of the bed, only a pair of boxers concealing his modesty. Dangling his hands between his open thighs, he stared at her with the same eyes she saw every time she looked in a mirror. “We’ve never talked about what Dominic and Rita did to you, Tabitha. Have you told anyone?”

“What is there to talk about?” she demanded. “I completed my training to their specifications. There’s no going back. I am what I am. What they made me.”

He grunted. “For a long time, I believed that too.”

Don’t listen to him. He betrayed us, abandoned his family. Abandoned you. Did he come back for you, for your brothers? What he did brought ruination upon us all.

“Archie did some digging into their records. Hardly any females are documented as successful trainees. The majority of the girls bred by Dominic were either sold to clients when they failed a test, or murdered and buried. There are two exceptions we’ve found—Caera, and you.”

Some of the turmoil inside her eased at the mention of their youngest sister. She remembered the scene in Rita’s lab, far beneath the ground in Montana. Caera was everything Tabitha was not, yet she’d snapped and ripped the bitch to pieces when her unborn child was threatened.

“She failed the rabbit test. Too sweet, too innocent, too caring. Rita wanted to give her to the boys in training, let them have their fun until… well, until.” Jasper sighed heavily. “If Darius hadn’t thrown off the shackles of their control, Caera would be buried in an unmarked grave somewhere. She wouldn’t be loved by a man who worships her, or have the children she fought so hard to protect.”

“I know the story.”

“Of course, you do.” He regarded her patiently. “Did you know Rita drugged me when I was barely in my teens? Gave me some experimental shit that turned me into a walking erection. Dominic set me on the housekeeper’s daughter, intending to further his breeding program. I raped that girl, Tabitha. It haunts me every day I’m alive. That sin above all others will follow me to the grave.”

She flinched before she could stop herself. “Seems to me, Dominic… violated you both.” There was no way she could say the word. “He just used you as a tool.”

“He did. That doesn’t absolve me of the guilt.”

“I don’t feel guilt. I don’t know what remorse feels like. I don’t feel, Jasper.”

“How old were you when he raped you?”

The knife was out of her boot and against his throat before she realized what she was doing. The instinct to protect herself, to keep that poor, tortured child safe from any further harm, rose above all else. “You know nothing.”

If he sneezed, if he so much as swallowed too hard, the keen edge of her blade would cut his flesh. There was nothing but calmness in his eyes, an empathy that did something to the ice around her heart. “Archie found their notes, little one.”

It was tempting, so tempting, to press the blade deeper. Silence the threat to her secrets. Pacify the voices in her head for just a little while.

Stepping back, she let her arm fall to her side. As Dominic’s voice heckled her for being a coward, she returned the knife to her boot, backing toward the door.

“Don’t run, Tabitha. Stay, sleep in the guestroom.” He rose slowly, hands open and unthreatening. “You need to be around family. Whatever’s going on with you, this… you’re not yourself. We can help.”

“Help me by staying out of my business,” she snarled.

“Elias doesn’t deserve the kind of justice you give out,” Jasper told her. “You can be something different to what they made you. Killing bad guys is one thing, but taking the life of a man who’s done nothing wrong will just eat at you.”

“I’ve killed my fair share of both,” she retorted, then turned and fled into the darkness of the house with Dominic’s laugh taunting her with every step.

She bolted down the stairs, her boots hitting the treads with heavy steps. Her feet tangled together halfway down, almost sending her tumbling to the bottom. Quick reflexes were the only thing that saved her, working on autopilot, shooting her hand out to snag the banister and break her fall.

Breath heaving, her chest constricted with pressure she wasn’t familiar with, she clung to the wooden rail for a long moment.

“Tabitha?” Archie called out quietly from above her.

No, no, no. More carefully, Tabitha took off again, reaching the lower level without a mishap, pounding down the hallway to the kitchen, and the back door where she’d gained entry. Yanking the door open, she escaped onto the porch, leaping down the steps into the backyard, then sprinting for all she was worth into the murky darkness.

She didn’t stop until she’d run the entire two blocks to where she’d parked the SUV. Dominic’s voice dogged her the entire way, berating her the way he had when she was a child.

