Page 1 of Reckless Knight (Knight's Ridge Empire 7)

TOBY

Name: Jodie Joanne Walker

Mother: Joanne Rachel Walker

Father: Unknown

The folder in my hand trembles as I read the words over like I have done a million times in the past couple of weeks.

While everyone else around me was focused on what intel Jonas Ariti might have leaked about the Family, how he might have put us all at risk, my eyes were firmly set on him. On the pain he’s caused behind closed doors.

On his own secrets.

Somehow, he’d managed to keep his son a secret from the Family all this time, and I was betting his existence was only the tip of the iceberg.

No one else knew the extent of the abuse we suffered, only the two of us who lived it. And even if they did, they still wouldn’t understand.

The parts I’ve told my friends, my sister, my real father, all just skirt around the edges of the torture Mum and I have suffered over the years.

And he needs to pay.

In the most painful way possible.

I’ve found the perfect person to make it happen.

It took a lot of digging, but eventually, Joker led me right to her front door.

Dropping the folder that contains every single piece of information our PI found for me about her life, I rub my hands down my thighs and stare up at her bedroom window.

Every morning without fail, her light turns on at 07:02. At exactly 07:15, the front door opens and she steps out. Dressed in leggings and an oversized hoodie with the hood up, she secures her headphones before pulling the door closed behind her and taking off down the street. Not once does she ever look up and show me her face. She runs for thirty minutes.

For the first couple of weeks, I sat here in the shadows watching, waiting, taking notes. But as the days passed, my need to see more only grew, and I quickly found myself pulling my own hood up and taking off after her.

Before the funeral, she didn’t spend much time at home, preferring to work or be with her cousin. But since that day, she only steps out of the house for her run, leaving me with her social media to try to discover more about the woman who allowed me to take so much from her on Friday night.

I might have had a folder detailing her life, but it didn’t tell me much about the person she really was. But the second she locked eyes with me across that bar for the first time, I knew. I felt it in a way I couldn’t when watching her from a distance.

And then, when she got up on the stage with Brianna, I knew she was going to fall right into my hands. Almost literally, when I finally made my move.

Pulling my phone from my pocket, I open my secure app and go through the facial recognition and passwords before pulling up the video.

Stretching my legs out, I push my fingers through my hair as the image of an empty room at Hades appears on the screen before me. But it won’t be empty for long.

There were so many things that could have gone wrong with my plans that night. Hell, I expected them all to crumble around me. It was pretty much the way my life was going. What was one more thing to batter my hope of ever getting back to normal again?

My blood heats the second the door opens and Jodie stumbles in with me close behind her.

The way her mouth falls open and her eyes widen at everything surrounding us makes my cock swell. I regretted not seeing that look on her face when it happened, but hell, this makes up for it.

Reaching down, I tug at my jeans, trying to find some more space for my dick. I fucking need it when she gets on her knees for me.

I might be able to replay every second of this video in my head from the number of times I’ve watched it over the past few days, but the effect it has on me never lessens. The effect she has on me never lessens. Just looking at her sates something inside me that’s been shredding me to pieces since the truth about the man I called my father all these years came to light.

She’s going to be the one to finally put the raging need for revenge burning within me to sleep. She’s the one who’s finally going to set me free from this endless fall into the abyss.

My fists curl on my thighs as she takes all of me. Allows me to use her for whatever I need.To take my hate out on her, to claim her. To make her mine in ways she’s never going to understand.

If only you fucking knew who I really was, Jodie.