Page 20 of Reign of a Billionaire

He crawled, pulling his body forward to shut the door with trembling fingers. My lips curled in disgust at his cowardice. These men were brave when it came to helpless women, but put them at someone else’s mercy and they were crybabies.

Once he shut the door, his gaze shifted to me, considering me. I watched his fear slowly fade as he took all of me in. A petite young woman. I looked weak, but I wasn’t. I’d been to hell and back, and I’d never let anyone overpower me again.

I could see the decision cross his expression before he lunged at me. I anticipated the move, taking a step to the right. My knife slammed into his shoulder, and a bloodcurdling scream pierced the frigid air.

He face-planted into the dirt, and I grabbed a fistful of his hair, slicing my blade across his neck with more force than before. His blood spilled into the dirt, pooling around him in fits of gurgles.

Maybe I should feel something, but I didn’t. No remorse. No fear.Nothing.

I kicked his body and let him fall to the ground with a satisfying thud.

It was time to take care of the innocents.

Chapter 12

Kingston

Istared ahead, stunned at the gruesome murder.

It had been the last thing I expected to witness when I followed Liana from her hotel room. Was Sofia backstabbing Perez Cortes and using her daughter to make it happen? It was a plausible explanation, yet my instinct warned that wasn’t it.

Unless this was a spur-of-the-moment kill. No, it couldn’t be. Liana came prepared. She waited for Sofia and Perez to make themselves scarce before she attacked.

But thenwhat?

Liana Volkov puzzled me more by the day. When I walked past her in the restaurant, there was no recognition in her eyes. Yes, she seemed astonished, certainly a little curious, but it wasn’t in line with the way a person reacted when they saw someone they used to know. A boy assigned as her bodyguard for years.

Did she forget me? It seemed unlikely. I’d spent more time with her twin, but I’d known both sisters for years. It would be impossible for her to forget me, just as it was impossible for me to forget them.

I watched in silence, sticking to the shadows as Liana staggered upright, glancing around, then fixed her blonde locks with clean fingers. Her hand didn’t tremble. Her expression was eerily calm. It was clear she knew what she was doing.

The more I watched her, the more I wondered whetheranythingwas as it seemed. But I had no time to ponder it as she pulled out a cell phone, fingers flying across the screen. The moment the standardwhooshof a message leaving her inbox sounded, she tossed the phone across the yard. It skidded along the gravel until it fell over the side of the nearby dock and into the water with a splash.

She stared down at the corpses, grinning with satisfaction. A long-forgotten emotion pierced through me as sharp as a blade, her grin doing things to me I couldn’t make sense of. That dull ache in my thigh throbbed, almost like it was a sign to look closer.

What did all thismean? Was Liana a friend or a foe?

I watched the petite woman stand over the corpses, and I wondered if she was waiting for reinforcements. Or maybe she was reflecting on her sins.

I didn’t know. Liana’s body might have survived, but on the inside, she was just as dead as Lou.

The sound of the engines approaching shattered the cold silence, and with a lethal efficiency, Liana opened the container door, ensuring the women were in plain view before disappearing in the nick of time.

Two vehicles and a bus came to a stop. The door to the first black SUV opened and a familiar figure stepped out—Nico Morrelli. The second stopped and another door opened to reveal Áine and Cassio King.

It was a known fact in the underworld that Áine King had an ongoing operation of rescuing victims of human trafficking.Nico Morrelli, with his real estate spanning multiple continents, ensured the women were safe and rehabilitated.

Their eyes landed on the dozen sedated women huddled in the container, and they quickly got to work.

“Do we know who sent the message?” I heard Cassio ask.

Nico shook his head. “It was an untraceable line.”

Smart.

It would seem that Liana was very familiar with covert dealings.

If I’d learned anything from this display, it was that Liana Volkov had become a formidable enemy or reluctant ally.