Breathless, her heart pumping to the beat of the panic filling her bloodstream, she unlocked her ride and threw herself in, beating her forehead against the steering wheel until she finally felt something other than the horrible sensation of claustrophobic despair.

Where was all the fucking air in Phoenix?

What the hell was happening to her?

One deviation in her plans had never affected her like this. She’d mastered the art of improvisation before she hit her teens, bouncing from one scenario into another when things went wrong. Panic wasn’t an emotion she was designed to feel. Fear, apprehension, terror… they were all supposed to be beneath her.

And yet… here she was, fighting with her body for a single, easy breath while her body reacted as though death was knocking at the door—which was utterly ridiculous, because she was death and she didn’t fucking knock.

As her thoughts began to stop spinning, Tabitha managed to pull in half a quiet breath. One, two, three, until her lungs expanded with a deep draw of air that made her head spin.

There, that was better.

Now she could think, could plan. There was nothing to be afraid of; the world was afraid of her, for God’s sake. She was the thief in the night, the beast in the darkened alley, the monster under the goddamn bed.

Staying here and talking to her brother was a fool’s mission. She knew what he wanted now, and returning to that house would result in capture. No way in hell was she getting on another plane so soon after this latest disaster, which left only one option to get to Denver.

Hell, maybe the drive would give her the time and space she needed to get herself back in the game.

“Elias doesn’t deserve the kind of justice you give out.”

Jasper’s words circled lazily in her head as she straightened, blew out a hard, cleansing breath, and started the engine. He’d meant them, she understood that, but her brother wasn’t used to dealing with the underhanded dregs of society any more. He and Atticus went after the big fish, the sharks causing currents in worldwide waters.

When it came to Elias Mitchell, she would be his judge, jury, and executioner.

*

Grit

Jasper’s sister was a pain in his ass already, and she hadn’t even made a damn move yet.

Almost a month after Jasper called to warn him that Tabitha was back in the States and likely heading for Denver, Grit still hadn’t seen so much as a white-blonde hair in the vicinity of either Elias’s hotel or the construction site.

Indeed, it seemed as though the woman was AWOL.

Though the contract between her and the Irish was still active, it obviously hadn’t been completed, yet Tabitha was totally off the radar.

Anarchy and Olivia’s time was being diverted solely to this project. They were scouring every available resource to find her aliases and track them—without success. There were no credit card or handy paper trails to follow.

The girls had been relentless in their search, going as far as hacking into Sky Harbor airport’ security cameras, tracking and identifying each individual that disembarked in Phoenix on the day Tabitha paid her brother a visit.

They’d struck gold on day six of that particular hunt, positively IDing the elusive woman despite her drastic change in appearance as she bulled her way off a layover flight from Philadelphia.

From there, they’d traced her steps through the airport to the car rental desk, then hacked into that system to match Tabitha’s false ID to a vehicle.

Black SUV, tinted windows.

So original, Grit thought with an eye roll.

Anarchy had first tracked the vehicle to a shooting range downtown, discovering that her sister-in-law had bought a new, shiny accessory—a Beretta 80X Cheetah—before the GPS system logged the SUV as being parked for a considerable amount of time just two blocks west of Jasper’s home.

Just before four a.m., it was on the move again, heading south for a brief time before it stopped… and the clever lunatic disabled the GPS tracker.

After that, Tabitha was in the wind; both she and the SUV disappeared into thin air despite an intense combing of the area with multiple CCTV cameras.

“How bored are you right now?”

Grit slid his eyes toward the fancy British accent, lifting his eyebrow. “Actually, I find all this quite fascinating. A month ago, I didn’t know what the hell half of these things were supposed to be; now, they’re actual buildings. Habitable buildings,” he added, gesturing to the cluster of completed cabins across the site. “Well ahead of schedule now, aren’t you?”

Blue eyes shadowed beneath the brim of his hard hat, Elias smiled. He was a tall man, although his husband was taller still, and he wore dominance like a comfortable jacket. “We’re progressing faster than anticipated, yes. The crews are pulling out all the stops.”

