“And don’t,” she said, her voice dropping an octave, “Mistake my hospitality as forgiveness.”
It was then a shrill scream filled the air and Angel’s eyes snapped up.
Everyone around him jumped in surprise.
Everyone except Ray, who kept her eyes level on Nathan’s, so cold, so angry. When Angel looked over her shoulder and saw Nathan’s pale face, an odd sense of calmness spread through him.
This was familiar, he thought as everyone around them scrambled to find the origin of the voice. As Kyle’s gaze narrowed and he turned to look past them all. He and Luke took off immediately, Christina and Jake trailing behind them. He was vaguely aware of Jack asking him to come as well, but Angel didn’t move and Jack took off.
Someone screamed again, and Angel saw Nathan flinch back. Saw Ray’s shoulder roll once, before she turned away from him and started walking.
But he saw the look in Ray’s eyes as she stepped past him. Couldn’t help but smile a bit crazily as he turned to a deathly pale Nathan.
“You might die today, Nathan Kraft.” He whispered. Nathan flinched, so hard that he almost fell on his ass. But then Ray was pausing in her tracks and turning to him, her eyes unreadable as she dipped her chin. Just once.
Beckoning him.
“And no one’s coming to save you.” Angel grinned one last time in Nathan’s direction, his eyes gleaming dangerously.
And with her heels in his hand, he went to inspect the reason behind that scream.
Knew it was only the start of a new war.
9
This was bad, Angel thought grimly as he looked down at the body sprawled on the sand. The blood from the cut on her neck was still flowing, seeping into the brown sand under the moonlight. There was an odd silence in the air, an eerie sort of solitude that only surrounded them when one of them was found dead.
But this.
This wasn’t just a surprise.
It was a call for war.
Angel let out a shaken breath and turned to face Raylene Walker, whose face was so expressionless it seemed as though she’d been carved of stone. His interest, however, snagged on one particular woman standing at the head of the body. Those pale brown eyes were narrowed, her blonde hair messed like a madwoman’s as Maya Larsen stared down at the body of her sister.
At June Kincaid.
Angel had never seen such a murderous look in anyone’s eyes. Maya had been frozen in place for the past five minutes, her eyes so deadly and cold as she stared and stared. No one dared move. Not even Alessandro. Not anyone.
June’s throat was cut from one side, her eyes wide open in misery and that blonde hair of hers stained with her red blood. Her feet were twisted at an awkward angle, those hands spread across.
Angel wasn’t close, but he could still see the faint red bruises on her wrist as if someone had grabbed her roughly and had hauled her close to slash open her neck.
The cut was precise, right on the side of her neck – deep enough for her to have bled to death in about 15 seconds. Angel clenched his teeth as he looked at her, his mind running at the possibility of anyone here killing her. Everywhere he looked he saw doubt. Saw suspicion. Every person that matched his gaze could be the perpetrator. Could be the killer.
“Ah,” Maya’s dry, low voice snapped him out of his thoughts. Everyone flinched at the gravity in her tone. Those brown eyes of hers were staring down at her sister, but her voice was crystal clear as she spoke, “Did you know June was going to be our next partner?”
Her question allowed for an awkward murmuring of voices to rise in the air. June Kincaid? A woman none of them had seen before? The Krafts had lost their reputation after the Raven had tossed them out. They’d lost trust. Loyalty. Integrity. Everything.
So why June Kincaid?
That’s when Maya’s eyes rose. Angel had to stop himself from flinching in surprise as those dead eyes settled at some point between him and Ray. To each of their credits, none of them moved. But Maya wasn’t looking at them at all. Was looking through them at a coward standing back.
“June was going to replace Nathan Kraft.” She said, and understanding dawned upon him. Ray’s fingers brushed his faintly, and he took the message. Both he and she took a step back, away from each other to reveal a man who’d once bragged at their doorsteps. Now, however, Nathan Kraft looked as though a bomb had been dropped right in his hands.
Maya’s eyes weren’t glaring. But they didn’t really have to.
Nathan fell to his knees, his lips wobbling, and his hands pressed together as he whispered shakily, “I did not–”
