Total pages in book: 60
Estimated words: 58532 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 293(@200wpm)___ 234(@250wpm)___ 195(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 58532 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 293(@200wpm)___ 234(@250wpm)___ 195(@300wpm)
Footsteps approach before we’ve taken ten steps, and both Cal and I sneak into a utility closet. The footsteps pass us by, two men laughing and chatting about something innocuous, and then they disappear out the same door we entered.
“We’re clear,” Cal says, and we head out of the utility closet and finish walking the rest of the way down the corridor.
But just as we round the corner, heading for the staff elevator, we come face-to-face with a man dressed in all black. He’s looking down at his phone but still walking toward us.
“Vamp,” Cal whispers.
“Gofer,” I add.
Being raised in a world where we’re constantly surrounded by the elites’ fucking gofers, it’s really easy to spot them in the wild. We’ve been to school with these fucks. Played hockey against them in our Concordia rec league.
He looks up from his phone, and his gaze meets mine for a brief, shocked moment before he looks at Cal.
“Slater brothers,” he spits, and I feel his intention spike—gun, kill.
Of course he’s got a gun. The elites and their fucking gofers never play fair. Not in life. Not in battle. Not in love. Not in any-fucking-thing.
I move before he can draw. My hand closes around his throat, and by the time he reaches for the gun, Cal has already ripped it free from his holster and thrown it across the room.
Crack, I snap his neck with quick but brutal force.
His body goes limp in my hold, and I slowly lower him to the floor. Cal grabs his feet, and we scoot the dead bastard across the tile floor and discard him in a closet near the maintenance lift.
“Shit just got real,” Cal mutters as I tap the button for the elevator.
“Pretty sure shit got real the morning Rook kidnapped Kylie.”
Cal chuckles softly. “Yeah.”
The elevator doors slide open, and we step inside. Cal hits the number sixty on the wall, and the doors slide closed. The lift starts to move up the floors, and my brother studies me for a moment.
“You’re reading short-term intentions now,” he comments. “But, like, well before they act on them.”
“Yeah.” I shrug. “I guess I am.”
Before Blair, before the bond, I could read intentions, but it was more long-term, overall intention. Now, I’m starting to read short-term ones, even when they’re impulsive. And more than that, the intentions are becoming clearer. The bond is strengthening me.
The elevator continues its climb toward the sky.
Thirty floors.
Forty floors.
The fear spikes again as we pass the fiftieth floor, but it’s not my fear. It’s hers. And the closer I get to her, the more I can feel her. The more I can sense her.
Fuck, I need to get to her!
My hands curl into fists as the cart comes to a stop on the sixtieth floor. The elevator dings softly, announcing our arrival to whoever is on the other side of the door, and both Cal and I brace ourselves for what’s to come.
The door slides open, and we both step out to find two guards—gofers again—standing in the private hallway outside the penthouse.
Both spot us, and the first dude’s intention, the one with the dark hair, hits me like lightning.
Kill.
I cross the distance before his hand can finish the path to his gun, snapping his head sideways with a sharp crack. He drops instantly.
The second dude barely manages to clear his weapon before Cal dives onto him, taking him to the floor and wrapping both of his hands around his neck until he strangles the life out of him.
Instantly, silence fills the hallway, and we keep moving, stepping over the bodies, and don’t stop until we reach the front door of Damien’s penthouse.
I attempt to open the door, but when Cal notices a card swipe above the lock, he jogs back to one of the dead guards, checking his pockets until he finds what we need.
A minute after that, we’re swiping the gofer’s keycard and entering Damien Snow’s penthouse. It’s fancy as fuck, and the entrance hallway is no doubt bigger than our living room at the cabin.
But just before we reach the end of the long foyer, Damien Snow steps into view. His eyes narrow when our gazes meet.
“Who the fuck are you?”
“We’re the men who killed your two gofers outside.”
“You have got to be fucking kidding me,” he hisses at me. “You’re those fucking Slater brother fucks, aren’t you?”
“Pretty sure no one’s joking, fucker.”
“Do you have any idea whose building you’re standing in?” He snarls. “Do you have any clue who you’re messing with right now? Do you have fucking sense at all? The Elite Council wants your heads on a silver platter.”
When Cal starts to react, starts to step forward, I put my hand on his chest. If anyone is killing this motherfucker, it’s me.
“They find out about this little preselection scheme you evidently have going with Holland, and they’re going to want your head too, dickhead. The only difference is that that’ll scare you. You cow to the Council. We spit in their faces. We don’t give a fuck. We’re here for her,” I say. “Let her fucking go.”