It was much like Atticus’s team, Grit supposed. Pay them well, take care of them, and in return, the loyalty and commitment was given back tenfold. In this case, building a centerpiece for Evander Ledston’s multimillion-dollar enterprise.

Casting his gaze over the site as though amazed by the work going on, Grit assessed each and every worker in the vicinity. While Ledston’s crews were mainly comprised of men, there were at least three women Grit had seen, hauling timber, hammering and sawing with their counterparts.

“How many women do you employ for this kind of work?”

Elias’s expression turned thoughtful. “Throughout the company or just amongst these crews here?”

“Here.”

“Five.”

“Any new hires recently?”

“No. We had one transfer in from Dallas a few weeks ago, though.”

Suspicion reared its ugly head. “How many weeks ago, exactly?”

“She arrived a couple of days after you. She’s been with the Dallas crew for…” Elias tapped away on his ever-present iPad, bringing up the employee files. “Six months. No complaints from the site supervisor there, and none from our guys here. Arrives on time, works hard, has a drink with the crew after work. Nothing out of the ordinary.”

“She bunking with anyone?”

“I wouldn’t know. Crew housing is for the crew, Grit. We don’t interfere unless there’s a problem. We hire adults, not children.”

“Stay away from her until I do some verification. I mean it, Elias,” Grit said darkly, pulling out his phone. “Tabitha hasn’t even sniffed in your direction that we can find; why sniff when she can have eyes on you all day, every day, with us none the wiser?”

“Hell. All right, I’ll stay away.”

“In fact,” Grit decided as his gut started to quiver in the way it did when it was right, “stay right here next to me.” He called Archie, mowing over her cheery hello without preamble. “I need a background check on one,” he reached out and tilted the iPad in Eli’s hand toward him, scanning the file, “Roberta Ingles.”

“Coming right up,” Anarchy sang. “Roberta Ingles… Let’s see now. Thirty-six year old female, single, home address listed in Dallas, Texas. Employee of Ledston Construction as of November last year, again based in Dallas. Looks like she’s a bricklayer by trade.”

Grit stared at Elias. “Is she laying bricks, Elias?”

Awareness flashed in his eyes, hot and wildly blue. “Carpentry.”

“I need a physical description, Archie.”

“I’ll do one better,” she hummed. “I’m sending the photo from her employee file to your phone now.”

Switching the call to speakerphone, Grit pulled up the photo as soon as it arrived, comparing it to the one on Elias’s file. A slow, predatory grin curved his mouth. “Got you, sneaky little witch.”

“Tabitha’s there in Denver?” Relief filled Anarchy’s voice.

“Tabitha’s here on the construction site,” Grit corrected, studying the two pictures.

The real Roberta was full-faced, with pale green eyes and short-cut dark hair. A tattoo of some kind of tree or flower ran up her neck, jawline, and disappeared into her hairline.

Fake Roberta was almost pixie-like. Big, lavender-blue eyes that had to be contact lenses. Curly auburn hair pulled into a braid over her shoulder, a few wisps of those curls dangling over her forehead. Not a drop of ink on pale skin.

If he mentally replaced red hair with blonde, those lavender eyes with Jasper’s icy blue, Grit was certain he’d found their assassin hiding in plain sight.

“I need you to check all Ledston’s records, Archie. The file you have and the one Elias has are not the same. You know Tabitha personally; verify that my suspicions are correct.” He ran his thumb over his bottom lip. “Where is she now, Elias?”

Fingers flying over the screen, he clicked on a schedule. “Her crew is working on the medical play cabin today.”

“Jesus Christ,” Archie butted in. “Do not tell Jasper you’re building one of those.”

Snorting, Grit glanced over to the building in question, studying the manic buzz of activity. There was a distinct possibility he’d meet resistance from the crew if he tried to take her down there, but he wondered if she’d come quietly when faced with an audience.

Not likely, he decided. Killers didn’t care who got in the way, not if bystanders were blocking the route to a target, or escape.

“Go back to the office,” Grit ordered Elias in a hard tone, gesturing to the on-site portacabin. “Get inside, make sure Callie and Evander haven’t gone off somewhere, then lock the door. Don’t answer it for anyone except me. Is that clear?”

“Are the crews at risk?” he demanded.

“No. Tabitha isn’t like that anymore,” was Anarchy’s input.

She also hadn’t been put in a position where she was trapped with someone intent on taking her down, Grit thought sourly. Self-preservation was the instinct of all humankind, aside from the idiots who had none. “Don’t make promises you can’t keep, Anarchy. We’re treating her as an unknown quantity, which means I have to view her as a threat.”

“For God’s sake,” she huffed.

“Her own brother admits she’s a few cards short of a deck,” he pointed out.

“Managed to sneak in and hang around under your nose for a month though, didn’t she? If she didn’t have self-control or at least a few more cards in that deck, she’d have stood out instantly. Instead, she’s been doing what she does best without you being the wiser.”

Oh, he hated having his failures rubbed in his face. His shoulders squared, ready to take on the bratty hacker in a verbal sparring match.

“Now, now, children. Stop before someone says something that can’t be taken back,” Eli chided in a mocking tone. “Lunch is in ten minutes, Grit. All the crews will break and head over to the food truck. Joe’s made a note on her file that she doesn’t break with the rest of the crew, she just keeps working. Takes the extra half-hour on her paycheck instead.”

Well, that might work. In fact, that might work better than expected.

“Lock you and your family down,” Grit repeated. “Anarchy, I’ll keep you updated.”

“Yes, boss,” she snapped, ending the call.

“Why are you still standing here?” he asked Elias. “Inside, now.”

For a heartbeat, dominance rammed into dominance like two mountain goats locking horns. Prepared for a battle of wills as their eyes met, Grit wondered how the fuck Eli and Evander got through any given day without coming to blows.

It seemed today, however, common sense was one of the Brit’s finer skills; with a nod, he took a step back, hesitated, then said simply, “I’d appreciate it if you take care, Rory. I’d hate to see anything happen to you on my behalf.”

Grimacing at the use of his real name, Grit just inclined his head. “This is my job. I can handle it.” It being a pint-sized pot of crazy. “Thanks for your concern.”

The older man walked away, heading directly for the portacabin. Keeping his eye on him, Grit monitored the flow of people around him, then breathed a sigh of relief when he disappeared inside the office. Casually, he wandered toward the medical play building, admiring the rustic theme.

Evidently, Evander was choosing to stick with the log cabin design throughout the site. To an outsider, even from an aerial view, the entire site would appear to be nothing more than a collection of vacation lodges.

They weren’t skimping on windows, he mused, in quantity or size. Making the most of natural daylight, protected by privacy tints.

Not for the first time since his arrival, Grit found himself being envious of the future Doms who’d get to play here. There was a special kind of peace in this valley he couldn’t find in Phoenix. Despite the fact he was on edge all the damn time because of Tabitha, he believed Serenity was going to live up to its name.

A whistle blew from across the site, sharp and shrill. The symphony of sawing, hammering, singing, chattering trailed off in stages as the crews set down their tools and headed over to the food truck. Music from the radios continued to play, and inside the med-play cabin, a lone hammer marched on to its own beat.

Standing to one side, Grit waited for a minute as two men hurried out after the rest of their crew, swiping off their safety gear. His phone dinged with a text.

Positive ID confirmed.

Game on, he thought with delight. Returning his phone to his pocket, he reached into the small of his back and tugged his gun from the waistband of his jeans. Double-checking the safety and the load, he tucked it back in its hiding spot.

“Here I come,” he muttered. “Ready or not.”

Strolling up the steps, he made his way into the building, every instinct on alert. He stepped around coils of electrical cable, following the tap-tap-tap of the hammer.

Most of the walls were bare, their innards on full display while the electrical crew wired in sockets and lights. The floors were boarded; his boots clomped lightly on the wood as he passed a couple of big, airy rooms in the same state of progress as the hallway.

The tapping grew louder, each set followed by a slight pause.

She was armed, he reminded himself as he approached the last room. A hammer was no match for a gun, but still, she was in possession of a lethal weapon.

In the doorway, he stopped, leaning against the jamb with one hand, and tucking the other into his front pocket in an attempt to appear non-threatening. “Boss asked me to see if you’re okay.”

The woman, not ten feet away from him, didn’t even flinch in surprise at the sound of his voice. She was slim, her figure showcased in a pair of black jeans and a gray tank top. A line of sweat darkened the material along her spine, disappearing beneath the toolbelt strapped around her waist. Those red curls were pristinely captured in a braid. “Boss knows I work through lunch.”

Well, at least she had the accent down, Grit thought. That slow Texan drawl was perfection. “Don’t think he likes the fact you do. In this heat, you need a break. Refuel, rehydrate.”

She finished hammering in the last nail on a piece of plasterboard, then twirled the hammer and shot the shaft home through a metal ring on the belt. With a heavy sigh, she turned around, a sly smile curving her lips.

“Let’s cut the bullshit. Took you long enough to catch my scent, big boy. Rory McCabe,” she said in a sing-song voice, losing the accent between one word and the next. “One of Mountain Daddy’s best mercenaries. So good, in fact, that he sent you here all on your lonesome to take on little old me.”

She’d gotten the jump on him, he realized. While he’d been spinning in circles, watching Elias’s back from all angles, Tabitha was way ahead of him.

“Thought you’d catch on a lot faster,” she continued with a pensive hum. “Guess you must really like the pizza here, huh?”

His expression darkened. “You’ve been watching me.”

“Watching you watching me,” she answered cheerfully, leaning against the wall. “Watching you guarding poor, doomed Elias Mitchell.”

“It’s a bad contract, Tabitha.”

“So I’ve been told. Did you know that an assassin doesn’t stay on this career path long if she starts breaking contracts? It’s kind of career suicide. No one hires her if she backs out at the last minute; not without exceptional reason.” She locked stares with him, those fake lavender eyes unable to conceal what she was beneath. “Can you give me an exceptional reason not to carve up Mitchell’s throat like a Halloween pumpkin?”

Grit tensed, his muscles aching to charge. “Elias doesn’t deserve it.”

“He doesn’t deserve it,” she mimicked, a spark of anger rising to the surface. Lifting a hand to her hair, she tugged the wig off and let it drop to the floor. “Do you know how many people I’ve killed who haven’t deserved it?” She popped out one of the contacts next. “Do you have any idea the amount of people there are in this world who have bad shit happen to them that they don’t deserve?”

There was no mistaking the family resemblance now, he thought, transfixed by the shock of white-blonde hair. When she removed the second contact lens and fixed those ice-blue eyes on him again, it was too much like holding her sadistic brother’s gaze. “Too many.”

“Indeed. I took the mob contract; I’ll be the judge of whether Mitchell deserves to die.”

It was said so simply, he almost didn’t have a response. Shaking his head, Grit took a step forward, noting how her hand slipped down to the hammer. “I have orders to bring you in, Tabitha. Take you back to Phoenix.”

A wicked glint flashed in her eyes as she wagged her finger at him. “Oh, don’t spoil things by lying to me. I can’t abide liars; I like to take their tongues as souvenirs.”

“Jasper—”

“Big brother isn’t here. We both know your orders are to take me down if I try and kill Mitchell. Not that you could,” she mused aloud, “although your attempt would shake up the monotony of my day. I do like the sound bones make when they snap.”

Okay, it was apparent Jasper wasn’t fully aware of how insane his sister truly was, Grit decided. J’s brand of sadism and his sister’s were two completely different beasts. “End the contract and I let you walk out of here, Tabitha. That’s the only deal you’re going to get.”

Her head tipped to the side, her smile adorable. “Aw, do you think I’m going to negotiate for my freedom, big boy? That’s cute, really.” Her fingertips stroked the metal head of the hammer. “Sure you want to play it this way? Your way or no way at all?”

He really didn’t want to have to shoot her. Dominant instincts screamed at him to protect the female, while the logical side of his brain warned him she was a danger. Conflicting interests were never a good thing. “I’ll do whatever I have to; Elias is under my guard, Tabitha. You go through me to get to him.”

Eyes bright, she pushed away from the wall and pranced lightly over to him on the toes of her heavy boots. She held her hands up, palms facing him, until she stood less than a foot away. “That’s acceptable.”

“I don’t want to hurt you.” It was true; the top of her head barely reached his shoulder. Her arms were well muscled, but his fingers would wrap around her narrow wrist with room to spare. Somehow, he got the impression she wasn’t as robustly healthy as she’d been.

“Life is pain,” she chirped. “Pain is life. It’s a full circle.”

“Does it have to be?”

“It’s life,” she replied easily, shrugging her shoulders. “It is what it is.”

He’d read once that someone who used that phrase was a dangerous individual, because they’d had the worst that life could throw at them and learned how to accept it. Nothing fazed them anymore, which summed up the blonde pixie pretty damn accurately.

“These are your options as I see them,” she informed him, staring straight up into his eyes. Not a trace of fear or bullshit in hers, just crystal-clear confidence and a little bit of madness. “One: you step aside, let me pass, and we both go about our day. Two: you try and stop me from leaving, and we both end up in considerable pain for the foreseeable future. Three: you pull that gun, attempt to capture me, and I kill you.”

“The contract—”

Annoyance gleamed. “If I decide to fulfil the contract, I’ll make it fast. That’s all I can promise.”

Resignation swamped him. This was where things boiled to a head—he couldn’t let her go, and she wasn’t willing to spare a life—which meant she was leaving him with no real options at all.

They stared at each other, balanced on a delicate precipice, each reading the situation exactly how it was, and neither making a move to strike.

Tabitha smiled slowly. “Always figured it was hard for a good man to hit a woman first; not that I know many good men. I was taught how to defend myself, and how to attack. I’ll make this easy for you.”

Pain erupted in his sternum, her small fist plowing into the weak spot between the two halves of his ribcage. It knocked him back a step; the next blow snapped his head back. She barely gave him time to absorb the hits before she took his legs out from under him.

The hard hat skittered across the floor.

“Don’t feel bad,” she told him, poking her lip out in a sympathetic pout. “That wasn’t even close to beating my personal record for a takedown.”

Refusing to groan, Grit laid on his back for a full ten seconds. Obviously, he’d underestimated how strong she was for her size; that wouldn’t happen again.

“Bye-bye.”

As she stepped past him, he lashed out and curled his fingers around her calf, just above the boot. Catching her mid-stride, he yanked, rolling and banding his arm around her leg. A quick twist and he brought her down to her knees, lunging forward using the breadth of his chest like a battering ram and weight press in one.

Forcing her cheek to the unfinished floorboards, he locked her head down with a forearm over her slender neck, pinning her down with his superior bulk. “Bad girl.”

She growled. Actually fucking growled at him like a rabid tiger cub.

“Stay still,” he ordered, a touch of his Dom voice coming into play.

Of course, crazy didn’t respond well to orders—or her brand of it, at the very least. Laughing like a demented hyena, the slight form beneath him began to hump and squirm, doing things to his libido he had no control over.

He was, after all, a man who loved women. Their scent, their softness, their willingness to submit. Really, it was no surprise that his body responded… favorably to the stimulation of her ass on his cock—but her reaction certainly came as a shock.

Tabitha froze, her breathing stuttering in panicked bursts. Little hands curling into fists, she made a noise that might have been a whimper.

“Easy, Tabitha. Easy, little tiger,” he murmured, his protective instincts surging to the fore. Never would he have imagined—

The thought cut off abruptly as his words triggered an explosion. She didn’t scream—the sound was too low and fraught. She coiled beneath him, then bucked, ramming her elbow repeatedly into his side.

The fear he sensed in her evaporated, replaced with an unholy fury capable of singeing his goddamn eyebrows off. He was fond of them, so he doubled his efforts to keep the furious wildcat beneath him.

Disbelief ricocheted through him as she bucked again, kicking her legs toward his ass. The chunky heel of one boot smacked against the back of his thigh; the other skimmed up the inside of his legs, grazing his balls with enough pressure to make him flinch.

Apparently, that was all she needed.

Swinging her arm around, Tabitha rammed her fist into his side; awkwardly, but sufficiently angled to strike the soft spot between his ribcage and hip. Her knuckles jammed under his lowest rib, forcing him to twist to evade the sharp pain, and then… somehow, she was free.

“The fuck?” he muttered.

The little tiger was furious, he thought belatedly as her boot connected with his midsection. Goddamn it if she hadn’t donkey-kicked him as she squirmed away.

Wheezing slightly, Grit attempted a second grab for her leg, but anger seemed to make her faster, and a hell of a lot meaner. She landed on his back, her knees jammed into the joints where his arms attached to his shoulders.

Swearing a blue streak, he tried to push up, only to find she was using her full weight to prevent it. She couldn’t be more than one hundred pounds, maybe one-twenty at most, but she knew how to use it to her advantage.

Small hands ran through his hair as though testing the softness before she fisted them on either side of his head and used them to bang his face into the floor. “Bad man. Bad, dirty man! Don’t like it. Dirty, dirty, dirty!”

Jesus Christ, where was an insane asylum when he needed one? He hissed between his teeth as his nose made repeated, painful contact with the wood. With a grunt of exertion, he managed to draw his elbows into his sides, lifting himself up like he was simply doing a complicated rep of push-ups.

The tiny assassin on his back—perfectly capable of slitting his throat—smacked him on the top of his head, then slid her arm beneath his throat and caught him in an effective chokehold.

Oh hell, no. There wasn’t a cat in hell’s chance he was getting choked out by a skinny little lunatic; Atticus and the rest of the damn team would die laughing, and he’d never be allowed on a solo mission again.

Her arm tightened, putting pressure on his windpipe. Curling his fingers around the limb, he gave serious thought to snapping the bone beneath skin and muscle.

Luckily, he wasn’t feeling vindicative, even though his nose felt like it was one of those squishy stress balls. “Enough with the games, tiger. Let go.”

“Dirty,” was her emphatic reply.

Spots began to dance at the edge of his vision, his sight wavering. Damn her to hell and back, she was going to force his hand, wasn’t she? The crazy in her wasn’t listening to anything, let alone reason.

If she wanted dirty, he’d give her… he lost that train of thought as oxygen leeched from his brain. Grunting with the effort to stay conscious, he opted for the one last hope in his grasp; he pitched himself onto his back, insane gremlin and all.

He heard her breath erupt in a noisy exhale, felt the waft of it ruffle his hair—which was oddly sensitive. The death grip around his neck loosened as he heard her head thunk against the floorboards; he sucked in air like a drowning man.

Now was the time to get up, pin the psychotic female to the floor, and knock her the fuck out before she did any further damage to his person, or someone else. If he borrowed one of the company trucks, he could stuff her in the back seat, transport her to the airport, and in under two hours, her insane ass would be safely in Jasper’s custody.

Hell, Evander might even let him commandeer the private jet to get rid of her.

That was his plan, until Tabitha laughed delightedly, squirming from under him, and bent over to kiss his forehead with a loud mwah! “This was fun. We’ll have to do this again if you can catch me.”

Oh no. No, no, no.

Ignoring the burning in his lungs, the weakness in his extremities, Grit gained his feet as Tabitha tapped her fingers to her temple in a cocky salute. He charged, knowing damn well she was going to win this fucking round by a mile.

She sidestepped, gave him a kick up the ass that propelled him forward, then tsked. “Better up your game, big boy. You’re playing in my league now… and you’re lacking some very important skills.”

His hands slammed against the section of wall his prey had skillfully completed, catching himself before he slammed face-first into it. Muttering a stream of curses—both at himself and at the bane of his present existence—he spun around.

Tabitha was gone.

Atticus and Jasper were going to string him up by the balls for this, he thought, stampeding toward the door. He doubted they’d be impressed he’d retrieved her wig and used contact lenses after having his ass handed to him.

When he burst out into the yard, the music was still blaring, the crews were just starting to filter back to work, and there was no white-blonde pixie in sight.

Goddamn it all to hell, he was screwed.